Website owners have plenty of options when it comes to making money online. This guide breaks down the top 11 ways you can monetize a website.
Earning an income online seems extremely difficult and can certainly be a chore. But if you hit the right niche and have a smart marketing and monetization strategy, it’s a satisfying way to make a living. It’s also an opportunity for you to make money doing something you’re passionate about.
But if you’re not careful, you’ll invest a lot of time and money into an online business model that doesn’t work. So, before you even secure a domain name, you must design a solid plan to be profitable. And the first step you should take is to decide how you are going to make money.
You will find many different ways to earn money online. If you want to make money, these 11 methods are the best ways to do it.
11 ways to make money with your website:
- Advertising
- Affiliate Marketing
- Pay Per Click (PPC)
- Selling Products
- Selling Services
- Sponsored Posts
- Premium Content
- Email/Phone List Building
- Webinar Hosting
- Donations
- Sell Your Website
1. Advertising
Selling ad space is the traditional way to make money online, and while it has given way to more creative ways to monetize websites, it is still a common tactic for profit.
And you don’t necessarily need millions of page views per month to make a decent amount of money this way: if your business website appeals to a small but very specific niche audience, you can sell ad space to businesses that want to reach such people.
For example, if you blog about maintaining motorcycles made in Japan and you have a loyal readership, you can sell advertising space to, for example, companies that sell parts for motorcycles made in Japan.
Real World Example: Newspaper websites often rely heavily on selling ad space. If you visit the USA Today website, you’ll see a mix of static and video ads for everything from drugs to fantasy sports, reflecting the broad demographics of their audience.
USA Today articles have a wide range of ads in both static and video formats within or alongside the content. Image source: Author
2. Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing and affiliate links are an increasingly popular form of monetization for websites and blogs. Under this system, you would choose an affiliate program (Amazon is a common option) and generate an affiliate link that you would post on your website to refer to your audience.
If one of your readers clicks on the link and buy the product, you get a commission for that sale. This commission can be substantial, ranging from 1-10%.
Real World Example: Wirecutter reviews consumer and electronics products, and has affiliate links throughout . The site aims to help people find the best consumer products, and as a result, customers trust its recommendations and buy through its links, which earns a commission for the site.
3. Pay Per Click (PPC)
Pay per click has exploded in popularity in recent years thanks mainly to Google, but also other search engines. PPC allows advertisers to reach a more targeted audience by placing their ads on search engines for specific keywords.
Google’s Adsense program allows websites to run search engine placed ads within of your own website, generating income as well. Google gives you a code that you can embed on your website that identifies what content you have and starts serving targeted ads.
Real world example: You don’t have to look far for Find websites that run Google Adsense ads. You’ll typically find them most often on blogs that talk about consumer products.
4. Selling Products
Selling products is a traditional way of making money online. You have products for your customers, and you use your site to promote, organize, and sell them to visitors. Under this model, you would use an integrated marketing strategy that could include PPC advertising or email marketing to attract visitors who search for your products and make purchases.
Real World Example: Amazon is probably the best-known example of an online-only company using a website to sell products.
5. Selling Services
Selling services is another common way to make money online. It’s similar to selling products, with a few key differences. Unlike selling products, once you ship a product to the customer, the transaction is complete. But when you sell services, you’re selling an ongoing relationship over the Internet. As with selling products, this requires an integrated business marketing strategy.
Real World Example: Wix is a website that allows customers to host and design their own websites. They also provide a variety of related services for a monthly subscription fee.
6. Sponsored Content
If you have consistent website traffic, you can sell sponsored content opportunities. In a sponsored post, an advertiser writes an article that is somewhat informative but mostly promotional. It takes the format of a standard piece of content, but has a clear promotional tone.
You should let your readers know that this is sponsored content, usually with a simple “Sponsored Content” header above the title . Good website management will prevent sponsored content from overwhelming your original content.
Real world example: BuzzFeed often includes sponsored posts within its regular content. As is standard practice, they clearly mark the article as sponsored content so as not to mislead their readers.
The BuzzFeed website often features promoted content within its original content list. Image source: Author
7. Premium Content
If your website has a ravenous fan base that craves more content, put some of it behind a paywall. Keep a regular stream of free content, but save your best stuff for a premium subscription.
This allows a website to avoid the clutter of sponsored posts and ads, which also gives the site a premium feel which makes it seem worth subscribing. Use a content management system to maintain separate streams of free and premium content.
Real world example: Patreon is a platform that allows artists and content creators to sell premium subscriptions. For example, a popular podcast might offer two shows per week: one version free and one only for premium subscribers.
8. Building Email/Phone Lists
Many websites create extensive lists of names with contact information such as email addresses and phone numbers. They then trade and sell those lists to third parties so they can market their own products.
The price of an email or phone list will vary widely, depending on the industry you cover or the quality of the leads, but a strong list can sell for hundreds of dollars per thousand emails. A lower quality listing could cost around $10-$20 per thousand records.
Real World Example: NextMark is a company that offers tens of thousands of listings that you can purchase. The lists span a number of industries and can be broken down depending on whether you also want just phone numbers or email addresses.
9. Webinar Hosting
Webinars have become an increasingly common method of connecting with an audience. Your website can host a free webinar promoting a product, a webinar that can be placed behind a paywall, or a webinar that is simply for branding or development.
A webinar series can be repackaged as a video tutorial that can be sold on the website. Webinars are a great way to sell knowledge or promote products with limited overhead.
Real World Example: Wells Fargo offers a series of webinars aimed at educating its clients on financial basics, all while promoting their banking products.
Wells Fargo webinars focus on helping customers understand their finances while promoting their brand and products at the same time. Image source: Author
10. Donations
A less common form of monetization, but by no means uncommon, is to ask your audience for donations directly. This is a more common strategy for non-profit websites, since it relies on the charity of its readers. Typically, this strategy involves marketing yourself as someone worth investing in or emphasizing the importance of the service you provide that makes the site worthy of donations.
Real world example: Wikipedia is probably the best known example of a site run entirely by donations. The site completely avoids advertising, relying instead on the generosity of the millions of people who use the website every day.
11. Sell Your Website
If you’ve gradually built a strong audience and brand with your website, it may be time to sell it to someone who’s willing to take the reins. The downside is that you lose a regular stream of income, but the upside is that you get a large balloon payment and no longer have to deal with the daily headaches that come with running an online business.
Real World Example: If you want to get an idea of what the upper limit is for selling a company that is entirely run on a website, LinkedIn was sold to Microsoft for $26.2 billion in 2016.It’s probably a bit more than you’ll pay for your website, but it shows that website-based businesses can be very valuable.
The software will make it easier to make money from your website
A website is a great way to make money at home, and today there are more tools available than ever for an online startup business looking to get established. The Ascent has reviewed dozens of the best software options in a variety of areas, from customer service to e-commerce to marketing automation.
Check out some of the reviews on the areas you need help with the most. your business, and try some of the software options to see if one is right for your business. You’ll be surprised how much better your business can run.
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