As a blogger, there is always one question: how can you make a little money with your blog. Maybe you even want to turn your blog into your main job. In both cases, you need something to sell to help you to make money blogging.
Keep in mind, that what you offer to your audience has to match your target group. You need to offer products that are valuable to the same people that find your blog posts valuable.
Of course, there are some other ways to make money with your blog than offering products: for instance, affiliate marketing or advertising on your website. But honestly, the real money is in selling products. And do not be intimidated by the term product. Not every product is physical and not every product needs to be huge or take years to create. In fact, it is often better to start with smaller products to see what your audience really likes – and turn to create more complicated and pricey products later when you already know what your audience craves for.
Here are 10 ideas for products that you can create and offer on your blog.
Before you read on - we have various resources that show you exactly how to use social networks to gain massive traffic and leads. For instance, check out the following:
FREE Step-by-Step Twitter Marketing GuideFREE Pinterest Marketing Ebook
1. Worksheets
Maybe you can remember the worksheets from your school days. I had a couple of worksheets and workbooks to learn languages. Often they had some tasks and some blank spots that I had to fill out.
You can create worksheets for your niche. If these are really useful, some people from your audience may be willing to pay for them.
Worksheets are usually not the highest-priced products – but easy to create and good products to get started with selling products to your audience.
You can use Word/PDF or tools like Canva to create your worksheets.
2. Templates
There are many options to create templates. I have seen design templates for Canva or Photoshop. I have read a lot of mail templates. I have created blog post templates. There are ebook templates. There are templates for almost anything.
Usually, templates come in a format that can easily be edited and changed by your customers.
The price depends on what the templates are for – how much value that has to your audience.
3. Printables
I am not so overly fond of printables – I rarely print anything apart from business stuff. My office is as far paperless as I can manage.
But still, printables are all the rage for some bloggers who want to make money blogging.
There are recipe printables, gift cards, calendars, kids games, planners for almost anything, Christmas cards, gift tags, and greeting cards. – you get the idea.
Hey, before you read on - we have in various FREE in-depth guides on similar topics that you can download. For this post, check out:
FREE workbook: CREATE AWESOME BLOG POSTSFREE Beginner's Guide: START A BLOG
One printable may not be worth so much money, but you can create a complete package of printables – for instance, a package with printable kids games for rainy holidays.
Printables need a minimum of design skills as they need to look good when printed.
As an example see the printable pack by Moments a Day
4. Ebooks
Ebooks come in various formats and sizes. From a couple of pages to huge ebooks. Pure text books to books with hundreds of images. From continuous text to shortened bullet lists. Everything is possible in an ebook.
Ebooks are easy to create, you can use tools like Canva, old-school text processing tools like Word, or even iBook author to create your ebook. In the end, most ebooks are sold in PDF. You can sell your ebook directly on your website, choose another service or opt for Amazon.
eBooks start at low prizes like a couple of dollars, but some books are sold for hundreds of dollars. You can start with a small book and create more books as you get more experienced.
Ebooks are one of the most flexible formats for a digital product.
Image Source Mirasee
5. (digital) Subscriptions
Subscriptions simply mean that your customer pays you on a regular basis – and you send some value on a regular basis. For instance, you can sell some of the above products as a subscription, like a monthly printable or even a weekly worksheet or even a weekly email containing some awesome value.
You will have to offer something of high value at a fairly low price – your advantage is that you only have to sell it once and get a regular income which makes your income more plannable.
A great example of a subscription is a weekly meal plan.
6. Online Courses
Your options for online courses are endless – that’s one reason why online courses are one of the most used products to make money blogging. You can offer a course system that you host in a Learning Management system or an online platform. But you can also opt for an easy email course if you are starting out.
You can create a course about any topic that is of interest to your target group. Try to offer something that not everybody else offers, too. Create a course about questions that people from your target audience want to answer. That will make it easier for you to sell your course.
You can create courses about teaching a dog the most important commands. You can create courses on how to cook. You can create courses in Yoga. You can create a course on how to write a book.
Image Source Teachable
7. Memberships
Similar to subscriptions a membership has the advantage that you sell it once and cash in on a regular basis. That makes your business more plannable. Even if the price for the monthly membership is not that high, a membership may be a good idea from your business standpoint.
A membership site should offer more than a course. Something new has to be added to a membership on a regular basis to keep people interested and keep them paying for it.
Jon Loomer’s Power Hitters Club Community
8. Consulting services
This is not a digital product. And there is a limit on how much consulting services you can sell: your day only has 24 hours no matter how many clients you could book.
Consulting is a great way to make money blogging – but it is not the way to make you ultimately rich while traveling the world and living your best life.
9. Physical products
Whatever you can produce at a reasonable price and ship to your audience, you can consider as a means of making money as a blogger.
- A travel blogger could sell T-shirts or coffee mugs with images from their travels.
- You can sell printed books.
- A dog trainer could sell coffee mugs with funny dog quotes.
To start selling physical products without any risk, you could also consider selling Amazon products and just make money as an Amazon affiliate.
Image source PinchOf Yum Online Shop
10. Whitelabel products
If you do not want to create your own products, you can consider buying someone else’s product and relabel it. There are thousands of options for Whitelabel products out there.
Image source Wikipedia
The downside of selling Whitelabel products is that you have to buy inventory first – that means you have to make an investment at a time when you do not know for sure if and how much of your products you can sell to your audience. In the worst case, you will sit on your stock and fail at selling it.
Examples of popular Whitelabel products are Essential Oils, Water Bottles, Coffee Mugs, Reusable bags, nutrition supplements.
Final Words on how to make money blogging
Selling online is an art. It is not a matter of repeating buy my stuff all the time. There are many things that can go wrong.
- you can create a product that your target audience does not need or want
- you can set your price too high (or even too low)
- you can create a huge product and never sell it
- your sales message may be wrong
Keep that in mind when you decide what you want to sell. Often it is better to start with smaller products at a lower price. These products are often easier to sell.
But!
If you only offer small products at a low price you will need to sell many of them. That is why sometimes selling high prices products can be easier. You only need to sell one online course for 5000$ per month and you can already make a good living. If you are selling 5$ ebooks you will have to find a minimum of 1000 buyers to make the same amount of money.
Also, digital products that you create once and can sell for an unlimited number of times are great to make money blogging. Physical products and consulting services always require you to spend time on delivering them – which means your options on how much you can earn are limited.
