You need to know how to monetize a website in order to make money with it. Making money from a website isn't difficult. Read on to learn the best monetization strategies to use on your web pages. Then start to make money off of your website within a short period of time.
Below are listed some of the most common and best ways to making money from a website. They are fast and easy to implement on your site, and once added, they are running on automation. Here are a few suggestions on how to monetize your website.
I. Network Ads
Google AdSense
gives you access to Google's huge network of advertisers. It's a fast and easy way for website publishers of all sizes to earn money by displaying targeted, unobtrusive Google ads on their websites.
You just put a snippet of code (provided by AdSense) on your web page, which will create contextual Google ads on your pages (ads that automatically are related to the content). Then you will earn when people visit your website and click on the ads on your pages. Making money from a website don't get easier than this!
You'll have to sign up for an account with Google in order to use the AdSense system; however everything is free, and it's very easy to use. Small and big websites alike are utilizing this system, and so should you! This is just one of the most popular revenue models for both bloggers and other web publishers.
Yahoo! Publisher Network
works the same way as AdSense. You choose your ad layout (format and colors), create channels for better tracking (optional), and collect your code. Then paste the code into every page you want that ad block to appear. Yahoo! then creates ads based on the content of your page.
At the time of writing, it's available only to people with a valid United States Social Security Number or tax ID number.
Similar Systems
Bidvertiser also places text ads on your site. The supply of ads is much smaller than AdSense or Yahoo! Publisher Network. However, here you have the option to choose the ads you'd like to have on your site, which is not the case with AdSense and Yahoo!.
Bidvertiser tells you the maximum bid per ad, so that you can accept the higher cost ads (which give you a higher revenue per click) and decline the low cost ones. So, this is another way to making money from a website.
AdBrite is a system that lets you display content-relevant ads and allows you to sell ads for your own site. They offer conventional text ads and banner ads, plus interstitial ("in between") ads. These are ads that place full page messages in between the current and destination page.
AdBrite also provides in-line ads. A double underline is displayed for words in your content that match up with AdBrite ads. If a visitor clicks on one of those words, an ad appears on top of your page. Because the ad is highly targeted, and the visitor is already motivated, there's a fair chance that the ad gets clicked and earns you a commission.
II. Affiliate Marketing
In fact, making money from a website is quite easy. Like contextual ads, affiliate marketing is a fast and straight forward way to monetize your website. Affiliate business simply means that you promote someone else's product or service and get a share of the profits made from your promotion.
What you do is putting an affiliate link (a link to the merchant's site) on your web page. When someone clicks on the link s/he is taken to the merchant's sales page, and if s/he buys something, you get a share of the profit (commission). There is nothing more for you to do than place that link on your page (except creating traffic to your website) - everything else goes on automation!
Affiliate commissions can be up to 75% of the selling price. The great advantage of this kind of online business is that there is no hassle mailing goods to customers, taking payments etc. You just send customers to the company, and the company sends you money in return. Simple and easy!
There are lots of companies that would like you to promote their products or services. The best place to find affiliate products, is CashOougle, where thousands of products are listed which you can promote. Creating the affiliate link to put on your web page is very easy.
More information on our Affiliate Marketing page.
III. Finder's Fee
Finder's Fee is about introducing buyers to sellers, and is another easy way to making money from a website. A finder's fee is an amount of money, given to the person who brings a buyer and a seller together. The finder does not become involved in the sales process and is not an agent acting on behalf of the seller.
The fee is often a percentage of the sales amount. The size of the fee should be determined ahead of time and put in writing before the sale is completed.
A Referral Fee is just about the same, but a simpler form of Finder's Fee - you get paid a fixed amount for referring a potential customer to a merchant (whether a sale is being made or not).
Lead Generation is also a "relative" to Finder's Fee; the difference is that you refer leads, or prospects, (including their name, email address and sometimes more) to a merchant. Leads can be generated for a variety of purposes - list building, e-zine or newsletter, winning customers and more. You get paid per lead you refer.
Note: The three terms above are often mixed up so 'Lead Generation' is used for 'Finder's Fee' an so on.
A good place to find merchants to do Finder's Fee business with is Commission Junction. You have to sign up for an account with them (it's free), then log in and click on 'Get Links'. Choose for example the category 'Insurance', and you will see many companies offering good money for sending them leads.
IV. Selling Stuff
If you have something to sell, you can easily do that from your website. You can sell tangible (hard) goods or digital downloadable items like ebooks. You could create an ebook on a topic you know well and that is related to the content of your site, and sell it from your site.
There are multiple services that can help you with the online selling. A good, inexpensive service is E-junkie.com, with which you can sell both digital and physical goods. Another service is PayLoadz.com (digital products only), which is even free to use if you sell for less than $50 per month.
If you are going to use E-junkie, here is an excellent Quick Start Guide that you can download for free. It's written by MaryAnn Shank of YourSBICoach.com.
For more detailed and in-depth information on selling stuff online, please browse our How to Sell Online pages.
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Of course there are many other ways to make money with a website; however those listed above are the best and easiest to get started with - especially if you are a newbie. And most are passive ways of income - once implemented on your website there is nothing more to do, they are running on automation!
For other online business options, take a look at the navigation bar on the left and browse the many ideas and opportunities. There are lots of ways to making money from a website, so I'm sure you will find something of interest.