Tuesday, January 8, 2013

Blogging as a Profit Center

Corporate Mrs. Love Bird circa 2009
November 2012 marked my 3rd year anniversary of having left the corporate arena and since carving my own career path, including attending two major blogging conferences last year, I've been thankful for the opportunity to monetize my blog, but it's been something I've been very cautions about.

My regular readers know I'm passionate about multiple profit centers, but before making the decision to think about this blog as a profit center I've noticed in the blogosphere there tends to be 4 camps of blogging for profit:
  1. The holier than thou blogger - this is the one who claims they would never accept advertising (often in a very snooty tone)
  2. The apologetic blogger - this is the one who finally accepts advertising but apologizes profusely for doing so. 
  3. The monetization obsessed - this is the blogger who goes overboard posting tons of sponsored posts many of which have anything to do with her editorial mission
  4. The well integrated blogger - this blogger seamlessly integrates her sponsored posts into her editorial without overwhelming her readers
It's easy to say that I think most bloggers who monetize strive for #4, and I do too. I want to seamlessly integrate monetization into my blog and consider long and hard before I accept certain partnerships for Harlem Love Birds. 

I'm sure you, my readers have noticed more partnerships as well and my goal is to bring things to you that I personally believe in. There have been many questionable things that I have had to decline (such as work boots and lottery promotions) since they really don't have anything to do with my blog.

For those of you who are also bloggers and interested in the business end of all this I'm working on an epic round-up of my favorite how-to guides for monetization. In the meantime check out this thoughtful post from SITS: When to Say Yes to Making Money Blogging.

If you blog, do you monetize and if not, have you considered it? For those of you who do, do you face challenges as you balance your editorial with the desire to grow your blog as a profit center?