Recently, I’ve had several clients request information on monetizing their blog - - what’s “monetizing” mean? Basically - you can make money with your blog by doing a few easy things that I’m going to list out for you here in a minute….

Some folks want to make a few bucks off their website so they can offset the cost of hosting and bandwidth. I have other clients who make a nice income off some advertising they insert in strategic places in their blog. While, I have other clients who actually make a living from it. It all depends on what type of site you are running, and how far you want to go with it. Most of these programs fit right into your current blog design nicely - are easy enough for you to add in yourself, or you can request your blog designer to add them in for you during the process of the set up of your blog design or website design.

There’s some expected grumbling in the blogosphere about advertising on blogs and how making money off a blog makes it.. sort of… unclean. This is an acceptable and understandable take on the question of advertising - however, if you’re interested in making a few dollars (or more than a few) with your blog.. read on…

One of the fasted growing and most popular tools for advertising on blogs - with an excellent return (I can attest to, personally) is the use of Text Link Ads. The basic idea is this: you submit your site to them and if they accept it, they begin selling text ad links on your site. The text ads are unobtrusive, you can place them anywhere on your site that you want, and they make you money with a monthly payout. You can display text ad links on the same page as other ad programs. With Text Link Ads, you can also sell ad space in your RSS feed using their Feedvertising program. I’ve referred quite a few clients and peers to this program, and not one of them has regretted signing up, and the reports I’ve received back are exellent!

Using Google Adsense is a fast and easy way for website publishers of all sizes to display relevant, unobtrusive Google ads on their website’s content pages and earn money. Because the ads are related to what your users are looking for on your site, you’ll finally have a way to both monetize and enhance your content pages.

LinkShare.com is free to join and easy to use. They offer their affiliates access to more than 500 of the top online retailers, covering all major product categories. Millions of dollars are generated on the web every single day in online sales, with Linkshare you are able to make a few dollars by displaying affiliate links on your site. Most bloggers write about different products and programs they like and support - so why not support those same products and programs by joining their affiliate programs and making a little money through your blog or website?

Those are my top three, for the moment. I may blog a bit more about some other programs that I’m currently using - however, I’m just trying them out at the moment and don’t want to support or endorse them until I have a good feel for my own opinion on their services, and it’s just too soon to tell at this point. I hope you find these links and resources helpful - I’d love to hear back from you if you find great success with any one of the three, or all!