Ad revenue tips for the casual blogger

Not long ago, a few exchanged comments on Lori Widmer's blog got me thinking about advertising revenue and blogging.

I started putting ads on my blogs about two years ago (I think). It took me an entire year to reach the $100 minimum for a check. After that, I started putting ads on more of my blogs, and now I'm getting on average about $30 a month — which works out to a check for $100 every three or four months. Not bad pay for something I would be doing anyway (I love blogging!).

I also have an affiliate account with Amazon, but I find that one's not very lucrative. I've gotten perhaps $40 in gift certificates over the past couple of years. I keep doing it simply because it's a good way to post an image for the books I review on Livre du Jour (which, again, I do simply because I like to!).

All this to say that I'm by no means an expert on earning ad revenue from a blog. I can, however, provide a few tips for others who want to make a little money on the side, but don't really care about turning their blogs into a full-time money-making endeavor.

1) Plan your ads. Google Adsense only lets you put three ad units on one page. That means you have to plan out your ads very carefully on your main page. Also, certain locations on the page are more desirable, and therefore bring you more money per click.

2) Left to right, top to bottom is the way most people scan online. So theoretically, ads in the top left will be the most successful. I'm not too careful about this, but I do like to use a header ad — an ad just under the blog header, and before the text.

3) Make use of individual post pages. I also put a footer ad on my blog posts, just before the comments. I usually make this a rectangular graphic ad, rather than a text ad. (Graphic ads earn more per click.) I also change the "# comments" link to point to the individual post page instead of the Blogger comment page, so that more people see the ad.

4) Limit sidebar ads. Bloggers who don't want the ads to be intrusive often stick a few skyscraper text ads at the bottom of all their other sidebar stuff, and then wonder why it doesn't work. Actually, I think small, tastefully placed ads in other areas (such as the header and footer ads I just described) are less intrusive than having a ridiculously long sidebar. As a result, I prefer the small square graphic ad, placed higher up in the sidebar, as an alternative to the long rectangular text ads.

5) Don't expect much from AdSense search. In my opinion, it doesn't work. I have it on one of my blogs as a courtesy to my readers (the template doesn't allow me to use the regular Blogger search bar), and I've only gotten a couple of clicks on that in about a year's time.

These tips aren't much, and like I said I am no expert, but there are still a few things I've learned from running ads on my blogs. I hope this will help at least a few of my fellow writers who would like to earn a little extra cash from their writing blogs!

The experiment: Day 10

Tuesday was the final day in an experiment I've done to see if I can increase my productivity, and therefore my income. As a review for anyone who hasn't been following the series, here is a list of the posts:

Day 1, which surpassed my wildest expectations
Day 2, in which I talk about how I maintained my increased focus
Day 3, when I found I was more productive at Starbucks
Days 4 and 5, in which my productivity started flagging
Day 6, when I didn't work enough hours but was pretty productive when I did work
Days 7, 8, and 9, a bunch of no-income days.

On Tuesday of this week, Day 10, I started out by sleeping in — the day was dark and dreary, and it's always difficult for me to get out of bed on days like that. My brain just doesn't believe that it's morning.

After getting up, I took care of a few final administrative things (primarily with my blogs) that I hadn't finished on Monday. Near the end of the day, I finally got some work done, but only about an hour's worth.

I had already planned on stopping the reports on my experiment after Day 10, but unfortunately the results have been somewhat inconclusive. I think I might have to try again in a week or so. The problem is that my sister is getting married on Saturday, so the rest of the week will be spent getting stuff ready on my end — I have to get her present ready and wrap it, and I still need to find shoes to wear for the wedding.

Possibly the other reason why my experiment seems to have failed is because I finished my work for the month pretty quickly, which made my slow period for the month — the week or so after the end-of-the-month assignments have been finished, and the next month's work hasn't yet been assigned — start a little earlier than usual.

Here's a small bit of success, though: Because I was so productive during the early part of my experiment, I was able to accept a small last-minute project my favorite client offered me a couple of days ago. So although the last few days haven't been as wildly productive, I did manage to increase my income for the month as a result of my experiment. It's not a total failure, then!

Ch-ch-ch-changes

As part of my admin day yesterday, I made some long-needed changes to all of my blog templates.

On Swan's Blog, you'll find that I've ditched the Blogger profile, written a new bio, replaced my bio picture, and eliminated some of the clutter in my sidebar. I've also provided a link to the site feed (atom.xml), and made my copyright notice a little more prominent.

Finally, I fixed something that has puzzled me for more than a year. My footer looked wacky on my computer screen for some reason, but I finally figured out that was due to an unnecessary bit of code that hadn't gotten deleted for some reason when I last worked on my template. It all looks right now! Hooray!

The experiment: Days 7, 8, and 9

The last few days of my "experiment" have been a little less productive. As I mentioned in Day 6's post, I got started a bit late on Thursday (Day 7), and though I did accomplish the minimum I wanted to do that day, it wasn't the income I was aiming for.

Day 8, Friday, I decided belatedly to take off. My sister had her wedding shower on Saturday, and her wedding is next Saturday, so my mom and I were doing some shopping in preparation for the big event.

Today, Day 9, also saw no income. I really needed an admin day, and what better to do on a Monday, especially during a slow week? I had 3,000 emails in my inbox to go through (I've been very bad about filing and deleting emails lately), as well as a whole lot of blog admin and catching up to do.

Tomorrow, though, will be back to work with a vengeance — and hopefully Day 10 will see a revival of the awesome productivity I had going at the beginning of this experiment!

The experiment: Day 6

Yesterday — Wednesday — was an interesting day. As I mentioned when I blogged about Days 4 and 5, I was getting started on work quite late in the day, because of a horseback riding lesson I'd had that morning.

I ended up only working for a couple of hours yesterday, so even though my hourly worked out to be pretty decent, I didn't meet my daily goal.

I'm getting started a bit late today, too, for a couple of reasons: because I let myself sleep in, and because I spent an hour listening to President Obama's press conference on health care reform from last night. This is further complicated by the fact that I have plans with a friend later today. But I'm hoping that the limitations on my time will actually encourage me to be more productive, the way it did on Day 1.

The experiment: Days 4 and 5

So far this week has been a mixed bag. Monday went pretty good, about as productive as Day 2, even making time for a ride on my horse and some TV with Michael in the evening.

Yesterday, however, didn't go so well. I was at the barn all morning and into the afternoon, first with a farrier appointment and then with some trailer training I've been doing lately with my horse. By the time I got home I was starving, so I grabbed some Burger King. Bad move! Whether because I ate too much, too fast, or my system just isn't used to fast food anymore, it all but put me out of commission for the rest of the day. I was sleepy, achey, had a recurring headache up until the time I went to bed nine hours later.

So today I feel even more pressure to get back to being productive, since yesterday didn't go so well. I'm already off to a late start, since I had a session with my trainer this morning, but I should be able to work some this evening since Michael will be working on homework.

The experiment: Day 3

Friday was Day 3 of my experiment in productivity. Although it wasn't as successful a day as Day 1 or Day 2, it was primarily because I put in fewer hours and finished earlier. Hey, what can I say — it was Friday.

One thing I found on Friday was that changing the scenery worked really well to cure a lag in productivity. I felt like I was really struggling at home, lapsing back into my habits of getting on Facebook a lot and that kind of thing. So I packed up my stuff and walked two blocks to the local Starbucks.

I found that I was much more productive at Starbucks — particularly when my laptop battery started running low, and I had to really focus if I wanted to complete the project I was working on before it died completely!

Do you ever find that working someplace else for a little bit helps to jump start your productivity?