This year, I made it public that I would make this blog as information as possible. The decision was meant to encourage bloggers as well as inform the rest that blogging is a serious profession. The reason I resolved to include a section about “blogging” is to downplay the narrative that blogging is a useless profession.
People who have little knowledge about blogging often view bloggers as noise makers, people who lost vision and resorted to disturbing other people’s peace. But I would shock them today: in this business, there are bloggers who make up to Ksh100 million ($1million) per month yet they are humble.
The primary source of income for many bloggers is Google AdSense but there is a significant number of individuals who have graduated from AdSense to Affiliate and direct marketing-others are now selling their own products. For your information, Google AdSense is for struggling bloggers, affiliate marketing is for established ones…people who have amazing skills in digital marketing.
One common thing about new bloggers is that they make so little that at some point feel like giving up. These guys need fresh energy to keep them going; this energy must come from bloggers who have made it.For my case, when I am about to give up, I go online and search for income of various bloggers (there are bloggers who post their monthly income).The moment I read the figures, I get inspired…I would also encourage you to do the same.
If you are almost giving up and perhaps AdSense rejected you application. I have a list below indicating the amount of money people make online every month. These figures are verified and have inspired other bloggers world over.
John Lee Dumas
Website: eofire.com
Site age: 4 years
Niche: Entrepreneurship, online business & podcasting
Total Monthly Revenue: $490,641
Total Monthly Expenses: $117,962
Net Income: $372,679
John’s entrepreneurship focused website, ‘EntrepreneurOnFire’ has lived up to its name – within 3 years of launching, it grossed over $3.7M with $2.8M in pure profits. That the site made just $69k within the first 365 days, but $232k in March alone is a testament to John’s hustle and content quality.
Pat Flynn
Website: smartpassiveincome.com
Site age: 7.5 years
Niche: Entrepreneurship, online business & podcasting
Total Monthly Revenue: $258,737
Total Monthly Expenses: $46,620
Net Income: $212,117
As the founder of SmartPassiveIncome.com, Pat is easily the most recognizable name on this list. For the last 7.5 years, Pat has been sharing his entrepreneurial journey with the world.
It started with him declaring that he will quit his job with passive income in October 2008, to making over $212,00 in revenue in March 2017.
By all means, that is one really impressive journey!
Pat writes at least once a week about marketing, blogging and building businesses on the SmartPassiveIncome blog. He also runs the highly rated Ask Pat podcast, a popular YouTube channel (73k subscribers and counting) and the wonderful Smart Podcast Player.
Additionally, Pat runs a handful of web properties such as GreenExamAcademy.com, FoodTruckr.com and SecurityGuardTrainingHQ.com.
Full though his hands may be, Pat still publicly shares every aspect of his buinsess with his readers through his detailed monthly income reports. The earliest report from October 2008 had revenues of $7,906.55.
Michelle Gardner
Website: MakingSenseOfCents.com
Site age: 5 years
Niche: Frugal lifestyle, savings
Total Monthly Income: 130,856
Total Monthly Expenses: $4,000
Net Income: $126,856
Michelle runs the popular MakingSenseOfCents blog where she teaches her readers how to save money, get organized and live a better life. She’s been blogging for more than five years now, and in that period, she has grown her ‘side income’ blog into a monster. She now earns over $100,000/mo.
Michelle’s blog is devoted to finding answers to problems we all understand: controlling emotional spending, earning extra income, and making better financial decisions. This is a trillion dollar industry globally and people buried under debt are desperate for solutions. Michelle herself proudly talks about paying off $40k in student loan debt within 7 months.
Michelle updates her blog around 8-12 times a month, usually with in-depth guides on everything from product reviews to renting out rooms. Along the way, she also teaches her readers how to make money from their ‘side hustle’.
Lindsay Ostrom
Website: PinchofYum.com
Site age: 6 years
Niche: Food Photography, Cooking
Total Monthly Revenue: $95,197
Total Monthly Expenses: $58,497
Net Income: $36,665
Lindsay Ostrom is easily the most recognizable face in food blogging. The founder of PinchOfYum, Lindsay has been whipping up delicious fare and photographing them for close to 5 years.
In the course of these years, she has grown the blog from a mere $21/month to an industry behemoth that earns over $95,000 every month.
The most interesting part about Lindsay’s journey is that she has managed to build a six figure business in a niche most don’t think about – food photography and blogging.
Justin Weinger
Website: SoOverThis.com
Site age: 5 years
Niche: Internet marketing
Total Monthly Revenue: $55,481
Total Monthly Expenses: $1,571
Net Income: $53,910
Want to get ‘over’ the rat race, debt and financial responsibility? Then Justin Weinger of SoOverThis.com is your friend and sherpa.
The site started in February 2011 as ‘So Over Debt’, a blogger’s journey to getting out of debt. Justin purchased the site in 2013, chronicling his own journey to financial freedom and making a promise to be as transparent and ‘non-guru’ like as possible. In the last two years, he’s made a remarkable habit of sticking to that promise.
Today, Justin has completely crushed his goal, making over $53,000 in profit in the last reported month.
Jennifer
Website: ShowMeTheYummy.com
Niche: Food and recipes
Total Monthly Revenue: $46,367
Total Monthly Expenses: $2,185
Net Income: $44,181
ShowMetheYummy is a four-year-old site in the food recipes niche. Jennifer, the owner of the site, started publishing income reports in November 2014. That month, she made just $28 from a little over 19,000 pageviews. Since then, she’s grown the site to over 700,000 pageviews and over $40,000 in monthly revenue.
Abby
Website: JustAGirlAndHerBlog.com
Site age: 3 years
Niche: Home organization, DIY, and home decor
Total Monthly Income: $41,700
Total Monthly Expenses: $6,340
Net Income: $35,360
Abby teaches her readers how to turn houses into homes, and in the process, makes over $35,000 every month. That she managed to reach this figure in a tough niche with minimum spend on advertising shows what’s possible if you just focus on creating high quality content.
Abby shared her first income report in February 2014. In that report, Abby had total income of $2,446 with expenses of $272. Within one year, this figure was up four times to $13,887 – well over publicly shared goal of earning $10k/month by April 2015 (proof that you need to set hard goals for yourself!).
Harsh Agarwal
Website: ShoutMeLoud.com
Site age: 7 years
Niche: Tech tips, make money online and blogging
Total Monthly Revenues: $34,390
Total Monthly Expenses: $12,943
Net Income: $21,447
In terms of sheer traffic, Harsh’s website, ShoutMeLoud sits at the very top of our list of blogs. ShoutMeLoud gets over a million of page views every month.
These examples of a proportion of thousands of bloggers who make crazy money through blogging. If I publish the entire list,you will immediately quit your career and start blogging.
If you don’t own a blog and would like to become a blogger,you can start by registering your domain at Bluehost,then purchase a hosting plan and market it through SEMrush.
