Bjork here, back in the saddle for my monthly income report. I’ll actually be posting again tomorrow, as Lindsay and I have some food blog related news that we’re excited to share. It’ll be my first back-to-back appearance on Pinch of Yum!
Our hope is that these monthly income and traffic reports are inspirational and educational.
Inspirational in that you can see that’s it’s possible to create an income from a food blog and educational in that you can see where the income we’re earning is coming from.
Here is the breakdown for October’s income.
The Breakdown:
- Bluehost – $1,560
- Tasty Food Photography – $990.35
- BlogHer – $829.85
- Google AdSense – $605.28
- Elegant Themes – $97.50
- Thesis Theme – $93.72
- Amazon – $44.75
- VigLink – $16
Grand Total: $4,237.45
Income As Percentages
Income Notes:
It’s been fun to see sales of Tasty Food Photography hold steady over the past few months. To date the affiliate program has paid out over $1,400. Thanks to those of you that are Tasty Food Photography affiliates! Bluehost earnings are up compared to previous months. I’ll talk more about this in the tips and takeaways section below. BlogHer earnings are down compared to previous months. As with any advertising network, there will be times when advertisers aren’t paying as much to have their ads shown. October appears to be one of those months for BlogHer.
Traffic
Here are the screenshots of the Pinch of Yum Google Analytics for the month of October.
Traffic Notes:
The organic search traffic continues to grow each month, which is fun to see. When you crunch the numbers from previous months it averages out to around 100 additional visitors (compared to the previous day) that are arriving at the blog thanks to organic search traffic. It’s a good reminder to be intentional about writing posts that are search engine friendly.
Tips and Takeaways
The Teacher, The Landlord, and The Inventor
There have been a handful of people that have asked about how we create an income from affiliate programs with like companies like Bluehost, DIY Themes (creators of the Thesis Theme), or Elegant Themes. The question got me thinking about all the different ways to create an income with a food blog, and how there are distinct differences between each type of income.
It’s easiest to explain the different types of income by comparing them to three types of jobs: a teacher, a landlord, and an inventor. The information below provides an overview of how we create income from affiliate programs and also offers additional insight into the other two types of income streams.
The Teacher
The role of a teacher is, simply put, to teach. If you have signed up to be an affiliate for an affiliate program then you need to think of yourself as a teacher. At the very least, a teacher needs three things in order to be successful:
- A subject they have an expertise in
- A class that wants to learn about that subject
- Time to help the students if they run into trouble
The same is true if you’re an affiliate for a product. As an affiliate marketer, you should have:
- An expertise or experience using a certain product
- Readers that want to learn about that product
- Time to help your readers if they run into trouble
That’s what we are doing with the how to start a food blog page. We’ve used all of the products that we promote on that page and oftentimes help people troubleshoot issues they run into when they’re going through the process of setting up their blog.
If you’re not playing the role of teacher on your blog then you’re probably missing out on potential income. Take some time to browser the different affiliate networks listed below and see if you can find some products that you can teach your readers about.
The Landlord
The role of a landlord is to rent their real estate to the highest paying and friendliest tenants. As a food blogger, you need to think of your blog as real estate. We’ll call it screen real estate.
There are hundreds of companies that are interested in renting your screen real estate for advertising. The thing is, not all of these renters are equal. Some will have really annoying or offensive ads that pay a lot of money (for example, online casinos). Some renters have really great ads but will pay little to no money (for example, not-profits).
Your job as the landlord is to find renters that (1) pay an appropriate amount and (2) don’t make a mess of the place.
For Pinch of Yum, we’ve found the best renters to be Blogher and Google AdSense.
The Inventor
The role of an inventor is to create a product that helps others solve a problem. With Pinch of Yum, we’ve done this by creating an eBook called Tasty Food Photography. The inventor income is one of the most important types of income to create. It can also be one of the hardest types of income to create.
There is a lot that goes into creating a product. With a book, you have to write the content, take the pictures, edit the content, figure out digital media formatting, figure out distribution and setup payment processing, to name a few.
However, the hardest thing about creating a product is the internal struggle.
It’s that little voice inside our head that says “Me? What do I have to offer. No one would be interested in buying something I created…”
But that’s almost always not true. If I were a betting man I’d bet a serious chunk of change that you know the answer to a problem that someone else has. You just have to figure out what it is. Once you figure out what that is you can put on your inventor hat and get to work.
One of the most affordable ways to start creating an income as an inventor is to write an eBook. It’ll take a lot of hard work, but the good news is that you don’t have to spend a lot of money to get started. I don’t have room in this post to show the step-by-step process for creating an eBook, but I will provide the three essential pieces that we used create and distribute the eBook we sell on Pinch of Yum.
- A word processor (we used Apple’s Pages and converted it to a PDF)
- A distributor (we use E-junkie)
- A payment processor (use use PayPal Payments Pro and Google Checkout)
Your Food Blog Resume
The majority of food bloggers are only playing the role of landlord. They’re renting their screen real estate to companies that pay them a certain fee to show ads.
Far fewer people are playing the role of teacher and inventor. If you’re looking for ways to increase the income from your blog I’d encourage you to add the “jobs” of teacher or inventor to your to your food blog resume.
I’ll Be Back
To quote the great Arnold — “I’ll be back.”
Lindsay and I will be back tomorrow to fill you in with what’s been going on behind the scenes here at Pinch of Yum. Talk to you soon!
P.S. If you’re interested in learning more about some of the ways that you can monetize a food blog, we encourage you to download this free ebook, “16 Ways to Monetize Your Food Blog,” from our sister site, Food Blogger Pro!
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