October was a record-breaking month for my web earnings! New, high-quality, high-paying sponsors seemed to emerge from the woodwork. I began to leverage Medellin Living as a lower-cost alternative to advertising on GoBackpacking as well.
I am finally experiencing the benefits of having multiple sites, though I’m still concentrating the majority of my efforts on GoBackpacking.
In October 2009, I earned a total of $1,610:
- $1,449 – from direct text/banner ads
- $91 – Text Link ads
- $70 – Linkworth
As you can see, selling direct pays, and BIG. Probably even BIGGER than I realize because I tend to undervalue my blogs and am not the hardest negotiator.
There’s no sharing revenue with a middle-man, though it does require you build up some traffic, Page Rank, and/or reputation first. The irony for travel bloggers is that the best time to leverage their blogs are before their trip, and even more so AFTER their trips. While they’re away, even though they are reporting back cool activities and photos, they have less time to engage with the online travel community, comment on blogs, and use social media to the fullest.
A cool thing about almost every advertiser that buys space on my site is that they come to me. Great rankings in the search engines (primarily Google) and being listed on the Trusted Travel Blogs Network have accounted for many a new advertiser.
As my traffic has improved on GoBackpacking, I’ve decided to steer away from selling text link ads. My homepage is a sad PR 2 (even after this past weekend’s update) because of them all. Yesterday, I canceled my account with Text Link Ads after being with them for almost 3 years. They were my second highest source of revenue, however now that I’m valuing my blog more, I should be able to make up the $70-$90 per month with one new, quality sponsor.
November will be dedicated to working hard on a new blog project I’ve got going. It has HUGE potential and I am really excited about it. I can’t wait to share more, but not quite yet.
For those that are interested, GoBackpacking received 14,000 visits and 30,000 page views in October, reflecting a 15% increase over September.
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Tags: earnings
Congrats Dave! It is true about the irony of being able to build up websites the most when not actually travelling. My traffic has increased since I stopped and have been able to rehaul and promote my site, I still don’t have income of note unfortunately though.
Hi Rob – thanks for checking out Blog to Travel and linking to me from your blog. I appreciate it.
So far, November is off to a slow start – no advertisers approached me in the first week, though one big one did say he was happy with a 1-month trial and would
contact me in December to resume. I much prefer the boom months to the bust, but one of the cool things is I never know what emails will be waiting in my Inbox
when I wake up each morning.
Awesome month Dave! Well done. It’s difficult to predict what people are willing to pay for advertising but I find they’re usually willing to pay what I ask. Maybe it’s time for us both to push the envelope a bit and see where it leads.
I’m looking forward to seeing what this new site of yours is all about.
Thanks Kirsty, it felt great to have a big month. I sold a text link ad for $50 for 3 months recently, because that was the price I set on my blog’s Advertise page.
I set the expectation before she even contacted me, and thus didn’t have to negotiate. Normally, I’d be suggesting $35 per month, and even further discounts for long term commitments. I know I’ve undervalued my site, so I think this filtering will be a good thing.
I wish you were in closer touch as I start ramping up the buzz about my new site, but I know you’re doing great work over in Indonesia now.
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