How To Make Money From WordPress.com Blog?

Are you blogging on WordPress.com platform and wondering how you can make money from it? If yes, this is a detailed guide for you to look at various options to monetize your WordPress.com blog. Those who are new to blogging and just started with a blog, you ought to know about different variation of WordPress.

WordPress offers two ways to create your blog:

• WordPress.com : Free platform which is easy for anyone to start a blog instantly. It’s a good platform to start your first blog but I wouldn’t recommend to stick to it for long, as there are many limitations of this platform. I will talk about that in a minute, let’s have a look at other variation.
• WordPress.org : This is also known as self hosted platform where you host your blog on your own server. It requires a bit of technical knowledge (Though not much) and the advantage here is; there is no limitations here.

You should check out this guide on WordPress.com Vs. WordPress.org to learn everything about both the platform and understand the limitations and advantage of both the platform.

Now, if you are done understanding about both the platform and ready to monetize your existing WordPress.com blog, read on…

Different ways to Make money from Free WordPress.com blog:

Before I share all the available options, you should know that you can’t use AdSense on your WordPress.com blog. Google AdSense is the popular ad program for hobby and professional bloggers. You can learn about AdSense here, and now let’s look at other options which are permitted and being used by others to monetize their blog.

Note: If you are WordPress.com enterprise of VIP user, you can run your own ads including AdSense ads.

WordAds:

WordAds is the advertising solution for WordPress.com. It’s available for every WordPress.com user but you need to apply for it to get accepted for WordAds. I believe every WordPress.com user should apply for WordAds, otherwise WordPress already shows ads at times to cover the cost of hosting your free blog. By using WordAds, you will be showing ads and earning money from your blog. It’s simple and easy. You can request an invitation from here. (Make sure you are logged into your WordPress.com account). Here are two articles which I found on internet which talks in detail about their experience with WordAds.

• J.D. Moyer experience with WordAds
• Dennis reviewed WordAds here

Important points about WordAds:

• You can check your WordAds earning from Settings -> WordAds in your Dashboard.
• WordAds pays you for impression and not for click. So more traffic you will get, you will earn more.
• WordAds would work better for bloggers who have traffic from U.S or European countries.
• You need to earn minimum of $100 to get paid and payment mode is PayPal. If you don’t have a PayPal Id, create one for free here. Also don’t get disappointed if it takes time to reach $100 threshold. Remember something is better than nothing.
• Getting WordAds approval depends on monthly traffic your blog is getting and what kind of blog (Topic) you are running.
• You need to have custom domain name for your WordPress.com blog to use WordAds. (Why not get a self hosted blog instead?)
• Useful link: WordAds themes. These are theme which are officially recommended for WordPress.com blog running WordAds.

So this was about WordAds which you can apply for now and once approved, it will start earning money for you without doing and leg work.

Affiliate marketing:

This might be surprising for you, but WordPress.com let you use Affiliate links. The only thing is, you need to be using Affiliate links for reputable stored and legit stores. You cannot link to sources like pornography, gambling sites, get rich schemes, multi-level marketing and any other sites which can’t be call legit. You can use Affiliate links within your article using hyperlinks (Image with an affiliate link is not allowed). Affiliate marketing can do wonder for you, as it’s the best method to earn huge in short-time. Below are resources which will guide you to get started with Affiliate marketing and earn your first few dollars:

Sponsored posts:

This is another method which you can use on your WordPress.com to earn money. This will work better if you have an established blog and there are advertisers who would love to pay you for writing a sponsored story. Though either you need to get in touch with advertisers who are willing to sponsor a blog post on your blog or you can simply create a page call advertisement and mention that you are accepting sponsored post. You should check out ShoutMeLoud advertisement page to get an idea of what your advertisement page should look like. WordPress.com have certain restrictions on Sponsored posts which you can find here. Here are few resources for learning more about sponsored post:

• What is sponsored review and how to get started?
• Everything you need to know about Sponsored content (This is a detailed guide for experienced blogger)

Things to know:

• WordPress official recommend users to use self hosted WordPress platform if you want to run 3rd party advertising program (Ex: AdSense, BuySellAds, Infolinks).
• If you are violating WordPress.com advertising guidelines by using 3rd party ads or linking out to illegal sites, your blog will be suspended.

Conclusion: Think beyond simple ads monetization

If you have a high traffic free WordPress.com blog, you should add a custom domain and apply for WordAds to show advertisement on your blog. At any point if you wish totake your blog to the next level, you should migrate your WordPress.com blog to self-hosted WordPress blog (Here). Take advantage of affiliate marketing to earn passive income from your blog. None the less, focus on driving targeted traffic to your blog to increase your earning. None the less, sponsored posts can be a great resource for you to earn money from your blog. Learn a bit about Native advertising and sponsored articles, and this could be your gold-mine to earn enough from your WordPress.com blog.

Are you monetising your free WordPress  blog? What methods you are using and how’s your experience with it so far?