I know that a lot of you have your own ‘make money online’ (MMO) blogs. I use the term to refer to essentially any blog that journals strategy, tips or efforts to make money online through whatever means.
With that in mind, I want to reveal to you the reality of success for a lot of the bloggers that you look up to. It is something I have observed with interest since I started blogging around 16 months ago. And no, it’s not some clever technique or strategy. I am not going to be sharing some kind of ‘shortcut’ with you.
Instead, I want to share with you the practical reality of the world of MMO blogs and what it means for you. For those of you who are bloggers but don’t own an MMO blog, I think you can learn something from this too.
In Search of a Common Denominator
Let’s begin by considering why we read MMO blogs — because we want to make money online. Obvious, right? We’re far more likely to take interest in a blog if its author(s) have demonstrated their success in making money online.
More specifically, we want them to demonstrate their success in making money online in endeavors entirely separate to their blog. This is a key factor. Few people are impressed by MMO bloggers who have amassed a fortune by preaching principles that they do not practice.
Which leads me to my simple argument that in order to be a successful MMO blogger, you must be successful. Everything else you do — your content, design and marketing strategy — all pales in comparison to your entrepreneurial ability.
You only have to look at just about every single successful MMO blogger out there to understand my argument. Pat Flynn’s first ever income report in October 2008 boasted earnings of nearly $8,000. One of Spencer Haws’ first posts at Niche Pursuits was entitled How I Quit My Corporate Job and Became an Internet Entrepreneur. Despite Darren Rowse’s huge success with ProBlogger, his Digital Photography School blog is his crowning achievement. I could go on and on.
Let me tell you something — if you do not make money online and are starting an MMO blog in the hope that it will generate an income in the short or medium term, you are going to be very disappointed. Leaving Work Behind has been going for 16 months and I have been experiencing relative success with my freelancing work over the past few months, and yet the most I have made from this blog in a month is $330. If I add up total income and expenditure during the blog’s lifetime, I am at around break even point — before I account for any of my time.
At this stage, if one were to consider LWB a money-making project (which thankfully I do not), it would be fair to label it a spectacular failure.
Does This Mean That You Should Give Up?
I believe that many new MMO bloggers start in the hope that the blog itself will be a significant source of income. And it may be — but they’ll have to prove themselves in other areas in order for that to be the case.
If you have that attitude you may want to stop now. If on the other hand you want to create a blog to journal your progress and act as an accountability aid (as I did with LWB), I would heartily recommend that you go ahead. Although Leaving Work Behind has been a commercial flop so far, I would do it all over again. It has helped me a great deal in terms of accountability, it has referred many prospective freelance clients to me, I have met a bunch of awesome people, and I have little doubt that it will become a good source of income for me in the future.
My point is this — if you are an MMO blogger, you need to understand the principles behind the potential for your success, and do it for all the right reasons. Otherwise, you are likely to burn out.
The Good News
There is a silver lining to this cloud. If you are successful at making money online — even moderately so — it is possible to carve out a niche for yourself in what is an extremely saturated market.
This is especially the case when it comes to passive income. Plenty of people are interested in the likes of freelancing, but that pales in comparison to the number of people who are interested in establishing passive income streams. If you can demonstrate having made money via passive income streams and are willing to reveal your strategies, you’ll probably be onto a winner.
People are always in search of new passive income bloggers. The fact is that there aren’t that many out there (who are making a great deal of money). I believe the reasons for this are twofold:
- Making money online via passive income streams is tough
- The really successful guys are too busy building their income to blog
The ease with which a big player can establish themselves in the MMO niche is perfectly demonstrated by Billy Murphy of Forever Jobless. He burst onto the blogosphere a couple of months ago, riding on the coattails of serious success in eCommerce and membership sites. He amassed 520 comments across three posts. The fact that he then promptly disappeared again is moot — due to his enormous success, he was able to generate a great of interest in mere days.
Consider the Non-Financial Benefits
I don’t intend for this article to be seen as ‘anti-blogging’. Quite the opposite — I fully endorse blogging as a fantastic way of establishing relationships and opening doors. Nor do I intend to belittle the efforts of successful MMO bloggers — although their success has contributed an enormous amount to the popularity of their blogs, they still have to produce great content and market effectively.
I would not be where I am now if it weren’t for this blog — even though it is yet to offer a net return on my financial investment. What it has brought to me in terms of relationships and experience is immeasurable. And I would like to think that the hardest yards are now behind me.
But my point is this — don’t go into MMO blogging for the wrong reasons. Don’t be yet another blogger who thinks that the secret to making money online is to blog about making money online (whether or not you actually do). You’ll be in for a long road that probably ends in failure.
Creative Commons images courtesy of BruceTurner and Images_of_Money
Alex B. (@DreamJobGuy) says
Tom,
Great post, and I couldn’t agree with you more! The ole saying is; “if you’re going to talk the talk, then you better walk the walk.” In other words, people want to see folks practicing what they preach!
As for me, I’ve been working on several projects, and folks always ask me; “that’s awesome, how did you do that, or how did you know what to do?” ..So there’s the problem / the gap.. So my central “authority blog” launch will close that gap and provide my readers with a sense of knowledge, skill, and ability to empower them to achieve their passions, goals, and dreams.. I’m certainly looking forward to my launch!
Thanks again for a great blog post, and I couldn’t agree with you more on your last point in the post; “don’t get into it for the wrong reason(s).” — I was general here because it doesn’t even have to be the MMO niche, in my opinion. No matter what you do, or what you put your time into, don’t do it for the wrong reasons..
Give everything you do 100%, unless you’re donating blood! —
Tweet this: http://clicktotweet.com/lZQX4
Thanks again Tom, and keep up the great work my friend!
All the best,
-Alex
Tom Ewer says
Cheers Alex 🙂
Cari - A Writers Website says
Another gem! Thanks Tom. Having been caught in once by a MLM, this was particularly pertinent for me. We recovered from the knock and put our heads down and just kept working but the whole saga, made me very wary of online marketing – (not doing it) but providing value for our readers. Still dithering but seeing a way now to accomplish that (the value). Your level headed explanation is refreshing. With three blogs/websites in three different niches, MMO may be in my immediate future.
Cheers,
Cari
Tom Ewer says
Sorry to read of your experience Cari, but it was a valuable lesson learned no doubt.
Henri says
Really like this post.
It’s funny how people have this idea that if you want to make money you have to teach others how to make money.
I’ve had clients in the past come to me with the idea that they’ll teach people how to make money and then they’ll have the proof. That’s crazy to me. I always go, “whaaat?”
I’d say I’m an accidental case when it comes to doing the whole MMO thing. I started off just sharing my experiences + how I made a living online, and from there I followed what I wanted to do and what people wanted to know.
And that’s what has brought me to where I am today.
Good stuff, as always, Tom!
Tom Ewer says
It was pretty much the same for me — cheers Henri!
David says
I was wondering when I was going to read this somewhere. Well done for writing what I had had lurking at the back of my mind 🙂
I think this is an important area. Part of the issue is that when you start looking into how to do things to get your blog or site ranked into google you come across loads of information about how to make money online. You don’t find many examples where it was done in other areas than MMO, you also touched on this.
The MMO niche is like a black hole, sucking all the search traffic in and it’s hard to get to the other good stuff because of that 🙂
Tom Ewer says
An interesting point David, and true I think (unfortunately).
Joe @ How I Got Rich says
I started my MMO blog as a way to network with other people in the same position as me.
I started the blog when I first started with affiliate marketing so I started with near zero earnings and took off from there.
The blog doesn’t make me any money but it made me some good contacts over the years which can be worth more than a few quid from the odd affiliate link.
There are so many MMO bloggers that make most of their money from ‘teaching people’ rather than their actual sites that it can be tempting to try to follow in their footsteps. But I guess for every person making money from ‘teaching MMO’ there are 100s not making any money from their MMO blogs (although trying).
The most I ever made in one month from internet marketing was £1800. At that point I think I might have been qualified to ‘teach’ people on my MMO blog but I didn’t take that opportunity and now I’m almost back at zero from my internet marketing sites.
As an aside: teacher get paid for teaching rather than doing (a subject) which is a bit like an MMO blogger teaching people rather than doing 😉
Michael says
You have describe some very nice and interesting ways of earning money online. I am exploring new ones and hopefully to earn well in the future.
Ryan says
Great stuff! Iv’e been tempted to give freelance writing a try a few times but never got round to it. Iv’e been blogging for a while now and am a decent writer so i think i could make some good money with it. I make my money affiliate marketing & buying/selling online, but after reading your personal journey i may just give freelance a shot!
Tom Ewer says
Go for it Ryan!
Marcus Da Costa says
Great content, I’ve done a similar post recently as more people are turning online.
Tom Ewer says
Thanks Marcus 🙂
Michael Lawton says
Excellent post! I keep telling people who ask they same Question and I tell them to write about whats important to them. The money will come in time from the people who keep coming back. You monetize just about anything these days.
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