Getting Started
Before you start blogging about your cat or dog, you need to have a platform to contain those content that you write. That platform is basically a website. This is something which you will have to pay for on a yearly, two year basis. Depends on how your budget is. The website is basically your domain name. A domain name is an address on the internet which blog readers can find you and you content. You will have to come up with a domain name for your blog. This domain name will be your website address. So let us say you are blogging about German shepherd dogs. You came up with a domain name called www.dogcatplace.com You may have to come up with multiple domain names if the one you chose is already taken. This domain name is the address where readers will find your content to read once they type it into the URL or do some kind of Google search to find content on your pet blog.
2. You have a Domain, What Next?
Hosting, you have picked out and registered a domain name for your pet blog, that domain must now be hosted somewhere for your content to be stored and retrieved. So a website host is basically an area on a server that gives you storage space along with various applications that you can use on your website. Some of these applications maybe free, while some are paid for. These applications allow website enhancement and other great features. The Good thing about hosting is that you can purchase your domain and host using the same service provider. Many of these domain services such as Bluehost or Weebly provides a great platform for easy content upload to your blog.
3. No Coding Required
Once you have a domain name registered and a hosting platform available to you, you don’t need to know any coding to have your blog setup the way you want it. It is basically a drag and drop. Meaning you drag the application you want to display over to your blog and that’s it! So let us say you want to insert an image of a cat eating a fish in one of your post. All you need to do is log into the account given to you by your hosting provider. Go to the post you wish to add the image, drag and drop the image app on the post and then upload the image to your post. Quite simple. Adding text and other content is just as simple.
After you have your domain name setup and hosting. The ball is in your court now. You must start to writing useful content for your readers. Having a dog or cat blog provides the blog owner with a tremendous amount of things to blog about. From health, beds, clothing, furniture, cute pics, videos, and just about anything that nowadays can be related to your dog or cat. Continue writing as much good content as possible. Ensure that your blog posts are at least 600 words long for better Google search results. Before you begin thinking about making money from your blog, ensure that you have at least 20 great post that are about 3 to 6 months old on your site. Concentrate on writing content first, then the next step is monetizing your blog, meaning time to think about making some money.
How Pet Bloggers Make Money
Once you have all those great content, you can then apply to an ad network such as Google AdSense to have ads displayed on your blog. Google AdSense has come a long way and has ads which now can target specific content on your blog. The ads work like this; you get paid a percentage each time someone clicks an ad on your dog or cat blog. So let us say that your blog is waking in over 30,000 unique visitors per month. That is 30,000 different people reading what you write on your website monthly, and 500 people click on ads each worth a dollar per click. That is $500 dollars your blog has made just from AdSense clicks. And guess what? The more content and visitors your site gets, the more click and revenue your site generates. There are other ad networks available such as Media.Net (Yahoo and Bing Network) Revenue Hits and Bidvertiser just to name a few.
2. Affiliate Marketing
There are thousands of affiliate networks which you can apply to and start making huge amount of earnings on your pet blog. Affiliate marketing is basically you the blogger selling products on your blog on behalf of another company and you get a percentage from each sale you make. So let’s say company A is selling dog glasses for $20 dollars each. You apply to company A to place a banner link on your website to advertise these dog glasses. Each time one of your readers click on the banner, they are redirected to the website of the company to buy these dog glasses. When they do make a purchase, you are commissioned a share of that sale. So if the company stated that commission is 8% of price, that means you have just made $.1.60. That figure may not sound like much, but that is just a single sale from a small inexpensive item. There is easy potential to make thousands of dollars monthly from affiliate marketing.
3. Selling Your Own Products
Once you have your own pet blog up, you can make money by selling your own product. This can be anything physical or digital. So let us say you make animal bracelets for pet owners, you can have these products displayed on your dog or cat blog for your readers to see and buy. There is no middle man and all sales go directly to you. Digital products may include eBooks about dogs, cats or whatever pet you decide to write about. You can write fiction stories or nonfiction such as dog care, cat care, dog training, cat training, your life with dogs etc. There is great potential in making money selling these digital products.
4. Direct Advertising
Once your Blog has gotten large enough and has gathered many followings. Companies will begin to approach you in placing direct advertisements on your blog. They will pay you a monthly figure for keeping their ad(s) on your site running. This can range from hundreds monthly to thousands of dollars. But you blog must have good and sustained traffic.
START NOW!
Thinking about it is one thing. But taking action is another. You can start making money in short time with a dog blog or cat blog. Get a cheap domain name and get hosting. Start writing content to your blog and let your blog grow and start making some good cash.