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Apr 21, 2009 10:40 pm US/Central
Good Question: Can You Make A Living Blogging?
(WCCO)
With more than 20 million blogs online, there's no question that people enjoy sharing their thoughts in published form. But a new report suggests that nearly a half-million people blog as their primary source of income. Are people really making that kind of money blogging?
"I haven't met them," said Andrew Eklund, CEO of Ciceron, a Minneapolis Web Marketing firm. "I mean you could go swing a 2x4 in front of this building and hit a blogger. But one that has change in their pocket?"
A Wall Street Journal column declared
"America's Newest Profession: Blogging For Hire". Columnist Mark Penn claimed that 452,000 people blog for their primary source of income. He points out that Department of Labor statistics find significantly fewer computer programmers and firefighters.
Many critics have questioned Penn's methodology and his statistics, largely because there's no real survey that identifies people who make a living by blogging.
"There are a few superstars that are out there that can making a living at this but very, very few," said Eklund.
Of course different people define "making a living" in different ways. Bloggers make money through advertisements, freelance writing agreements, or in-kind product or service exchanges (free stuff).
"I support myself completely through blogging," said Annie Scott, a prolific blogger with freelance gigs at a series of AOL blogs, including
Stylelist.
Scott said she cranks out dozens of posts a week and gets paid per article.
"You have to write a lot of content to stay afloat," said Scott.
Eklund said people like Scott are more like a new type of journalist than the type of blogger most people think of.
"This is not you and I blogging on the weekend about our kids and cats," said Eklund.
However, the freelance blogger-for-hire model is generally a more reliable paycheck than collecting money through advertisements on a site run by one-person.
"I've worked for a number of sites in the past, and many of them do pay for traffic," she said, although right now she's being paid by the post.
"There's no one model for this out there yet," said Scott.
Ang Dezelske runs
Overheard In Minneapolis. When asked if she's getting rich from the ads placed on her side, she responded: "Not even close."
Dezelske said she makes about $3000 a year, on a site where she spends at least an hour a day uploading and updating content.
"I do it because it's fun, not to make money," she said.
Jimmy "Dutch" Gaines blogs as "Dude Weather" on
SecretsOfTheCity.com.
"Videoblogging is a pretty good way to make a living. I can set my own hours, I get paid, I get to smoke and drink of the job," joked Gaines.
"But it's not as easy as it looks," he explained. "I do all the writing, all the filming, all the editing."
Eklund is doing a seminar for corporations, explaining whether it makes sense to spend money on helping bloggers make a living called
"Radical ROI".
"The whole conference is to help leaders figure out what's real and what's simply hypey-buzzword-bingo," said Eklund.
Many online ads don't perform well, because people don't click on them. That's one reason why bloggers hoping to make money on those ads find themselves disappointed, Eklund explained.
"Click-throughs are very low," he said.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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