Things to Avoid when Monetizing Your Content

It has never been easier to monetize your content. With the quick rise of social networks and being online almost all the time, you, as a publisher, have an almost unprecedented access to your target audience. This strategy is not only available to big companies and businesses around the world, but also to individuals who have built entire careers out of being influencers online.

What they are trying to sell is unimportant, it could be anything from food, clothes, and lifestyle to game guides – the important thing is that they are doing that with their content. As you probably know, content can be anything from videos, blog posts to Instagram pictures, and the important thing is that the audience sees it, and reacts to it.

Naturally, even with a whole science behind the strategies for proper content monetization, there are also many mistakes that can often be avoided, resulting in increased revenue for you, or your business, and a much more satisfied audience.

A small, highly selected audience with great engagement is a much better solution than having a big following that is not interested in you. It is the quality vs quantity question.

We will try to mention some of the most common things people do that can help you avoid your content monetization strategies.

1. Being too Pushy with Ads

If you are trying to monetize your blog, and you consider yourself the next Kardashian, don’t forget – you are talking to real people. When creating content, often it can be too easy just simply placing ads all over the places, after all won’t ads help you sell your product?

This is wrong, as a good marketing revolves around a good ad placement. You can create a whole blog post without actually mentioning your product, and still show people why they need your products or services. You can place different ads for different categories of people you are trying to reach. For example, using an AIDA model will help you avoid making all your ads sound too forced.

Think about when you are scrolling your Instagram feed, and think about all the totally unrelated posts and images published by profiles you liked because they posted cute cats. Not fun, and that will definitely result in an unfollow. Think carefully about how you can make money on Instagram or other networks and use it to your advantage.

2. No Overall Strategy

Creating content just because there is a weekly or monthly quota you need to fill is a nice way of distancing yourself from your audience. Creating an overall content strategy that will span multiple months will ensure that you always know where you are, what your next steps are and that your content has meaning – both in relation to other content, but also to your audience.

Picking a suitable topic and sticking to it, or constantly publishing about the same niche is a nice approach. If you want to become a beauty influencer and monetize your passion, you can expand to fashion and cosmetics, but you cannot sell your followers a dog food.

Create your goals, and clearly define what you want to achieve with them. Even if you do have good content, without an obvious goal, you’ll end up nowhere. Focus on your strengths, and evolve with time, explore options but stick to what you are good at. Sit down, dedicate some time to it, and think about the future of what you are doing.

3. Forgetting the Importance of Engagement

We’ve mentioned that even good content isn’t the only thing you should be focused on. While traffic is important, especially if you run a website, think about what makes your audience stay there. Metrics are particularly useful here, as they will allow you to see how many users, sessions, and the duration of visit you have each day.

This will allow you to further customize your content, monetize your social media or blog and create solutions that will provide better results. Use social network channels for content creators and reach out to people; don’t expect them to come to you.

Your content must have a hook, something to draw some potential users; your bait, in this case your content, is worthless without something to tease and give your audiences. You can do that at the same time, and provide value in the form of entertainment and your product or service.

To engage customers, think about their initial goals, what are they are looking for on your website and how you can provide that. Think of it as a journey, and it’s your task to make sure that every part of their journey is effortless for them, and profitable for you.

4. Wrong Content Monetization Method

Content is expensive to produce, and advertising cannot always bring enough profit to cover all the costs. It’s important to think about what you can do to improve that, and a study has found that besides automatic advertising, subscription and sponsored content are the other two top choices. Let’s not forget how easily advertising can be blocked nowadays, so exploring other options is important.

If you are behind a paywall, make sure that you offer enough tiers of customized memberships, as usually a one-size-fits-all method will not be good enough.

Another important thing you need to know is how your money is reaching you. Are you waiting too long for processing, or are you paying high fees? As a publisher, you just want your money available as soon as possible, but blockchain technology can help with that and reduce your monetization time.

Since blockchain technology allows you to set up smart contracts, your users will have to quickly pay before they try to download or repurpose your content, and by cutting out the middleman you will save a lot. Blockchain technology can help you monetize your content more quickly, as well as increase efficiency and trust.

Things to Avoid when Monetizing Your Content

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