The Media Supermarket

I made it clear to myself from the beginning that this will be a business blog, with a commercial side to it. At the same time, it is not intended solely for selling products and services. I really enjoy writing and sharing my experiences and thoughts with people. Since the main topics discussed here are related to business, I might as well apply them and gain some experience in making money through this new medium.
It’s been a bit more than a quarter since this blog has started, and I want to participate in Shai Coggins’ $100 challenge, to share the results and experience.
I’m using a variety of techniques and revenue streams to monetize the blog. Right now, I’m in the stage of experimenting with different methods, and looking for the best way to utilize each.
Monetization efforts range from totally passive income techniques, to techniques that get offline connections and result in business transactions. Therefore, I’ll group my methods to three groups: passive income, cost-per-action methods, and marketing methods that bring prospective clients.

Passive Income:The type of program that rewards me whenever a user clicks on an ad, without me having to convince the reader of anything, hence the name.

• Google Adsense:The ad system that pays bloggers for each click a user clicks on any of their ads. All I have to do is find how out to attract (and keep) visitors, and hopefully they will find the ads relevant for them, click on them, to result in money paid for me.
• Bidvertiser: The same system, but with a different network of adverisers.
• Kontera: Also pays per click, but in a different way. Their ads are the highlighted and underlined with double orange line. They also depend on context. If you hover over any of these orange link, a box with information appears. I get paid if you click on them. I just discovered they have new really cool formats, ranging from simple text, to pictures, video and flash. I’m going to start testing them.
  $0.78 was generated so far from these systems.

Cost per action (sale) systems: The ones that reward me if and only if the reader takes a certain type of action, buying a product for example. They are also called affiliate programs.

• Toolbars: Halfway between passive income and CPA, are toolbars. I create the toolbars, and hope to promote them as much as possible. I am rewarded the more people download and use them. I have already made my first $100 through Conduit, but it’s only redeemable when I reach the $250 level. Agloco is another system, where everyone who installs it gets to share the profits. This toolbar is supposed be released sometime during March ‘07.
• Auction Ads: These are eBay auctions featured on my site. I get to keep the profit made out of the sales if one of my readers makes a purchase through my blog.
• Text Link Ads: It’s an affiliate program, where if you sign up through my site and get accepted, I am rewarded.

Cost per (my) action: Programs that pay me for an action on my side, for example writing a post and / or linking to a certain site. PayPerPost and Blogsvertise are the two systems I am working with right now. I am still experimenting with these two systems, and already wrote two posts, one for each. I’m supposed to be paid $15 for these two posts. Blogitive is another similar system for which I applied. I was asked to make some changes, which I did, and hope for acceptance soon.

Marketing for prospective clients: I’m working on promoting my toolbars, The Middle East Media Guide, Mediadisk, and my services as a copywriter and translator. I got an offer to work with Textappeal, a company that works on providing advertisers with messages translated while taking into consideration the cultural implications of the target audience. More importantly, this blog was responsible for getting me an offer to work with the biggest Arab online community, which I gladly accepted:)

This is how my first quarter looked like. I think the results are great, and got me to really unexpected places and people, which I would never have found. My financial goals are mugh higher than this, and I’m constantly looking for more ways of providing value and quality content. More important to me, is growing, learning, and connecting with more and more people of similar interests.