If you are wanting to make money by blogging, there are two ways that you can go about it. You can either start your own blog or offer some sort of freelance service. Both are viable options to earn money, but which one is the best? This was one of the questions that I was asking before I decided to shoot for the stars with this blog. While I have decided to stick to owning blogs, it isn’t always the best option. Here’s a brief overview of the pro’s and con’s of each one.
Owning Blogs
Owning multiple blogs offers you the ability to earn more money from advertising. The basic idea is that if you have one site that advertisers are contacting you for, you can also mention that you run advertising for multiple other blogs and that perhaps they would be interested in advertising on these sites as well. This increases your earning potential. If you are able to build up the site enough to the point that you are earning a decent income, you can even hire a staff writer to take care of writing for you. This allows for true passive income.
The only downside to taking this route is that it takes time to build up a site. You can choose the path of purchasing already established sites to shorten this period, but this requires money to invest. Either way, it means that it is going to take some time before you are seeing a huge return on your investment (whether it’s time or money).
Staff Writing
Staff writing offers a lot of benefits. Most importantly, it’s a steady source of income right now. There is no waiting around for money to trickle in. It is immediate – well, usually paid monthly. Staff writing for a blog also offers you very limited responsibility – this means less of a time commitment. You do not have to worry about having to optimize SEO or networking or the many other things that come with owning a blog. Instead, it offers you cold, hard cash.
While it does offer you immediate cash, it doesn’t offer you much growth potential. Usually it means that you are paid X amount per article that you write. This can be a great supplemental income, but it is hard to earn a living off of it. One of my blogging friends was once writing for 11 different blogs as a staff writer. She said that with all of that work, she was making about $1,000 per month. This sounds like a lot of money, but this is a lot of effort as well.
Why I Choose Owning Blogs
As I mentioned, I have chosen to go the route of owning blogs. The potential for growth and the option for turning it into almost truly passive income (by hiring staff writers) seems most exciting to me. It allows me to stick to my goal of retiring in 2-3 years and only having to work 3 days a week. Early retirement is made possible by having multiple blogs.
What do you think? Do You Prefer Having Multiple Blogs or Staff Writing?
When I got to the point where I felt my original blog (Money Beagle) was manageable, I looked into creating a second blog. And I did! I agree, owning is better. You have more of an interest and desire in making it succeed and if you channel that energy, it can take you much further.
Nice – Yes, I think your second blog is going to be great!
It is the difference between being an owner or an employee. The sacrifice of ownership can be onerous at first but the benefits are also much better assuming that the venture succeeds. Being an employee brings limited responsibility but also limited reward. I choose to own.
I agree. Some people prefer to be an employee, but I am finding that I don’t like it as much as I used to.
I would love to have a mixture of both. I definitely would like to start up another blog that is a bit more SEO friendly, and perhaps do some staff writing in the future. But I don’t see myself ever leaving my day job. The benefits are just too good. so that severely limits the time and effort I can contribute to blogging.
Yes, time always plays a factor.
I’d rather be the owner as well since there is way more potential. But I’ve also done some staff writing to add an extra income stream and build up some link power at the same time.
Very good point. Staff writing does help give you some link juice while getting paid. Can’t beat that.
Since I’ve just entered the blogging world so to speak, I was wondering about this sort of thing so I’m glad you brought it up. One of the reasons I’m starting to blog is so that one day I can be my own boss. I think owning a blog is the right way to go (at least for me). If I didn’t have a day job, then I’m sure having some steady income while building a blog up would be great though.
I think it’s better to own blogs because there’s only so much money that you can make from staff writing. Owning is just more scalable. There are many more possibilities. On the flip side, you’re accountable for all of your income.
I tend to agree (obviously). I like the idea of having a huge earning potential.
[...] PITR presents Owning Blogs vs. Staff Writing posted at Passive Income To Retire, saying, To earn money online, you can do one of two things. Find out what is the best way to make money online. [...]
Ownership carries with it responsibility and a few headaches, but it appears easier for online properties, versus a traditional brick-and-mortar business.
[...] Income To Retire : Owning Blogs vs. Staff Writing – To earn money online, you can do one of two things. Find out what is the best way to make [...]
[...] from Passive Income To Retire presents Owning Blogs vs. Staff Writing, and says, “To earn money online, you can do one of two things. Find out what is the best way [...]
[...] presents Owning Blogs vs. Staff Writing posted at Passive Income To Retire, saying, “To earn money online, you can do one of two [...]
[...] at Passive Income To Retire presents Owning Blogs vs. Staff Writing, saying “To earn money online, you can do one of two things. Find out what is the best way to [...]
[...] presents Owning Blogs vs. Staff Writing posted at Passive Income To Retire. To earn money online, you can do one of two things. Find out [...]
[...] Passive Income to Retire Owning Blogs vs. Staff Writing To earn money online, you can do one of two things. Find out what is the best way to make money [...]
The one thing I found about hiring staff writers for my site is that I still spend a lot of time editing the content and making it more SEO friendly. While the content is usually good, I still want it to fit my site.
I found out that as much as I thought hiring staff writers would make for truly passive income – it was not.
Thanks for that information. That is very helpful as I plan out my future strategy.
[...] few months ago I wrote a post about the benefits of owning blogs vs. staff writing. In the post, I came to the conclusion that my strategy is going to be owning multiple blogs. I do [...]