During all of our childhoods, we were asked what we wanted to be when we grew up. This question would come up every few years, and we’d have different answers from what we said before.

When we’re still kids, we say things like rockstar or astronaut. Then we hit our teens, and we start looking for more. Some say they want to be cardiothoracic surgeons, while others are preparing to be pilots. Yet, none of us expected to work online for the rest of our lives.

The reality of the world we live in now is that most of the good jobs are online. The jobs that still exist in the real world are almost impossible to get for normal people. That’s why we’ve all flocked to creating and selling our own content online.

However, when you work online, you realize you need ways to monetize your digital content. Luckily, monetizing your content in a digital world can be a piece of cake if you know what steps to take. Keep reading to find out exactly how you can monetize digital content today!

Best Practices for Creating Digital Content

Before we jump into the top ways to monetize your digital content, we should cover the basics. Any content can be monetized – if the content is of high-quality itself.

When you create digital content for your platforms, keep the following in mind:

  • Know your target market;
  • Speak casually and with confidence;
  • Use high-quality media;
  • Provide the best customer service;
  • Always respond to feedback.

 
When you create content, it should always be written for your target users. If the people reading your content can’t relate, any income you make will be minimal.

The more you can include facts or points of intrigue that your users find interesting, the more income you’ll earn.

The most important thing to remember is that you’re providing a service for your audience.

They look for your content to benefit personally from the experience. Content that makes life easier for users is content worth coming back for!

A great way to ensure you provide the best service you can is through a feedback system.

Many publishers directly ask users what they would like to see or ask for topic suggestions. This makes your users feel included and like their opinion matters.

Make sure to form deep relationships with your users. When you prove yourself to people, you gain loyal followers. These are the types of customers who will always return to your content, no matter what.

These customers will support you even when they don’t need anything from you!

What to Avoid When Marketing

While monetizing your digital content is great, you can lose out on all your money if you make too many mistakes.

One or two can be overlooked, but when users are constantly disappointed by your content… Well, it’s safe to say you won’t be getting that car you’ve always dreamed of.

But if you really want to reach your goals, you have to provide the best content you can. That’s why all publishers should avoid these common marketing mistakes:

  • Lazy research or false information;
  • Manipulating or lying to users;
  • Too much focus on money;
  • Improper SEO;
  • Negative content.

 
The worst thing for a user to find out is that the information they’ve been using is false.

When you research for your content, make sure that all the information is valid first! If you knowingly provide false information, you’re only hurting your own income.

An issue that many publishers have is the belief that they need to manipulate or lie to users to get money.

This might work the first time on someone, maybe even a second time. But when your users find out that you’re lying, they will never come back!

This is an issue that stems from focusing on money over providing a service. You will naturally make money when you focus on giving the best service you can.

Users can tell from a mile away if a publisher only cares about money.

Another common mistake made by publishers is uploading negative content.

A few years ago, they did an experiment that showed viewers would rather see sad stories than good ones on the news.

This only applies when users want to know what’s going on in the world. In their normal lives, they want to be surrounded by content that makes them feel good.

The last technical issue that greatly reduces your income is your SEO.

Make sure to run all your content through SEO checkers and look up the best SEO practices for content.

Proven Strategies for Monetizing Digital Content

Now that you’ve got your content in order, we can look at the top ways publishers monetize their digital content.

Some of the most popular ways to monetize your digital content include:

  • Affiliate marketing;
  • Memberships and subscriptions;
  • Emails and newsletters;
  • Display ads;
  • Social media.

 
While these methods are great, don’t limit your content to them. Try any avenue you can that monetizes your content!

Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is a great way for you to effectively monetize your digital content.

Affiliate marketing involves promoting content or products for an affiliate brand or company.

If you go through the Admitad Partner Network, you can easily find an advertiser to partner with.

Admitad has helpful affiliate marketing tools to help you along your journey:

 
Admitad also offers great solutions for any type of publisher, including:

 

In Admitad Store you can browse through all the available advertisers. Once you’ve gotten the hang of promoting your desired advertiser, you can start marketing for popular brands like:

Join Partner Network Now!

When you decide on an advertiser, make sure to check their terms and conditions.

These T&Cs will state their commission rates and expected user actions. This can also define the minimal traffic that you should provide every month.

Though, once you’re happy with an advertiser, you can start marketing your affiliate links.

You can use your standard links that take users to the affiliate homepage.

Or you can use deeplinks that take users straight to product or content pages. These links usually make more money than standard links!

The more places you can promote your affiliate links on, the more an advertiser will pay you.

Memberships and Subscriptions

Memberships and subscriptions are the best ways to monetize your digital content.

A membership gives users the status of “member” and can have multiple levels for users to work up through. Such as a gold membership versus a silver or platinum membership.

Members have access to content and features that normal users don’t. The higher the member level, the more benefits they will receive.

A subscription works in a similar way, except this is usually a monthly payment. A membership can also be a monthly payment, but publishers more often offer a yearly amount.

A free version or teaser content should be available as an incentive for your audience. Give users a taste of what they could receive through a membership or subscription!

Subscriptions and memberships can be done on any platform. They work best when done on a website or blog, but can also be done through social media networks.

Most platforms allow you to keep accounts private and only allow select users access. You can ensure that no one has access unless they’ve paid their membership or subscription fee.

Once they’ve paid, they can view the content as much as they’d like!

Emails and Newsletters

Monetizing content in a digital age can be tough, which is why publishers resort to trusted methods.

Sending emails and newsletters has worked since the Internet came about. While it requires more persuasion nowadays, email marketing is very powerful.

There’s so much you can do through a website or social media account. The best way to monetize your digital content is to put it in front of your users’ faces every day. Nearly all online users keep their email notifications on.

If they see your content pop up on your phone each morning, they’ll start to expect it. Maybe they’ll even click on a link or two when they feel like it.

The point is that they start to rely on seeing your name pop up on their phone.

Your email subject lines are what draw users in. After that, your content will do all the work.

Make sure your links are relatable and stand out.

Personalize your emails as much as possible; it helps if you have a user database for this.

Keep advertising to a minimum so as not to scare away potential customers.

Most importantly, show your users exactly what they’d miss out on if they decide to ignore your email!

Display Ads

If you want to know how to monetize your digital content on a website, you should try out display ads. These networks provide display ads for you to place anywhere on your website.

Advertising networks provide ads in all forms. From sidebar ads to banner ads and links, you can put them anywhere in your articles. As long as you don’t overwhelm your users with too many ads!

However, there is no limit to the number of ads you can place on your site.

When you’re looking for an advertising network, make sure to check:

  • The quality of the ads;
  • If the ad links work;
  • If the ads take users to the right place;
  • How relevant the ads are.

 
Also keep in mind that the network you receive your ads from also defines how quickly the ads load on your website.

An advertising network with slow ads will drastically reduce your page speed.

The slower your page loads, the less likely people are to click on these links.

There are advertising networks that provide ads for platforms beyond websites.

Though, you’ll have to do some digging to find a network that matches your selected niche!

Social Media

Cross-platform marketing is a two-layer monetization strategy. Publishers have been effectively monetizing digital content for years using social media.

The first way that social media monetizes your content is through promotion. The more platforms your content is seen on, the more users can be directed back to your main platform.

Any social media account should act as a teaser for the real content.

This is where combining these methods comes into play.

When you create teaser content on social media, users are sent back to your main website or blog. When they are there, they are blocked by a paywall. A paywall informs users that they must subscribe or be members to continue.

If your content is worth the price, users won’t think twice about buying a subscription.

The other way that social media monetizes content is through built-in publisher features.

Most networks have features that allow content creators to generate an income. Usually, you need a set number of views or followers before you can get paid.

However, there are alternative methods for publishers, such as ConvertSocial.

ConvertSocial is a platform that instantly monetizes popular social networks, such as:

 
If you want to make a big income, you need to use all the monetization methods you can find!

Conclusion

The online world is full of amazing ways to monetize your digital content. However, this guide to monetizing your digital content can only do so much. The rest of the work depends on you and how much effort you’re willing to put in daily.

Whether you use affiliate marketing or display ads, all these methods rely on consistency. Users depend on content that comes out on a regular basis.

Whatever you decide to do, make sure you’re uploading content at least once a week. Every second day would be even better when it comes to marketing online!

If you fail, make sure to dust yourself off and try to market your content in a new way. There are endless ways to promote content. There are even more ways to create your digital content online.

If one method isn’t working, that doesn’t make you a failure. It just means you have to try another marketing strategy until you find one that suits you.