Chapter 31. How to Create Business from a Blog

First, let's agree that there are many ways to create business from a blog. I'll cover a handful to start. You're very welcome to share more advice and ideas in the comments section on my site at http://chrisbrogan.com/comments-from-101.

STRAIGHTFORWARD SALES

Blogs are a wonderful piece of software to use as a home base for several kinds of web site projects. For example, Chris Pearson[141] used a WordPress blog to build his DIYthemes site.[142] There, he's selling a beautiful theme called Thesis.[143] That's one way to create business from a blog: a simple sales platform.

AFFILIATE MARKETING

Another way is through affiliate marketing. For example, go back and hover your mouse over the URL for the two links to Chris's latest project. You should see this: http://diythemes.com?a_aid=t4ag3. That part after the ? is an affiliate code. Some sites don't really divulge that they're doing affiliate marketing. Others make disclosure very vital. Now that you know what to look for, you might check other blogs you read and see when they're slipping you an affiliate tag here and there. (In my case, I fully disclose all such relationships on my About page of my blog—see http://chrisbrogan.com/about.)

Want to learn more about affiliate marketing? I've been reading ReveNews,[144] a blog about the space, and I attend the Affiliate Summit[145] to learn more from the leaders in the game.

LEAD GENERATION

Blogs are a great way to establish thought leadership and, ...

Get Social Media 101: Tactics and Tips to DevelopYour Business Online now with the O’Reilly learning platform.

O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.