Make Money On The Internet | Make Money Online

The Internet is the new Gold rush, and publishers and content marketers are constantly seeking online business models that will help them make a fortune. There is an array of such models that can be utilised to make money.

Remember you don’t have to limit yourself to one model. The best strategy is to use a mix that fits your company, your brand, your audience and your expertise.

Selling sponsorships

From exclusive branding of specific topics to e-mail newsletter sponsorship, online sponsorships have great potential. One proven way in this model is when an advertiser sponsors a white paper or a video component and when it is downloaded, shares the recipient’s email contact information.

Selling listings

From jobs to directory services, an array of listings can be the focus as advertisers value this content. Generally, websites that sell listings are self-service. Whether the content is job listings or a directory of services, the advertiser can input the content and pay for their advertisement by charging a credit card or any other payment method.

Selling impressions

If you have great content, why not sell ad space adjacent to it? A good example of this is Forbes.com — one of the largest business-to-business (B2B) websites in the world in terms of overall traffic. This website gets between 12 million and 14 million unique visitors monthly.

It is estimated that Forbes.com generates $200 million annually online, with somewhere between a third and a half derived from advertising sales. With its interesting model, Forbes.com does not sell run-of-site advertising but position, section, and adjacency to editorial content.

Selling clicks

One of the best publishers known for selling clicks is About.com, which is one of Google’s top advertising partners. About.com is a collection of 456 websites on specific niche topics — everything from knitting to travel to fishing. It is the 12th largest website in the US, with 38 million visitors per month. About.com makes about $150 million a year in revenue and drops about $60 million to the bottom line — a very profitable website for its owner, the New York Times.

The About.com content providers or guides are experts at both Search Engine Optimisation and link-building, thus attracting enormous inbound traffic from Google, and monetising their webpages with Google AdSense.

Selling leads

In a lead-generation business model, everyone benefits. Advertisers and publishers can receive users’ contact information if positioned correctly. The publisher increases the amount of content available on their site, while getting paid each time a user is interested in the content. The user gets immediate access to in-depth information. The advertiser gets immediate access to the lead and adds to its robust master file of leads.