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Is it crazy to share revenue with your blog's readers?

by x3xsolxdierx3x
38 replies
I see very few people that give back to their readers, with only an occasional contest/drawing, of course, structured specifically to gain further publicity and reinforce their own personal brand and site.

Is sharing revenue with readers, on a consistent basis, that crazy of an idea?

An even deeper question...do you ever feel like you contribute a ton of valuable insights/comments and never receive anything really in return?

How would you plan and execute a revenue sharing arrangement? Thoughts?
#blog #crazy #readers #revenue #share
  • Profile picture of the author VanessaB
    Isn't this exactly what Squidoo's model is based on?

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  • Profile picture of the author tht222
    Share revenue with people that contribute to your blog - like write posts, articles, etc. A lot of people get online to have fun, share, and get involved in something that interests them, and giving them some $$$ is just like an bonus to them.

    You get free content and they get some beer money - it's a win-win.
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    • Profile picture of the author adrianwinston
      Originally Posted by tht222 View Post

      Share revenue with people that contribute to your blog - like write posts, articles, etc. A lot of people get online to have fun, share, and get involved in something that interests them, and giving them some $$$ is just like an bonus to them.

      You get free content and they get some beer money - it's a win-win.
      Agreed, a more incentive to post. DP did it, I don't think google liked it though :\
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      • Profile picture of the author x3xsolxdierx3x
        Maybe this is just thinking outside of the box, but, do you all think that Adsense needs to be used in order to effectively share revenue?

        ....I've been very vocal about NOT using adsense on blogs....the ONLY way I'd display it is if there were some way I could share that revenue with readers. Unfortunately, that gets into murky waters as people may just click to earn from it or something.
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        • Profile picture of the author adrianwinston
          Originally Posted by x3xsolxdierx3x View Post

          Maybe this is just thinking outside of the box, but, do you all think that Adsense needs to be used in order to effectively share revenue?

          ....I've been very vocal about NOT using adsense on blogs....the ONLY way I'd display it is if there were some way I could share that revenue with readers. Unfortunately, that gets into murky waters as people may just click to earn from it or something.
          One thing many DP users did I assume, google will hate it and punish you. Then you need to write a post explaining their TOS. LOL!
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  • Profile picture of the author hetalamish
    No.. It is not at all crazy idea to share revenue with readers.However if you are a genuine blogger than it is like you are adding value to your work. With revenue sharing you are actually sharing your good and bad both.. Which shows your transparency. Many successful bloggers share their revenues on there blog and they are really role model for people like me who wants to earn online.
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    • Profile picture of the author x3xsolxdierx3x
      Originally Posted by hetalamish View Post

      No.. It is not at all crazy idea to share revenue with readers.However if you are a genuine blogger than it is like you are adding value to your work. With revenue sharing you are actually sharing your good and bad both.. Which shows your transparency. Many successful bloggers share their revenues on there blog and they are really role model for people like me who wants to earn online.
      This thread was actually begun about 2+ weeks ago, fwiw...I see it was bumped up....

      look at all the top Make Money Online blogs....how many of them share revenue with the readers that give them so much? I stopped commenting on 99% of their blogs because, I would dedicate so much time to blogging, and most of the time, I never even received a response back (in the comment section, or by email....)...and, I'm pretty sure many of them have ghost writers cranking out their content as well....which puts everything from generosity to transparency in question....

      I think it just may be time to try a new approach to blogging....
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      • Profile picture of the author JohnMcCabe
        I can see a couple of problems with some type of 'paid to read' model...

        > Someone will figure out a way to game your system and steal your money.

        > Some sponsors may consider it 'incentivised traffic' and disallow it.
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        • Profile picture of the author x3xsolxdierx3x
          Originally Posted by JohnMcCabe View Post

          I can see a couple of problems with some type of 'paid to read' model...

          > Someone will figure out a way to game your system and steal your money.

          > Some sponsors may consider it 'incentivised traffic' and disallow it.
          They aren't really be 'paid to read' though....it would simply be devising a system to give back to people, via revenue share, who 'give back' to the blog....essentially, incentivizing people moreso to contribute comments, digg posts, etc...
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          • Profile picture of the author JohnMcCabe
            Originally Posted by x3xsolxdierx3x View Post

            They aren't really be 'paid to read' though....it would simply be devising a system to give back to people, via revenue share, who 'give back' to the blog....essentially, incentivizing people moreso to contribute comments, digg posts, etc...
            Ah, so we're talking about a different animal. From your original post, I thought you were trying to find a way to reward people for simply reading your blog.

            What you really want to do is encourage and reward valuable participation. It would take some doing, again to prevent gaming the system, but it's an interesting idea.

            I seem to recall a site back around the time of the dotcom bubble that was doing something similar. It was starting to gain some traction, and they went out of business because they owed payments before they collected revenues. I.E., Amazon pays ~60 days after sale, so promising payment monthly would cause cash flow problems.
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            • Profile picture of the author x3xsolxdierx3x
              John,

              I really appreciate the bloggers who have been transparent about their earnings and endeavors in the online world...there seems to be a new breed of these bloggers emerging, however, none that I can find have developed a bit of a blog business model around revenue share. Along with their transparency, I have been able to really analyze what kind of earnings could be expected, and through which kind of monetization methods.....I think certain affiliate programs, integrated with a structured and clearly defined revenue share arrangement, could REALLY incentivize readers comment, digg, share on facebook, etc...


              Originally Posted by JohnMcCabe View Post

              Ah, so we're talking about a different animal. From your original post, I thought you were trying to find a way to reward people for simply reading your blog.

              What you really want to do is encourage and reward valuable participation. It would take some doing, again to prevent gaming the system, but it's an interesting idea.

              I seem to recall a site back around the time of the dotcom bubble that was doing something similar. It was starting to gain some traction, and they went out of business because they owed payments before they collected revenues. I.E., Amazon pays ~60 days after sale, so promising payment monthly would cause cash flow problems.
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              • Profile picture of the author psresearch
                As far as incentivizing comments I would imagine you'd need a way to reward higher quality comments. I know there are systems out there that do that already although I can't think of one off the top of my head. And there was a really popular one that closed down a couple years ago.
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  • Profile picture of the author StrikeNet
    We are looking into paying people a certain % of ad revenue if they link to our sites. That's sort of an affiliate deal, but it's a little like paying readers.

    Kinda similar idea...
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  • Profile picture of the author tpw
    I have seen a few people do this, and without fail, it has led to failure anyway...

    When you are sharing revenue with readers, you better not put the adsense on the site, because people will make fraudulent clicks so they can be paid more...

    The real issue is the fallacy of your original question...

    Originally Posted by x3xsolxdierx3x View Post

    I see very few people that give back to their readers...

    An even deeper question...do you ever feel like you contribute a ton of valuable insights/comments and never receive anything really in return?
    Value comes in many formats... Money is not always "the value that people seek" from you...

    If your blog product is solid and you have regular visitors to your blog, then obviously YOU ARE GIVING VALUE TO YOUR READERS ALREADY....

    Although you may not see it, your readers do, or else they would never bother to come back to your site...

    I contribute to WF frequently, yet Allen Says does not feel a need to share his revenue with me, and why should he anyway... (But hey Allen, if you were considering this, keep me on your list...) LOL

    When I first started online, I had a newsletter...

    I wanted more interactive participation, and I told people that if they participated, I would give them free advertising in the newsletter...

    People participated anyway, but 99% of readers did not have a donkey to sell... Only one guy ever took me up on the advertising opportunity... Everyone else was just happy to participate...

    In my newsletter, those other people were happy to see their name in lights... It was really that easy...
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    • Profile picture of the author rprost
      Originally Posted by tpw View Post

      When you are sharing revenue with readers, you better not put the adsense on the site, because people will make fraudulent clicks so they can be paid more...
      I thought the same thing, it would be a good way to increase adsense atleast until you got banned, but Squidoo gets away with it, so maybe you can do it.
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  • Profile picture of the author garyv
    If your blog has a narrow niche, then you could possibly share revenue w/ those that buy what you're promoting. It would essentially just be a discount, but might be more incentive for some people to give them cash back. This is essentially the business model of fatwallet.com - They pay people that visit their site, and buy from their affiliate links.
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    • Profile picture of the author tpw
      Originally Posted by garyv View Post

      If your blog has a narrow niche, then you could possibly share revenue w/ those that buy what you're promoting. It would essentially just be a discount, but might be more incentive for some people to give them cash back. This is essentially the business model of fatwallet.com - They pay people that visit their site, and buy from their affiliate links.
      That would be an incentive program that I can believe in for long-term profits...
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  • Profile picture of the author Peter.J
    I am running one such site at the moment, where I share 80% adsense revenue with the people that post on the site as well as 50% ad revenue from advertisers that we gain, over 600 affiliate groups etc...so far so good, but we did have to change the adsense system as I came across someone abusing it.
    So tread with caution when dealing with the big G.
    If you want some help let me know
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    • Profile picture of the author x3xsolxdierx3x
      ....but, honestly, I don't think Adsense would be the way to go with this, at all....at least not for a personal blog....

      Not only could people seriously click-bomb your account, and make you a threat to advertisers, but they could also just click ads relentlessly in order to earn higher revenue.....
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      • Profile picture of the author adrianwinston
        Originally Posted by x3xsolxdierx3x View Post

        ....but, honestly, I don't think Adsense would be the way to go with this, at all....at least not for a personal blog....

        Not only could people seriously click-bomb your account, and make you a threat to advertisers, but they could also just click ads relentlessly in order to earn higher revenue.....
        In which case, you get banned or warned. That's what stinks, if Google can devour the web, see what your looking for they should ban the user not the publisher.
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  • Profile picture of the author Peter.J
    That is true, adsense is an easy target for outsiders to manipulate to add extra revenue, although google does have a very good algo to determine whether the click is real or not, and picks up uncommon actions. Hence the fact I got someone to handle that for me, so everyone no matter what has an equal chance of earning without my account at Google being banned.
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    • Profile picture of the author adrianwinston
      Originally Posted by Peter.J View Post

      That is true, adsense is an easy target for outsiders to manipulate to add extra revenue, although google does have a very good algo to determine whether the click is real or not, and picks up uncommon actions. Hence the fact I got someone to handle that for me, so everyone no matter what has an equal chance of earning without my account at Google being banned.
      Whoa, that's good news. Actually quite interesting, thanks for sharing that.
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      • Profile picture of the author Peter.J
        Originally Posted by adrianwinston View Post

        Whoa, that's good news. Actually quite interesting, thanks for sharing that.
        If you are the victim of a script that bombs your adsense the best and cheapest route is to get tracking software that measures your clicks pages, it will log all the clicks as well as the IP from where it originates and then you simply send Google the report. Hopefully they will be kind enough to see it is not you and will not ban your account.
        Statcount works well for this.
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        • Profile picture of the author x3xsolxdierx3x
          Originally Posted by Peter.J View Post

          If you are the victim of a script that bombs your adsense the best and cheapest route is to get tracking software that measures your clicks pages, it will log all the clicks as well as the IP from where it originates and then you simply send Google the report. Hopefully they will be kind enough to see it is not you and will not ban your account.
          Statcount works well for this.
          In a different thread "John Mcaabe" here referenced loosing his Adsense account because his account was essentially click-bombed relentlessly....when he explained the situation to Google, he said, they essentially agree with him, but still decided to keep his account closed because they saw his account as a bit of a liability to advertisers....

          I wouldn't touch adsense with a 50 foot pole, at least not for a personal blog...

          Can anyone thing of any other way a revenue share could effectively be executed on a blog?
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          • Profile picture of the author Peter.J
            Originally Posted by x3xsolxdierx3x View Post

            In a different thread "John Mcaabe" here referenced loosing his Adsense account because his account was essentially click-bombed relentlessly....when he explained the situation to Google, he said, they essentially agree with him, but still decided to keep his account closed because they saw his account as a bit of a liability to advertisers....

            I wouldn't touch adsense with a 50 foot pole, at least not for a personal blog...

            Can anyone thing of any other way a revenue share could effectively be executed on a blog?
            Yes I could see this happening, as I said if Google is feeling kind enough they will not ban you, I have heard and spoke to people using this technique as I did a lot of research before starting my site.

            Also, I did get someone to write me a program where when a user registers they automatically uploaded in our system to track their posts and earnings. I implemented that with another program which fetches kewords, tags, pages etc to display affiliate links which in turn is posted on each posters articles. So a user can read on lets say marketing, some of the keywords will be highlighted with affiliate links for readers.

            I already paid a member of mine $50 with this method. It works but as someone mentioned above I had to pay for it to be developed.
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            • Profile picture of the author x3xsolxdierx3x
              Peter,

              I've been analyzing your site, and based on some of the research I've done on similar sites....I'm not so sure that I would offer a flat out 80% revenue share. Instead, I would implement some kind of system that uses an escalating revenue share tied in with contests or competitions in order to motivate people contribute a high quantity of high quality content. What if you began with, say, a 60% revenue share, and implement a points system that would give incremental increases in revenue share, with a cap of maybe 90%? (What do you think?) I think have everyone earn a flat 80% can limit people, and not really distinguish the high achievers from those who don't want to really invest much time into the site....

              Originally Posted by Peter.J View Post

              Yes I could see this happening, as I said if Google is feeling kind enough they will not ban you, I have heard and spoke to people using this technique as I did a lot of research before starting my site.

              Also, I did get someone to write me a program where when a user registers they automatically uploaded in our system to track their posts and earnings. I implemented that with another program which fetches kewords, tags, pages etc to display affiliate links which in turn is posted on each posters articles. So a user can read on lets say marketing, some of the keywords will be highlighted with affiliate links for readers.

              I already paid a member of mine $50 with this method. It works but as someone mentioned above I had to pay for it to be developed.
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              • Profile picture of the author Peter.J
                Originally Posted by x3xsolxdierx3x View Post

                Peter,

                I've been analyzing your site, and based on some of the research I've done on similar sites....I'm not so sure that I would offer a flat out 80% revenue share. Instead, I would implement some kind of system that uses an escalating revenue share tied in with contests or competitions in order to motivate people contribute a high quantity of high quality content. What if you began with, say, a 60% revenue share, and implement a points system that would give incremental increases in revenue share, with a cap of maybe 90%? (What do you think?) I think have everyone earn a flat 80% can limit people, and not really distinguish the high achievers from those who don't want to really invest much time into the site....
                I agree 100% with what you saying. Only problem is that the site really has to be special for someone to agree to this, some sites that offer the same service start from 70% and I have seen 2 that gives full 100% share revenue. Now adsense can give you a nice couple of dollars but you need a high click through ratio, so this is why I implemented the affiliate networks, you can earn much more with this. Also I am in the process of landing a deal to obtain roughly 4000 affiliate site (currently I have just over 600) for a greater number of products for the users to generate income from.

                I do like the idea of escalating the share with a point system, I have not yet come across a site which does that. I cannot at this time, I already spent over my budget get the various programs what I am running currently. Fantastic idea though.
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                • Profile picture of the author x3xsolxdierx3x
                  I know of one. I'll PM you Peter....you can use it as a reference.

                  Originally Posted by Peter.J View Post

                  I agree 100% with what you saying. Only problem is that the site really has to be special for someone to agree to this, some sites that offer the same service start from 70% and I have seen 2 that gives full 100% share revenue. Now adsense can give you a nice couple of dollars but you need a high click through ratio, so this is why I implemented the affiliate networks, you can earn much more with this. Also I am in the process of landing a deal to obtain roughly 4000 affiliate site (currently I have just over 600) for a greater number of products for the users to generate income from.

                  I do like the idea of escalating the share with a point system, I have not yet come across a site which does that. I cannot at this time, I already spent over my budget get the various programs what I am running currently. Fantastic idea though.
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                  • Profile picture of the author JohnMcCabe
                    Originally Posted by Peter.J View Post

                    If you are the victim of a script that bombs your adsense the best and cheapest route is to get tracking software that measures your clicks pages, it will log all the clicks as well as the IP from where it originates and then you simply send Google the report. Hopefully they will be kind enough to see it is not you and will not ban your account.
                    Statcount works well for this.
                    Not trying to hijack the thread, but "Google" and "kind" do not belong in the same sentence.

                    I can't even say I fault their reasoning.

                    If I pissed off a syndicate enough to click-bomb one site, the syndicate will likely continue the assault on a new site as well. And fraudulent clicks are a detriment to the advertisers, from both a cost and statistical view.

                    I'll admit I was seriously torqued off when I got that "we believe you did nothing wrong, but your account is still closed" email, but in the cool light of day, I understand why they did it.
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  • Profile picture of the author Fraggler
    If you don't want to use AdSense you can use any monetisation method that allows for custom subids...

    Programmatically assign the subid to each offer and split it from there.

    You could also assign one ad-spot to whatever ad code the user would like to insert. Moderate it to prevent dodgy code. You have your own advertising on other places on the page. This means the user can put adsense on if they want or their own banner to a cpa offer or other affiliate program.

    You could also look for software that allows you to make your own 'cpa network' and allows the users to choose an ad from there...They then have a backend to login to check their earnings and other stats.

    Competitions are probably the easiest way to go though...

    If your market is new to the internet and not familiar with internet marketing then an Amazon voucher is more measurable than potential residual income.
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  • Profile picture of the author Peter.J
    Another thing, which a number of people are doing already and hopefully I will implement it before this weekend is a referal system. So if you a member of the site you earn X amount, if you bring friends, relatives or whoever else maybe 20% or 30% of their earnings go to you.

    Just have to work the math out of that one though.
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  • Profile picture of the author bhuff85
    Did you have someone design this blog for you? One of the blogs I frequent (Smart Passive Income by Pat Flynn) has a similar looking layout (one which I really like, too). Just wondering who designed it, as I'm in the market for a unique design that is similar to this layout, although not the same. Just need to find a solid Wordpress designer who can get me a killer layout!
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  • Profile picture of the author DogScout
    Instead of revenue... pay in links (through guest posts) to their sites? Maybe even no follow?
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