How I Made Over 12K In The Last Year Online

The time has come where those self-employed can submit our 19/20 taxes. I’m usually pretty early off the block and submit mine within the first few months. I couldn’t stand the pressure and worry about submitting it in January. Especially if I hadn’t saved enough to pay my bill in full. Within the spreadsheets, I already maintain I have full sight of all of my additional income. Keeping a spreadsheet is one of my top tips on how to make filing your taxes easier. But that’s not what this post is about, this post is about how I made over 12k over the past year online.

That amount is mainly through my blog but also includes a few other side hustles which I will talk about in more detail. But the first thing I want to preface is that I didn’t start earning money from my blog for a few years. I started writing (and still write) because of my passion for writing. I didn’t set out to make money from it and to be honest, didn’t really know you could 4/5 years ago. It takes a lot of hard work and time to do but I want to show you that it is possible to make a good part-time income from it.

I have always worked full-time alongside my freelance/ blogging work. For a period I didn’t have a lot of spare time as I spent most evenings and weekends working away. I did find my balance eventually but it still takes time and work. But that’s time I’m willing to put in because I love it. But I know what you’re all here for, you want to know more about how I made over 12k online.

Sponsored content

The bulk of the money I make and a large chunk of how I made over 12k last tax year is through sponsored content. Generally, mine is through agencies who want to either promote a product or gain a link to their site from mine. Back at the end of 2018 and the start of 2019, my DA was up to 42 and I earned a lot of money per post for sponsored content. But when MOZ all changed I dropped to 33 and haven’t moved an inch since. I did see a bit of a shift in how much I made, but thankfully it wasn’t too much.

I don’t accept everything that’s thrown my way. In fact, I probably accept less than 50% of the offers I make. Sometimes the budgets are too low, sometimes the brand wants too much control over the post, or more often than not the item/ site I’m asked to promote just doesn’t fit with my brand. The sponsored content generally comes from one of four places:

1. The brand/ agency contacts me directly either because they’ve found my site or I’ve been recommended
2. I applied for a campaign directly from the brand through a site or Facebook group
3. Ongoing relationships. There are some PRs and agencies that I have ongoing relationships with and do multiple campaigns and work for.
4. Pitches I send directly to brands. This is the least common one for me as I don’t tend to pitch that often but this is something I want to do more of

For me, this is the biggest part of how I made over 12k online last year.

Blogger Outreach

In a previous job I was in, I did a lot of blogger outreach and it was something I loved doing. I loved the communication with bloggers and discussing ideas that would fit their job. And I currently do blogger outreach for two clients independently. Due to everything going on in the world the jobs are paused at the moment, but I work on a monthly basis with them both.

For my roles with this, I find suitable bloggers for the brands and work with them on sponsored content. I won’t go into much detail on what I earn from these but for one it’s a monthly retainer, and for another, it’s a cost per link I get for them. While this side-hustle has a lot of admin involved with emails and spreadsheets I do love it. And I love working with bloggers (for the most part!) I’d love to take on more clients for blogger outreach, especially in different niches and fields.

How I made over 12k online: Freelance work

This is probably the area I have made the least amount of money in as I’ve only done about 3 or 4 pieces of freelance work, but it’s a start. A few of them are linked in my sidebar, and a few are pieces I ghostwrote for websites. I’ve written a few very personal pieces for The Metro and I’m in the process of writing one for INews as well.

This is one of the areas I really want to push in 2020/2021 as it’s an area I love so much and there’s so much scope for it. For me, the hardest part I find is the initial pitch, especially if it’s not in response to a shout-out on social media. But this is a big challenge for me to take on.

Social media promotion

Again this is another small section in the overall area of how I made over 12k online last year. But it played a small part. For me generally, social media promotion on Twitter/ Pinterest happens with most blog posts I write. But Instagram is where I made a little bit of money through feed images. I don’t do a lot of ads’s on my Instagram (especially not paid ones), but I did get a few through Tribe in 2019/20.

Photography is an area I’m working very hard on improving both my skills and creativity in. And this may be why I haven’t done as much as I would have liked. The other reason is that I struggle to know where/ how to apply for paid Instagram content.

Other very small ways I make money online

There are a few other things that have literally made me a few pounds here and there online. It’s nowhere near enough to talk about individually but it includes:

1. Cashback- I am getting back into using cashback sites for all of my online purchases as it’s free money for shopping. I use Quidco at the moment as I find it the easiest and best site to use.
2. 20c0gs- I made about £150 through 20cogs through completing and signing up to their offers. I talk about it in more detail through this post about how you can make free money on 20 cogs.
3. Affiliate marketing– I don’t do much affiliate marketing on my blog but it made me a few pounds over the year. For some bloggers, this is the main way they make their income so it really differs from person to person.

Do you make money online?

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