So you guys know that I am honest to a fault right? I get emails all the time asking how I do what I do with Vintage Revivals. So I have decided to share my secrets! Its going to be a continual series so if you want answers make sure you leave a comment or send me an email with your question!

Ok so Vintage Revivals is almost a year old (at the end of July)  I have learned a lot of things in this year, one of them being how to make money by blogging about what you love.

You probably have noticed that I don’t have a lot of sidebar ads. I don’t really promote etsy shops etc. This is perfect for some people. But not me. Why?

Around Nov. I started getting interest from people wanting to advertise on VR. I was over the moon excited,  I mean gosh they want to advertise on MY blog? Awesome! So I started with sidebar ads and giveaways. But then something happened.

I love love love the companies that advertised and this has nothing to do with them in particular but I felt like my blog was turning into “Here is my newest sponsor”, “Here is my newest sponsors giveaway”, “Here is my other new sponsor” etc. Do you know what I am talking about?

I decided that it was making the content of my blog seem a little watered down, you know when you post just to post?

So I stopped accepting advertisers. There are tons of successful blogs that sell ad space but it wasn’t right for me, that is a decision that you have to make for yourself. I don’t look down or criticize blogs that do that at all, I think they have worked out a great system and who knows maybe someday I will start that again, but for now here is how I am making a little bit of cash.

Have you ever heard of an ad network? There are tons of different ones out there. They pay different ways and do things differently. I am part of 3 so here is the low down on them. The common thread with all of these companies is that they want you to share YOUR opinion 100%.

Social Spark is an ad network where you write blog posts about a certain company or subject.

The Good:

You set your price and then they send you offers from all different types of companies. You can either accept or decline the offer. They tell you in advance how much each campaign is worth. They range anywhere from $5.00 to hundreds. They work with a lot of large brands and have AMAZING customer service.

The Not So Good:

You just have to make sure that you are blogging with what you feel comfortable with. I get offers daily from Social Spark. Most have nothing to do with my blog so I don’t accept them. You can determine yourself what is right for your blog. I just choose to keep mine on the topic of my niche.

You can see an example of a post I did that was sponsored by Social Spark and Pier 1 here.

Rivit is an ad network that runs banner ads on your sidebar.

The Good:

Rivit pays per CPM which means that each ad that runs has a set price for every 1000 times your blog is viewed. The ads have a CPM of between $.40 and $4.00 depending on the campaign. Unlike Google Adsense it is not based on a CTR (Click Through Rate)though the higher your CTR is the better ads you get…  Basically you are doing nothing, other than putting the HTML on your sidebar. And you guys should know that I am a big relationship builder,  and they have the cutest girl running the show over there that I adore named Stacy. She is pretty much wonder woman.

The Not So Good:

Havent found anything yet. The ads that run are pretty relevant to my site, if I had to choose something I would say that the one thing I don’t love is that you don’t know how much your average CPM rate is a day. It just fluctuates. But its not a biggie to me.

UPDATE:  I would no longer recommend Rivit. Their CPMs are very very low and they are not good about paying on time.

Clever Girls is the third company that I am a part of. They are kind of a combo of the first two. In that there are sponsored posts and you can apply to be a part of their sidebar ad network

The Good:

The Ladies that run Clever Girls are HILARIOUS. They are like the cool funny girls that want to be friends with everyone. Seriously I laugh out loud at the newsletters and tweets they send out with the opportunities. If you want to participate you reply to the email. I have not done a Clever Girl post yet because I have been so busy, but I am really looking forward to it.

The Not So Good:

Haven’t found anything yet! I am quite new over there still.

So there are a few ways to contribute to your thrifting/grocery fund.

Personally I think its great to belong to more than 1 network because you can get a lot of different opportunities coming your way.

And here is the best part. They all look for blogs that are big and small!!

So click over and sign up! Even if your blog is small and you only make $50 that’s like a whole new dresser people!

And in the policy of full disclosure I have not been asked or compensated by any of the above companies to blog about this subject. I just wish that someone would have showed me when I started!

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