Do you want to sell some advertising on your blog?

When most people start a blog with the aim of earning some money from it, their thoughts generally turn to selling advertising. In time, they will realise that selling space on a blog is only one strategy for monetisation, and they'll begin to explore other areas.

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But for now, let's consider advertising sales. How do you get people to want to place an advertisement on your blog, and more importantly pay for it?

In simple terms, you need to become a sales person. And that often doesn't come naturally to a writer. Throwing up a page telling people they can advertise with you, and quoting your rates won't work, until you have loads of traffic and keep appearing in search.

Here are some simple steps you can follow for a "soft sell" approach to a business you think would be a good fit for an advert on your site.

1/ Identify a target business

What would interest your readers? What do they buy? Once you know the answer, then search for companies that can offer what they want and need. Use some common sense here. On my scuba blog, there's no point in trying to get Inmotion Hosting or Aweber to advertise, but it does make sense for Dive gear manufacturers and people who sell diving vacations to be on there.

2/ Give them some attention

Write something about them, or one of their products. It could be a review, or a piece of news you've garnered from their own website. Maybe you have some personal experience of one of their products or services?

3/ Find out who the decision maker is

This will usually take a phone call, but you need to know who's responsible for advertising and PR in the business. Once you have their name, find them on Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin and anywhere else you can.

4/ Email them or DM them the link to the post you wrote in point one.

Don't be pushy, just send them the link with a short message that says something like "I just wanted to let you know I wrote about xxxx the other day, and I thought you'd be interested in seeing it."

5/ Interact with the company / individual

If they have a blog with comments on it, then start leaving some. If you've found them on other social media, start talking to them. Get them to know who you are, and learn some more about them.

6/ Now pitch!

Now is the time to pitch. You have a relationship going. Your email won't be yet another cold caller trying to sell something. You also have the advantage that you can pitch to them, and not use a standard format. As you've been following them for some time, you should have a good picture of what the business is focusing on. So your pitch can be specific: "I know you're really pushing the XYZ product at the moment, and I think my readers would be interested in it. I'd like to suggest you try an advertisement on my site..."

7/ Be persistent

This is where we find the winners as sales people.

Here's an interesting thing. I've done the above many, many times. And you know what? I don't think I've ever had a total "No!" People never say "I'm not interested, go away and don't ever contact me again."

What they do often say is "No, not right now."

They'll explain that their budget is all used up, or that they don't want to do anything until their new ABC product launches, or any one of a whole plethora of other excuses. This is pretty much standard business practice. But I repeat: This is a "No, not right now."

I'd wager that 90% of sales people simply give up at that point. They are the losers.

The smart ones email back to say: "Thanks for coming back to me. I'll contact again in three months / when ABC launches and let's talk again."

Then they DO IT! And they keep doing it!

Eventually, the time will be right, or there will be some spare budget, and your follow up will be met with a "OK, we'll give this a try now."

I've done business this month with two sets of people I first contacted over a year ago. I went through the process above, and then stayed in touch every three months, and it's paid off.

Try it yourself!

Do you have any stories about selling advertising you'd like to share?

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