The nice thing about paid blogging is that there is almost always an opportunity to earn some extra money. I do paid blogging through several companies, so starting in September I began figuring out future paychecks and payouts from the various companies I work for. PayU2Blog pays on a bi-weekly basis, so I don’t have to plan too far in advance for them. Plus, since they assign me the work, all I have to do is login and check my inbox every few days. But PayPerPost pays out only monthly, and I have to check and snap up available opportunities through their online interface, so I really have to put some work and a bit of time into making sure I’ll have money coming in every day, thirty days ahead.

Another nice thing about paid blogging is that it’s relatively easy. Depending on the company you work for, simply inserting a link like Asgi shoes somewhere in the body of your blog entry is enough to earn a few bucks.

Do you plan on doing paid blogging as a way to subsidize your holiday spending?

 Loading ...

Someone told me about Snapbomb and their blog marketing opportunities back in June, so I decided to join and check it out. Joining consists of creating an account, filling out your profile and adding blogs that you would like to write Snapbomb opportunities on. Once your blog has been approved, you can view available opportunities for it (and any other blogs you might have).

Opportunities are listed in two categories: available (qualified) and non-matched (unqualified). Available opportunities will pay you for a written post; non-matched posts are available for you to take, but only for brownie points/potential advertiser ratings, and not for money.

Opportunity payouts are based on the value of your blog. Your blog’s value is determined by several things, including Google PR, Alexa ranking and traffic.

Each opportunity listing gives a brief description of what the opportunity is about (what you should write about), the page you need to link to, and how much you’ll be paid for it Again, opportunity payouts are based on the value of your blog, so if you have multiple blogs in the system, you may see differing payout amounts for each blog.
Upon clicking the link to view the opportunity’s individual page and how to accept it, you’ll see a full description, keyword suggestions, and what link and anchor text to use. You’ll also see the minimum words required (typically 150).

Best of all, Snapbomb strongly encourages full disclosure. Straight from their bloggers FAQ:

We recommend that all bloggers clearly disclose that they are writing a sponsored post.

Payment is done sixty days after an opportunity is submitted and approved. Yes, this is a long time, but it’s nice to build up a balance simply by doing a sponsored opportunity here and there.

And yes, Snapbomb does pay!

(New to paid blogging? Check out What is paid blogging?)

PayU2Blog is a company that pays bloggers to write sponsored posts for third party advertisers. Like other paid blogging companies, PayU2Blog compensates bloggers with a specific dollar amount in exchange for that blogger writing a sponsored post.

However, there are a few key differences with how PayU2Blog works. For starters, you don’t have to worry about getting first-come, first-serve assignments. Assignments are signed to you. This can be a distadvantage to bloggers who want to pick and choose their own assignments. PayU2Blog refer to this as “cherry picking”, and they do not allow it. In essence, you are to write about what you are assigned. Skipping over assignments can result in the permanent banning of your account.

PayU2Blog doesn’t want to overwhelm its bloggers, so there are options to limit the number of assignments you would like to receive in a month, or go on a hiatus (known as a black-out date).

Each typical writing assignment pays $5.00, unless it requires more words, links, and/or images or a video. More important, the average PayU2Blog assignment is freeform. This means you can write about whatever you want, so long as the required link is included somewhere in the blog entry. The word requirement is sixty words.

A blog is considered to be eligible if:

• the blog is at least thirty days old
• the blog is written in English
• the blog has original content
• the blog has only one author
• existing advertisements must not obscure the blog
• the owner of the blog must be at least eighteen years of age

There are a few other requirements, and a blog’s acceptance is ultimately up to PayU2Blog.

Payouts on assignments are done every other Friday, via PayPal.

(New to paid blogging? Check out What is paid blogging?)

PayPerPost is the granddaddy of paid blogging. While they may not be the first paid blogging company, they are surely the first to make paid blogging mainstream. PayperPost and paid blogging go hand in hand.

PayPerPost, who is also often referred to as PPP, was established in the summer of 2006, and currently operates several other companies under its parent company, IZEA.

PayPerPost has the following basic requirements for an eligible blog:

• the blog must be at least thirty days old
• the blog must be written in English
• the blog must have original content
• the blog must have only one author
• existing advertisements must not obscure the blog
• the owner of the blog must be at least eighteen years of age

PayPerPost’s paid blogging assignments are referred to as opportunities, or opps. Each opp outlines everything that you need to know in order to successfully write an accurate post. This includes what advertiser, product, service, event, website, etc., you are writing about, the tone the post should have (neutral, opinion, positive, buzz), what link(s)s and anchor keyword(s) you must include, what images, if any, you must include, and the minimum number of words the post should have (50, 100, 200 or 300).

Most opps will also have a transparent tracking image that you will be required to insert somewhere in your post. Some opps may also have a press release or other information that must be copied and pasted into your blog entry.

When you are ready to submit your completed post, you will be required to select the blog the post is on (only necessary if you have multiple blogs listed in the PayPerPost system), and specify the title and permalink URL to the post. Upon submission of a completed opportunity, the post may or may not be automatically approved. It then goes for manual approval, and another manual review right before the blogger receives their compensation.

A blogger is paid exactly thirty (30) calendar days from the date of their submitted blog post. All payments are made via PayPal.

Many bloggers are supplementing their income or generating extra fun money by participating in paid blogging. Paid blogging is when a blogger writes a public blog entry for advertisement purposes, in return for receiving monetary compensation. The public blog entry may advertise a product, a service, or simply generate buzz and traffic for a newly launched website.

With paid blogging, you can’t just set up an obscure blog with blogger.com or on a new domain, and do paid blogging and expect the dollars to come pouring in. Most advertisers are looking for established blogs that have a reader base and decent amount of traffic to pay for advertising on. And this makes sense. Why would anyone want to pay money to have an advertisement that isn’t going to be seen by many people, if any at all? Many advertisers are also looking for blogs with Google Page Ranks, which can sometimes be difficult to turn up, as Google often reduces a paid-blogging-participating blog’s PR to zero if the paid-for posts on that blog are not disclosed and has its links tagged with rel=”nofollow”.

Generally, if your blog is established, and dates back at least a few months, and has some traffic coming in, you will be eligible to do paid blogging. Even if your blog does not have a PR, you’ll still be able to do paid blogging. However, you may not be eligible for a lot of the high paying opportunities that bloggers with blogs that have PR are eligible for.

So, how do you get started with paid blogging? First, make sure that your blog meets the requirement. Generally, these requirements are:

• Blog must have been active for X amount of months (typically one or more)
• Blog entries must be in English
• Blog entries must be original content
• Blog must not contain or promote illegal content or violence
• Blog must not be adult in nature
• Blog must not have excessive profanities
• Blog entries must not be obscured by ads
• Blogger must be eighteen years of age or older

Then you’ll need to find some paid blogging sites. Popular, verifiable ones that I recommend are:

• BloggerWave
• Blogitive
• Blog To Profit
• Blogvertise
• LoudLaunch
• PayPerPost
• PayU2Blog
• Smorty
• SocialSpark (coming soon)
• Sponsored Reviews

When you sign up, you’ll need to provide some basic information about yourself, including mailing address, social security number (for tax purposes) and PayPal account (all of the paid blogging sites listed above pay via PayPal). You’ll also have to provide your blogs: titles, URLs, archive link and RSS feed link.

Once approved, you’re ready to start paid blogging! Each site will have its own rules and terms to read and abide by, and each one will walk you through writing a paid blog entry and submitting it.