Last updated on August 15th, 2020 at 09:07 am

I started this blog in April 2013, purposely for sharing practical tips on how to make money online in Nigeria. Now — one year after — I decided to analyze various aspects of the blog to know how much progress I’ve made and how close I am to achieving my goal.

After playing with my Google Analytics reports for about 30 minutes, I was able to retrieve some vital statistics about the blog that will help me figure out where I’ve done well so far and where I’ve under-performed.

I’ll be showing you these statistics because I want you see the practical manifestations of many of the tips I’ve shared on this blog. And I want you to learn from my findings, mistakes, and progress.

Now, let me start by showing you my findings. I’ll try to comment on each and explain why I think I got those figures. Later in the post, I’ll share 10 lessons you should learn from these findings.

1. Traffic

The screenshot above shows the traffic reports for the 30-day period between April 4 and May 4, 2014. Over this period, the blog attracted 2,155 visits from 1,512 users. Based on that, I deduced that the blog presently attracts about 70 daily visits. To me, that’s rather low for a one-year old blog.

In addition, there were 4,317 page views over the last 30 days, which means the average visitor reads at two pages before leaving the blog.

Now, what about all-time traffic? I checked that, too. I found out that the blog had attracted 13,627 visits from 9,007 users since the time of its launch. And there had been 24,660 page views. See the screenshot below for the figures.

Of course, my traffic fluctuates. It goes up particularly on days when I publish new posts because I notify my email subscribers and Facebook fans after publishing a new post. I observed that the traffic also spikes whenever I publish an interview.

In addition to the traffic from my email subscribers and Facebook fans, my guests also send traffic to the interview by sharing the link with their mailing list subscribers or on social media.

2. Traffic sources

Having discussed the number of visits, let’s now see where the traffic has been coming from and why.

The screenshot above shows the traffic sources over the past 30 days. Of the 2,155 total visits, 757 were from direct visits, 733 were referral visits (that is, they were sent from other sites), 483 came from search engines — mainly Google, and 171 came from social media.

Now, let’s see the all-time reports.

The above screenshot shows the all-time sources of traffic to the blog. Of the 13,627 total visits to the blog since its launch, 5,639 visits (41%) came from other sites (referral visits), 3,441 were direct visits (25%), 2,567 (19%) came from Google, 580 (4%) came from social media, and 50 visits came from my email campaigns.

Looking at the 50 visits from email campaigns, I asked myself, “Does that mean only 50 visits have come from my email subscribers, despite sending them notifications each time I publish a new post?” But I quickly found the answer to be “No.”

Most of my subscribers, instead of clicking the link to the new post in the email I sent to them, visit the blog directly, and this explains why there is a huge number of direct visits.

Since referral visits made up the largest fraction of my traffic, I decided to probe further into where these visits were coming from – I mean, the referring sites. Below is a screenshot of my finding.

From the screenshot, you can see that a whopping 4,711 visits came from my other blog (URL obscured deliberately). Why? Because I linked to Web Income Plus in a post on that blog. The post ranks number one on Google for a keyphrase commonly used by Nigerians who want to transact business online. So, due to the high SEO ranking, that post on my other blog attracts lots of visits, and sends down visitors to this blog through the embedded link.

The report also revealed that Google sent 2,649 visits to this blog. This is because the blog ranks prominently in Google for keywords related to PayPal alternatives for Nigerians, hottest blogging niches in Nigeria, how to make money online in Nigeria, and hundreds more.

Nairaland, the most popular online forum in Nigeria, had also sent me 904 visits so far. This is because my signature contains a link to this blog anchored by a very catchy line of text. So, each time I open a thread or reply to one, other users will get to see my signature, and those interested will click on it.

Next is MyTopBusinessIdeas.com. This blog, owned by Ajaero Tony Martins, had sent me 127 referral visits. Why? Because I once interviewed Mr Martins on this blog, and he shared a link to the interview on his blog.

3. Engagement

Your traffic — no matter how much — is useless if visitors don’t engage with your blog before “bouncing.”

Engagement is a measure of how helpful your blog is to your visitors, and how interesting or relevant they find your content.

With that in mind, I analyzed user engagement on Web Income Plus using the two most suitable metrics: average session duration and bounce rate.

As you can see in the first screenshot in this post, the average session duration is 3 minutes and 57 seconds, which means the average visitor spends about 4 minutes on the blog before leaving.

I think that’s good enough. Getting the attention of internet users isn’t easy. So, holding them down on my blog for a whopping 240 seconds is no small feat — not necessarily the best, though.

Looking at the same screenshot, you’d see that the bounce rate is 62.92%, which shows that visitors spend some time on the blog before leaving. (A lower bounce rate indicates longer visit duration.)

Overall, I’d grade myself 7/10 in this aspect.

4. Content

So far, I’ve published 36 posts on this blog (you can see all of them here). Now, I don’t need anyone to tell me that I performed very badly in this aspect. Yet, I preach consistency and the like. Well, do as I say…because I’ve not led by example with regard to my posting frequency. I have my excuses, though. And I think they’re strong enough.

The poor posting frequency notwithstanding, I try to put in my best when writing a new post. In fact, one of the reasons I don’t post often is that I always wait for the time I can concentrate fully on writing a detailed, unique, and helpful post.

If you read this blog often, you’d have observed that most of my posts are quite long. Most of them exceed 1,000 words. The longest so far is the tutorial on how to set up a WordPress blog, which exceeds 2,000 words. Do you know why my posts are long? I try to include every necessary detail to ensure that the reader has few or no questions to ask after reading. Any post that leaves you asking too many questions — despite reading it to the end — is a useless post!

I tried to find out which posts on this blog have attracted the most visits. I observed that the post titled, “Online Payment Methods for Nigerians: 5 Ways to Receive Payment from Foreigners (Aside PayPal)“ has been read 7,866 times (and that’s why you’ll see it always topping the list of popular posts). This is partly because it is the post to which I linked from that article on my other blog.

Here is the list of the top 5 most viewed posts on this blog since its launch in April 2013:

• Online Payment Methods for Nigerians: 5 Ways to Receive Payment from Foreigners (Aside PayPal) — 7,866 views
• How I Make Money Online (in Nigeria): My Story, My Goal, and My Advice to You — 1,516 views
• 6 Proven, Risk-free Ways to Make Money Online in Nigeria — 899 views
• The Secret Keys to Success in Blogging (Interview with Ajaero Tony Martins) — 469 views
• How to Make Blogging Work for You (An Interview with Muhammed Abdullahi Tosin) — 443 views

Interestingly, the longest post on the blog didn’t make the list.

In the aspect of content, I grade myself 8/10. Or do you disagree?

5. Interaction

In terms of interaction, I can say the blog has been active to a good extent. Readers have left comments on most of the posts, and I replied almost every comment on the blog.

As of the time I’m writing this post, the blog has 552 comments — including those left by me. And the most viewed post on the blog happens to have generated the most comments — about 80 comments at the moment.

6. Aesthetics

When I launched this blog, I was using the Graphene theme. (Remember that old, orange color design?) I love that theme because it is highly customizable and simple (I love simplicity). But the theme has one downside — it’s not responsive — and this is why I ditched it.

I recently switched to another theme that looks great on mobile devices (responsive, I mean). After tweaking for several minutes and getting my hands dirty with some coding, I ended up with a design I like.

And since I switched to this new theme, I’ve received a number of positive feedback about it from my readers. Even Muhammed Abdullahi Tosin described it as “seductive.”

7. Related assets

I have two main assets for driving traffic to this blog from my own end: a mailing list and a Facebook page.

Presently, my mailing list has over 450 subscribers, while the Facebook page for the blog presently has about 215 likes.

I’m growing both assets organically. So far, all subscribers and followers have joined on their own, and I’ve not tried to attract blog subscribers or Facebook followers with paid advertising.

8. Profits

This probably is the part that interests you the most. But, well, I’ve not made a dime from this blog so far. And I’m not in a hurry (after all, I have other blogs that fetch me money).

When the time’s right, the money will start flowing in. I don’t mind if that would take additional one or two years. I’ve always known that online business isn’t a get-rich-quick thing.

Now, here are the lessons you should learn from my findings…

• Lesson 1: Publish new posts frequently and consistently. The more you publish, the more traffic you will attract. As I stated earlier, traffic spiked on days when I publish new posts on the blog. If you can publish a new post per day, do that. But ensure that your posts give value to the reader.
• Lesson 2: Build a mailing list and notify your subscribers each time you publish a new post. Similarly, share the link to each new post on your social media profiles. Your subscribers and followers make up your guaranteed traffic. Even if search engines don’t rank your posts, your subscribers and Facebook followers will always click your link.
• Lesson 3: Feature experts in interviews and publish the interviews on your blog. Each time you publish interviews, chances are your guests will also share the link with their blog readers, mailing list subscribers, social media followers. This will increase referral traffic to your blog. And you can convert those extra visitors into regular visitors by getting them to subscribe to your own mailing list, too.
• Lesson 4: Implement SEO. Optimize your blog posts for keywords that your audience are using to find the type of information you share on your blog. This is what helped my blog generate a decent fraction of its traffic from Google.
• Lesson 5: Publish guest posts on other blogs, especially blogs with higher authority. Your guest posts on such blogs can continue to send traffic to your blog over a long time. As I explained earlier, my topmost source of referral traffic is a guest post in which I placed a link to this blog. Though that other blog is mine, the results have nothing to do with ownership. I still would have gotten the same results if the blog belonged to someone else.
• Lesson 6: Adopt forum marketing. Participate actively in online forums where topics related to your niche are being discussed, and share helpful tips. Place a link to your blog within your signature, so that people who appreciate the information you share can click through. As I explained, Nairaland sent me lots of traffic.
• Lesson 7: Offer helpful posts that really solve readers’ problems. This will compel visitors to stay longer on your blog to read more posts, which means increased engagement. The more engaging your content is, the higher the number of regular visitors you will have.
• Lesson 8: Encourage readers to leave comments on your blog. And when they do, respond promptly to their comments and questions. This is your way of telling them that you value them very much. Also encourage readers to share your posts on social media.
• Lesson 9: Choose a simple design for your blog. Don’t kill your design by trying too hard to make it look beautiful. Nobody will blame you for a very simple blog design. But an overdone blog design can repel visitors from your blog.
• Lesson 10: Don’t make money your priority. I’ve run the blog for over a year and haven’t made a dime. Yet, I’m still not in a hurry to make money anytime soon. Though I’m moving slowly, I’m sure I’ll make more I can imagine when the time’s right. For now, I’ll focus on growing the blog and continuing to provide value.

Over to you…

What other lessons did you learn from my findings other than the 10 I listed? Do you disagree with any point I raised in the article? Do you have any question or contribution? Share your thoughts by leaving a comment.

And don’t forget to share this post on Facebook and Twitter. I’ll greatly appreciate.

Last updated on August 15th, 2020 at 09:07 am

If you’ve read this post on Google Adsense, you’d have known that I have a blog aside this one you’re reading that also caters to a Nigerian audience. For some reasons, I don’t want to reveal the name of that blog. But throughout this post, I’ll refer to it as NGFR.

I created NGFR in April 2013, and as at one year after its launch it was attracting over 1,200 daily visits — with less than 50 posts published. Thanks to keyword research and search engine optimization.

When I noticed that amount of traffic, I tried monetizing NGFR through various methods, including contextual ads (Adsense, Ad Dynamo, and Promo Nigeria) and direct sales of ad space to interested advertisers. However, I didn’t achieve success with any of these.

For months, the blog continued to generate 1,200+ daily visits, but I couldn’t make good money from that traffic. At a point, I got confused as to what do with the blog. I put it up for sale on Nairaland, but no one showed interest. Then I dumped the decision to sell the blog, and I planned to keep and grow it, instead.

I had no doubts that if I could boost the blog’s traffic to at least 10,000 daily visits, I’d be able to make money consistently with those same monetization options that have failed me in the past.

So, I sat down to brainstorm for ideas on how to grow the blog. I conducted keyword research and generated hundreds of promising keywords. I knew for sure that if I could craft fine content around each keyword, the blog’s traffic would blossom with time.

My next step was to write posts around those keywords. I planned doing that gradually until all topics in my “pool” are exhausted. But I never found time for that. Client assignments, my academics, family matters, and other commitments couldn’t avail me the extra time I needed to write the posts. All I could add to the blog over the next six months were less than 10 posts.

Despite that I was too busy to act on my plan and couldn’t do much to grow NGFR, the number of visits increased gradually to 2,000+ daily visits and 70,000+ monthly visits. Sadly, however, this increase in traffic didn’t fetch me a kobo.

In October 2013, I stumbled upon a post on Nairaland, in which the poster stated his intent to invest in any promising web-based business. Seeing that as an opportunity to grow NGFR, I quickly pitched him my original idea (which was to build a high traffic blog through the power of keyword research). I stated how much I’d put into the project already, and how much traffic the blog was generating at the time. I also told him my plans to grow the blog, and how his investment can help achieve the goals.

Fortunately, the guy (I-Jay is his nickname) became interested in my blog. We fixed an appointment, and he paid me a visit at my place in Lagos. We agreed to hire freelance writers to create content around all the keywords I’d generated. We also discussed other ideas on how to grow the blog.

The following week, I-Jay released about 30% of the money I requested from him, and we outsourced the first batch of articles (about 120 in all). We planned publishing the articles gradually over the next two months, and then pay for more if necessary.

Let me tell you a bit about I-Jay: He’s a cool guy who works as a database administrator with a software development firm in Lagos. He’s fun to be with and very understanding. He’s just two or three years older than I am, so we interact like friends. And we got along easily and quickly.

Fast forward November 2014, the blog started generating income, fetching us $128. And since then, the figures have been increasing every month ($291 in December 2014, $361 in January 2015, and $434 in February 2015). Now, I’m loving it. And I-Jay is loving it, too.

[I know you’re wondering how exactly NGFR makes money. I’ll reveal that in the next post. Find out in this post]

Between November 2014 and February 2015, we published 241 articles. And as at the time of this writing, NGFR’s traffic has increased to about 4,500 daily visits, over 100,000 monthly unique visits, and about 400,000 monthly page views.

We’re moving forward. Without I-Jay coming into the picture, I doubt it if the blog would have moved forward one inch.

Now, what should you learn from all these?

There are times when you’ll have all the knowledge and ideas you need to make money online, but you won’t have the time or money required to implement your strategies.

Similarly, there are times when you have the time and money, but you won’t know jack about how things work in online business.

What you should do in such instances is to find someone who has what you’re lacking, and pool resources together with that person. That way, you’ll be able to achieve your goals rather than have your ideas rusting away in your brain or notepad.

In my own case, I knew the strategies that would work, but didn’t have the time to implement them. The other option I had was to pay people to write the content, but I didn’t want to do that. I-Jay, on the other hand, had some money to invest, but has no idea where to invest it. He came on board, dropped the money for content outsourcing, and we’re now getting the results. Now, he has realized his investment on the blog, and subsequent earnings would be his profits.

If you’re unable to implement your great online business ideas because you have no time or money, or you’re have some money to invest but don’t know how to go about it, then find someone else who has exactly what you lack and pool your cards together. That way, you’ll achieve great goals within a short period.

Although this recommendation won’t work for everyone because we humans are just complicated. But if you think it will work for you, give it a shot!

Your turn

Do you have any contributions, objections, or questions? Share your thoughts by leaving a comment. I’ll reply.

And… don’t forget to share this post with your friends and colleagues.

Last updated on August 15th, 2020 at 08:39 am

Sometimes in 2016, I came upon the idea of one promising niche — targeted at Nigerians, of course

I quickly did my keyword research, and I figured my instincts were on point: The niche comprises hundreds of lucrative keywords used by Nigerians. So I kept the idea somewhere in my mind — for months.

About one year later, I shared the idea of the niche with a friend who had struggled with a number of online businesses and was looking for a promising one to settle down with.

It wasn’t easy giving out the niche idea just like that, but I did because I wanted to help someone. After all, I already have a number of money-spinners to myself, and I might not even have the time to work on the idea.

But to my surprise, my friend later discarded the idea. His reasons were that it won’t be easy getting information for the different topics within that niche, and that the niche would require frequent updating of articles, which he wouldn’t be able to keep up with. Of course, I had no problems with his decision.

Few months later, someone else who stumbled on my blog got in touch with me, asking me to suggest a good online business he could invest in. According to him, he was ready to pump up to N500,000 into any lucrative online business.

I quickly remembered my “golden” niche idea. I told him that I have a cool niche we can build a new blog around. I didn’t disclose the exact niche, though.

After enlightening him on how I plan to start and grow the blog using the power of keywords and long-form content, he asked how soon he would start to get returns and how much the blog would be generating. Those are questions I hate to be asked because I can’t give definite answers to them.

While I was beginning to sense some desperation to make quick returns in his tone, I patiently answered his questions, giving some realistic expectations based on my personal experience.

Afterwards, we agreed that he would start by releasing N100,000, which would cover the cost of hiring writers for the first batch of articles. He would be a “sleeping” partner, while I would be in charge of everything related to the setup and running of the site.

But that was the last time we communicated. He didn’t contact me to follow up on our plan. And I didn’t bother to contact him, either, because I don’t want to create the impression that I’m desperate for his money. Again, I held on to my golden niche idea.

Fast forward to December 2017, I decided that I was going to implement my niche idea myself. For over one year, it’s been there in my mind, gathering dust (not the literal dust; my mind isn’t dusty inside. LOL!).

My final posting in medical school was to start in January 2018, so, it was obvious that I won’t have the time to write articles for the blog myself. But I had to do the little time permitted me to.

I quickly chose a domain name, registered it with Namecheap, and set up the site on my hosting plan with the same company. I chose a cool premium theme (the same one I’m using on this blog), installed a number of necessary plugins, and linked up the site with Google Analytics and Google Search Console.

I needed to hire another writer because the one writing my other blog “NGFR” always had enough work on his hands. Within a few days, I was able to get someone — a cool headed guy with amazing research skills. And I sent him the first batch of 20 topics. That was how I started building the blog. It wasn’t so easy creating time for that amid tight school schedules, though.

My usual strategy with any blog is create is to publish the first batch of well-optimized articles and then leave it for a while. I usually wait for about 6-9 months to see if the blog would show signs of growth — or potential for growth, at least. If see positive signs, I’d start pumping in more articles. Otherwise, I’d abandon it. This helps me to minimize risk.

So, after publishing the first 20 articles on the new blog, I decided to stay put and watch what happens.

Traffic results

Although my usual waiting time is 6 to 9 months, the new blog started generating traffic on its own after just 2 months! I needed no other sign that this was going to be another money-spinner. So, I resumed work on it, publishing more articles. And here are the results:

By the end of January 2018 (after just one month), the blog started generating about 100 page views per month:

In February 2018, daily page views increased steadily from about 100 at the beginning of the month to about 550 by the end of the month:

In March 2018, daily page views increased steadily to about 1300 by month end:

In April 2018, daily page views increased steadily to about 3,300 by month end:

By the end of May, daily page views have increased to about 5,500:

So far in this month (June 2018), page views have reached about 6,100 per day:

Traffic generated so far has been majorly from Nigeria (89%) and from organic search (search engines like Google, etc.)

Income results

I didn’t monetize the site until March 2018, when I was sure of the site’s growth potential and ripeness for monetization. I didn’t sway from my original monetization plan — Google Adsense. And here are the site’s earnings since March:

• March 2018: $99
• April 2018: $242
• May 2018: $426
• So far in June 2018 (today is 22nd): $381

5 Important Things You Should Learn from This Story

As I always do, I share my stories — both successes and failures — to teach lessons and drive home some important points. And this post won’t be an exception. Here are some important take home points for you.

#1. Blogging isn’t dead at all

With the rate at which people go into blogging these days, one might be tempted to think that the blogosphere is saturated already and that blogging has been flogged to death. But that’s plain wrong!

Truth is, more than 80 percent of wannabe bloggers quit within months. So, there’s always enough room for new players. If you play the blogging game correctly and smartly, you’ll succeed at it.

#2. Money CAN buy quick results

As of the time of this writing, my new blog already has about 200 articles — each about 1,000 words long. There’s no way I could have written that much myself. (Even this blog (Web Income Plus) has less than 100 articles, and this is the fifth year since I started it.)

But with money, I was able to speed up the blog’s growth. So far, I’ve spent over N300,000 on articles alone. I’m already recouping my investment, though, since the blog’s income now trumps my monthly spending on articles.

#3. The silo structure works!

I have built a number of successful blogs, but I’ve never recorded any success as fast as this. When I sat down to think deeply about what I did differently, I could only give myself one answer: implementing the silo structure.

I’ve never implemented the silo thing on any site before this, so I can deduce that it played a key role in speeding up the success of the site. I doubt if I would be discussing a topic like silo structure here because it can be somewhat confusing for beginners. But if you’re interested in learning about it, this post would help.

#4. Diversification is key

Even though I have 6 to 7 other sites that were generating income that added up to a cool monthly total for me, I still won’t stop exploring new opportunities. You know why? Because “anything can happen”.

Few days ago, the traffic to one of my highest earning Amazon affiliate sites suddenly crashed by 50% — for reasons I’ve yet to figure. While I wasn’t happy about it, I was glad that I had other sites to fall back on. You can imagine how downcast I’d have been if that were to be my only site. And as I’m typing this, I’m already working on a new affiliate niche site while planning to launch three to four new blogs for Adsense within the next three months.

#5. There are no secrets!

If you think there’s some magical stuff that I use to get results, you’re wrong! The keys to success in blogging these days haven’t changed: Find a good niche, do your keyword research, and publish long-form content consistently. There are no shortcuts.

Before you start thinking I’m a magician of some sort, remember this: As I stated in this post, I’ve had my fair share of failures. And just so you know, before creating this new blog, I created two others that are not necessarily failures, but aren’t as successful (neither is earning up to $100 monthly).

Your turn…

There you have the details on how I started and grew the newest income-earning blog under my belt. Let me know if you have any questions, contributions, objections, or other thoughts. And don’t forget to share this with others. As always, you rock!

Last updated on August 15th, 2020 at 08:34 am

I started this blog in April 2013 with the aim of teaching fellow Nigerians how to make money online and convincing doubting minds that making money online in Nigeria is indeed real and realistic.

Now I feel fulfilled each time look at the little I’ve been able to achieve so far for myself and for others.

If making consistent income full-time with little or no effort is what it means to be a successful netpreneur, then I’m certainly one.

And if helping others to achieve success in blogging is what it means to be a successful blogger, again, I’m proud to say I’m one.

Now, at the risk of sounding boastful (I have every reason to, anyway), I want to show you some of the money-making blogs that were either started or remodeled in line with the helpful strategies I teach on this blog.

And just so you know, all these blogs are owned by people who have learned from this blog as well as some of my information products. And they’re raking decent monthly income for their owners. I know this because I keep in constant touch with the owners, and I’m very much aware of their successes.

Now, here are the blogs.

1. NaturalHealthBag.com

I already wrote about this blog in one of my earlier posts. It’s a blog on natural health and alternative remedies created by Mr. Ife Oluwatuyi in 2013. After months of crafting long, detailed, and well-optimized posts at intervals, Ife started making money from the site via Markethealth affiliate program at first, and later contextual ads served by MonetizeMore with popup ads served by Popcash.

In 2015, Ife got a juicy offer for the site and he sold it for a staggering $3,300. At the time, the site was attracting about 3000 visits per day and earning around $250 every month, yet it had just 13 posts. The buyer has since retained Ife as the blog’s content strategist, and the income is still flowing in — big time!

Whether Ife still owns the site or not, the truth remains that it was created in line with the valuable information I’ve been sharing on this blog.

2. Homeremediesbox.com

This is another blog on natural health and alternative remedies created by Ife Oluwatuyi after he let go of NaturalHealthBag.com. His aim from the outset was to repeat the same strategies he used to grow his first blog. He worked towards this aim since he started the blog last year. And now, the site is earning at least $200 per month, this time from contextual and popup ads.

In a recent conversation with Ife, he told me he’s trying to sell off the site, and the same buyer who bought NaturalHealthBag.com has shown interest by even offering a higher figure. So, another few thousand dollars will land in Ife’s pocket soon. I’m jealous!

So, I can categorically state that Ife is a blogger who knows his onions, understands how SEO works and how to implement it — just as he learned from WebIncomePlus.com. His double success with this same strategy shows that online business isn’t based on luck.

3. SheIsComplete.com

This blog was started in December 2015 by Mrs. Ruth Zubairu, a young and vibrant housewife who decided to venture into online business as a way of making money from the comfort of her home. The blog focuses on topics related to women and motherhood, and it caters to a global audience.

I first knew Ruth when she contacted me sometimes in 2015 to buy a copy of my e-book on freelance writing. She implemented the strategies I revealed in it, and she now earns a decent monthly income as a freelance writer. She even went a step further by offering blog setup services. Aside helping her attract freelance writing and blog setup clients, her blog also fetches her some affiliate commissions by the side.

Ruth’s keeps taking her freelance writing services to new levels by the day. And because she’s now a contributing author to the world’s biggest and most valuable blog, HuffingtonPost.com, her writing is now read by millions every week. Presently, her blog generates about $350 monthly in cumulative earnings.

As her own way of giving back to the society, Ruth founded the VIP Blog Writers Hub on Facebook, where she helps bloggers write to become highly visible brands and get paid too.

4. Reviewcious.com

This blog covers a wide range of topics targeted strictly at Nigerians. Originally created as a review site by my good friend and freelance writing mentor, Adeniyi Adesanya in 2013, the site was switched to a WordPress blog in line with my recommendation, and it now features tutorial and product review posts.

Through SEO, the site presently generates about 5,000 daily visits and earns around $350 monthly through Google Adsense.

5. Naijaquest.com

I must admit that Naijaquest.com has been in existence before the owner, Mr. Olawale Salaudeen, stumbled on this blog. But after reading my blog extensively and holding a physical meeting with me, he was able to learn the various SEO strategies he used to turn the blog’s fortunes around.

Naijaquest.com, which also covers a wide range of topics targeted strictly at Nigerians, presently attracts 7,000 daily visits and earns around $450 monthly through Google Adsense.

6. Nigeriafashiontrends.com

As its name implies, this blog focuses on fashion tips, latest fashion trends/styles, and everything related. And it’s targeted at a Nigerian audience. The site was created in February 2015 by Mrs. Modupe Wahab, a Lagos-based civil servant. An ardent reader of WIP, she was one of the first people to hire me for blog setup and keyword generation. And she diligently implemented all she learned on the blog — though she creatively broke a few rules (I won’t go into details here).

A few months back, Modupe told me her blog was already generating about 13,000 visits per day. Then I told her it’s already ripe for monetization, and we both agreed on Google Adsense to start with. She recently got her Adsense account and she now earns around $10 per day (which would sum up to at least $250 monthly). Just so you know, SEO is her major traffic strategy.

I’m expecting more…

I know of few other blogs created by WIP readers that are very likely to start making money soon. But I’ll wait until they really start earning before I add them to this list. So, this post will be updated from time to time.

If you think this blog has inspired you to create a blog and you’re already making money from that blog, feel free to tell me about your success. And I’ll readily and proudly add your blog to this list.

Now, 3 big lessons to learn…

I didn’t craft this post just to brag about my successes. I actually want you to learn three very important lessons.

1. Online business is real

I understand that there are many people out there who are bragging about making money online when in reality they don’t earn a kobo. But the truth is that online business is real, and the blogs I’ve featured in this list are more than enough proof.

And to further prove that online business strategies aren’t flukes and are actually scalable and repeatable, Ife created two sites using the same strategy and achieved the same result.

2. Online business isn’t easy

Well, this might be the most depressing part of this post. But I must tell you the truth. It’s good to be motivated by other people’s successes, but it’s also important to know the challenges they battled with before achieving those successes — so you’ll know the harsh realities to prepare for.

Except for Ruth who makes her money from freelancing, none of the others I featured here made a dime online within less than one year. It took Ife over one year of consistent hard work to build each of the two blogs to the point of success. And the same runs true for the owners of Naijaquest.com, Reviewcious.com, and Nigeriafashiontrends.com.

And if you visit the blogs, you’ll see that they all feature unique, detailed, and valuable posts that people and search engines love. They don’t do copy-and-paste blogging and they don’t publish 100-word posts like most other lazy asses out there.

3. Each success in online business makes you an expert

No one has the monopoly of knowledge. While it’s through that the owners of these blogs might have learned one strategy or the other from me, the fact that they’ve gotten good results from those strategies makes them experts at those strategies, too  — especially since each person had different experiences and challenges while implementing the strategies.

So, if you’re looking for experts in SEO, you won’t go wrong with Ife, Adeniyi, or Olawale. In fact, Ife has the added expertise in selling websites on Flippa. If you’re looking for someone to teach you how to become a successful blogger while still keeping a day job, Modupe would be the right person to reach. And if you’re looking for someone who has mastered the art of managing an online business along with being a wife and mother, Ruth is your go-to person.

Your turn

I hope you’re motivated and duly convinced by this post. Now, if you have any questions, contributions, or objections, share those thoughts by leaving a comment.

Last updated on August 15th, 2020 at 08:35 am

Last year, I published this post, in which I detailed all I achieved within my first year of running this blog.

It’s now a little over two years since I launched the blog, and I think it’s just fair to let you in on what I’ve achieved between the time I published that post (May 2014) and now (July 2015).

My primary intent with this post is to motivate you by showing — in the practical sense — how a blog or online business grows gradually with time, provided it’s correctly and consistently nurtured.

In addition, I want to share an important lesson you need to learn.

So, let’s get going!

1. Traffic

The screenshot above shows the traffic stats for this blog for the 30-day period between June 25 and July 24, 2015. Over the period, the blog attracted 6,446 visits from 4,744 users. From that, I deduced that the blog now attracts over 200 visits per day. Comparing that to last year’s 70 visits per day, that’s an improvement.

However, there’s a slight reduction in page views per visit (now 1.85 from last year’s 2.00), and average time spent on the site by each visitor (now 3 minutes and 39 seconds, from last year’s 3 minutes and 57 seconds).

Below is another screenshot showing traffic stats for the period between May 2014, when I published the end-of-first-year report, and July 24, 2015.

Over the past 14 months or so, this blog attracted 62,232 visits from 43,212 users and generated 103,903 page views. Comparing that to last year’s figures (13,627 visits from 9,007 users), the improvement is more than obvious.

2. Traffic sources

After digging up the traffic figures from Google Analytics, I probed further to know the major sources of my traffic over the past 14 months. The screenshot below summarizes it all:

As seen on the screenshot, 25,542 of the total 62,232 visits were referred by other sites. 22,724 visits were from my loyal readers who visit the blog directly from time to time. And 13,307 visits came from search engines — majorly Google. While there are other traffic sources (social media, etc.), those are insignificant.

I dug deeper to find out which sites (aside Google, Facebook, and my mailing list) referred visitors to this site the most, and here are the top performers:

• NGFR (my other blog, which I wrote about in this post)
• Nairaland
• Notopoverty.com (owned by my good friend, Akaahan Terungwa)
• Naijawriterscoach.com (owned by another good friend, Muhammed Tosin Abdullahi)
• Inboxdollars.com

I wasn’t surprised that some of these sites sent me a lot of visitors. I have a high-traffic post on NGFR that links to another post on this blog. I’m very active on Nairaland, and my signature contains a link to this blog. I once granted an interview for Notopoverty.com, and Akaahan has mentioned my name and this blog severally in his posts.

As for the visits from Naijawriterscoach.com and Inboxdollars.com, I really couldn’t explain those.

However, the author of NWC is my good friend, whom I’d once interviewed on this blog. And regarding Inboxdollars.com, I once mentioned it in one of my first posts on this blog, as one of the first sites I worked with while searching for ways to make money online.

3. Engagement

Going by the first two screenshots, the average visit to this blog lasts close to four minutes. And that’s quite impressive, as getting people’s attention online is becoming more and more difficult.

The current bounce rate (a measure of whether visitors read more than one page or post on your blog before “bouncing” off) for this blog, going by recent figures, is 68.24%. That’s not too impressive (the lower your bounce rate, the better). My other blog, NGFR, has a bounce rate of less than 5%.

4. Content

This is one area where I think I deserve some spanking. Over my first year of running this blog, I published 3 posts per month on the average. But over the past one year or thereabout, my posting frequency has reduced to about 2 posts per month.

Now, that’s not progress. But then, I’d still blame it on my other commitments (medical school, my wife and kids, etc.).

However, I’m sure the quality of my posts hasn’t reduced at all. I still take my time to write long and detailed posts that are filled with valuable and helpful information. (And that’s one of the reasons why I don’t publish new posts too often.)

5. Interaction

Over the past one year, my blog has remained active. Both old and new posts continued to attract comments from visitors to the blog.

In fact, despite the reduced posting frequency, the blog generated 689 comments — that’s significantly more than the 552 comments submitted during the first year.

6. Aesthetics

I didn’t make any changes to the blog’s design over the past year. So, there’s nothing to say here.

7. Related assets

This blog has 2 main assets attached to it: a Facebook page and a mailing list.

As of the time of this writing, the Facebook page has 510 likes — not too different from the 450 likes attracted during the first year. I actually stopped taking Facebook seriously when they introduced their silly new policy of showing each of your updates to only less than 20% of your fans. That, to me, makes zero sense!

As for my mailing list, it had around 3,000 subscribers as of three months ago. But I recently pruned the list to cut out inactive subscribers who are only wasting my money. And I’m now left with about 1,000 active and responsive subscribers.

And just so you know, I switched from Mailchimp to Getresponse earlier in the year for two reasons. Firstly, Mailchimp’s free account allows no more than 2,000 subscribers, and it doesn’t come with the autoresponder feature. Secondly, Getresponse has far more features and more affordable pricing.

8. Profits

This is no doubt the most interesting part of this report. In the similar post I wrote after one year of running the blog, I clearly stated that “I’ve not made a dime from the blog so far. And I’m not in a hurry…”

But it’s a very different story now. Over the past one year, I’ve monetized the blog through multiple options that cut across affiliate marketing and information marketing.

While I wouldn’t give specific figures for certain reasons, I’d love to give you some idea of how financially productive this blog has been.

Through affiliate marketing, this blog has generated over N220,000 between January and July 2015. That’s not spectacular, but it’s still significant.

From the sales of my various information packages (E-books on freelance writing and mailing list setup + Affiliate Cash Academy), I’ve earned over N150,000 between January and July 2015. Again, that’s not particularly impressive.

From the above, I deduced that this blog currently earns at least N50,000 per month. That’s a fraction of my monthly income, as I also earn — even more — from Google Adsense as well as my good old freelance writing business.

The major lesson you should learn from this report

Don’t ever be in a hurry to monetize your blog.

Take your time to gather a loyal audience and establish your reputation as an expert in your chosen topic. Take your time to build trust and credibility by offering volumes of valuable, problem-solving information for free.

Truth is, people won’t buy whatever you promote to them until they deem you credible. And sadly, you can’t build credibility overnight. It takes months to years!

I found myself in a niche where scammers and con artists abound. But I was still able to gain the trust of thousands of people because I started out by focusing on what matters most: building trust. I dedicated close to two years to that. And now, I make money consistently with this blog.

If you think one year and half is too long to blog for no income, then online business isn’t for you. Try your luck with some fast-moving brick-and-mortar business!

While there are other lessons you can learn, I have already discussed them in the end-of-first-year report post. Click here to read it.

Now, your turn…

What do you think about this post? Share your thoughts by leaving a comment.