5 Proven Ways to Keep Earning Money With Your Old Blog Posts
They can still make you a fortune if you know how to do it.
Writers are too often obsessed with their new blog posts, so they forget about the value they’ve built over the past blogging years.
If you anxiously create new content daily, does it mean your old pieces don’t generate income anymore?
As a new writer, I am always searching for ways to give more value to my readers and give my old content a second life. I’ve published over 120 posts by now on various platforms. It might not sound impressive for someone, but for me working full-time and writing as a hobby, that’s a lot!
In this article, I share the tools and strategies that help me continuously make money through old blog posts regardless of their publication date.
A brief disclaimer here:
You don’t have to be a pro writer to earn money through writing; neither should you be a sophisticated marketer. The right strategies and mindset are the key to growing your successful online presence.
1. Give Your Old Piece a Second Life
There are websites where you can republish your old pieces and keep earning money from them.
I personally know quite a few writers, including myself, who monetize content through the following platforms — Vocal and Newsbreak.
Our world is dynamic, and you never know when a new writing platform will be launched. The good news, many writers have already learned how to leverage existing platforms and grow their income.
In March 2021, I started republishing my old content on Vocal to see how the platform works and what I can expect out of it. I joined to take part in one of their challenges but ended up experimenting with my old content.
I republished 24 pieces during my first month and earned $50.35. Most of the earnings came as bonuses and tips from my fellow readers.
It takes just a few minutes to republish old pieces and adjust them to the platform. Your articles will get a second life, and you’ll keep earning money for internal and external views!
Here is my in-depth Vocal.media review, if interested.
Since every single view adds to your earnings, I started promoting my republished pieces on social media, on Quora in particular. This strategy helped to boost the views as well as the income.
Another great author, Aamir Kamal, creates SEO-optimized content that consistently makes him a 3-figure income on Vocal.
Another popular way to make extra income from old blog posts is to republish them on Newsbreak. The website was launched in 2015, according to its LinkedIn page, and it is a local news website in the US. However, the creator partner program was just introduced in October 2020.
The platform offers a guaranteed minimum monthly payment for qualified writers, payments based on page views, and referral bonuses for readers and creators. Here is the link to the partner program if you are interested.
Kristi Keller shares her success story as one of her old republished stories got 200,000 views, and she earned $1.000 for being a part of the creator’s program. How cool is that?
Even though every platform has different rules and audiences, it’s worth researching new opportunities. Roz Warren has a detailed guide on transforming your old content and giving it a second life if you are eager to give it a try.
Lessons learned
You have to start small to achieve big!
Consistent writing and publishing will help you steadily grow your followers and income.
It is worth choosing a primary platform for content publication that you can later republish elsewhere. Likely, some websites accept the formerly published content and pay good money for it.
2. Sponsored Mentions
As a content creator, you are not the only one eager to reach your target audience.
Plenty of companies and brands want to do the same thing! Hence, they are eager to sponsor the collaboration with you to promote their products inside your content.
The outcome — you are paid for the promotion, while brands get awareness and valuable clients.
I started writing from scratch with zero experience and a content portfolio. After a year of writing, a few companies have reached out to me and offered collaboration.
Here are two things they were particularly interested in:
- Articles ranking in the top 10 Google search results;
- Themed content to mention their products or services.
Having a background in marketing, I created multiple how-to guides and case studies that rank pretty high on Google, such as this one. It’s a guide where I explain how you can check competitors’ Facebook ads in just three steps.
If your content is well-written and placed in front of the right reader, it won’t take much time for collaboration requests to arrive. And this is what happened to me!
Lessons learned
I extended my article with the added value for the readers and received a commission for it. At the same time, my partners benefit from getting new prospects that might become their paid customers.
It is a great way to establish relationships with certain brands and get paid for your old content.
However, if you begin your writing journey and have no content that might be suitable for collaboration, I suggest starting with an affiliate. It is a powerful and often undervalued way of making money with your content. I have some success stories to share with you.
3. Old Good Affiliate
I believe there are no established bloggers in this world who haven’t tried affiliate programs at some point.
In fact, 84% of content publishers monetize their blogs through affiliate collaborations, according to BloggingX. It’s not a coincidence. It’s a brilliant opportunity to make passive income while you sleep.
The idea behind the affiliate programs is simple — you write about specific products or services, educate your readers by sharing your experience and add an affiliate link to your content. If someone decides to buy a recommended product through your blog, an affiliate link will assign the sale to you.
The benefits are huge for both parties. You can get up to 50% commission, while brands get a new paid client. It’s a so-called symbiosis in the current business world!
Last year I earned $3,110.40 from a single article through the affiliate program.
I use PartnerStack to join various affiliate programs. It is a partner platform for SaaS that aims to accelerate growth for software businesses and their partners.
What’s convenient about PartnerStack, your payments are accumulated and stored in one place; you don’t have to deal with different dashboards and withdrawal methods. Deposits come to PayPal or Stripe.
Here is a screenshot from my PartnerStack dashboard and a referral who has purchased a yearly subscription to a recommended service. It brought me a steady income every month by June 2021.
Lessons learned
I am in love with the affiliate programs and keep promoting products and services in various posts. However, I’ve also realized the best environment for affiliate promotions is your own blog, not the content you host elsewhere.
It might get tricky with side platforms since they set their own rules, and you can quickly be banned for policies violation.
The good old way is to do affiliate promotions on your own website, where you set the rules and manage the content.
4. Turn Your Old Pieces Into an eBook
In this case, you’ve already done the hard work for the inner part of the ebook. What’s left are the cover page, intro, a table of content, and a closing remark.
Putting old blog posts into an ebook is much faster than writing it from scratch.
You can offer an ebook in exchange for an email sign-up, or you can start selling it on Amazon. Jarod Dickson has a fantastic 3-mins guide on how to self-publish and market your ebook on Amazon in case you are interested.
When I first stumbled upon the idea to repurpose my hundreds of published blog posts into an ebook, I stuck with the following question: “Why would anyone buy my ebook if it is nothing but a set of self-published pieces available online for free?”
It’s a valid point, and I am not the only one who raised this question. Here is what Jeff Rohde, a founder of J. Scott & Company, says about it:
“People are willing to pay for good content — even if it’s available on your website already.”
Moreover, people are busy and impatient. We have no time to go through all the available information online. That’s why we are eager to pay for the curated list of suggestions along with the author’s tips and experience.
Joel Friedlander, a book designer, a blogger, and an author, shared that he repurposed 40 achieved blog posts and wrote a new introduction to create a 222-page book that is offered for $14.95 (print) or $4.99 (ebook) on Amazon.
Lessons learned
What’s great about creating digital learning materials, they can make you money while you sleep!
It does sound fantastic when I say you can make passive income by selling repurposed blog posts.
However, I want you to remember this — none of the sales you have is a coincidence or luck! They are directly linked to what you’ve done before!
Tim Denning has made a 5-figures by sending just one email offering his ebook. However, that’s the tip of the iceberg! He has been writing for six years, and now he can make a solid income through his writing, reputation, readers’ trust, and expertise.
If you want to make money selling ebooks, here is what you should do first, according to Tim Denning:
Build relationships with future readers who will buy your eBook by publishing free content so you can opt out of marketing if you choose.
5. Link Old Pieces to New Offers
It did not matter when you published your last piece unless readers can still find and read your content!
I constantly stumble upon articles published five or even ten years ago. It does not mean that content is irrelevant. It can be a good evergreen piece that readers can still benefit from.
Why not go back to your old pieces and link them to your new offers?
You can turn old blog posts into a sales-referral machine by adding links to your new ebooks, website, consulting services, online course, anything!
Tony Koraza runs a popular 2MinutesMadness publication, where he promotes an upcoming print magazine and a Mad online store built on Etsy. Besides feeding readers with valuable content, he offers many other benefits, promoting his products and services.
How cool is that?
Lessons learned
Content is the environment where you meet your readers.
As an author, you shape your readers' experience, build relationships and tell them what to do next!
You can double or even triple the output from your old content if you add extra benefits to your readers.
Go through the list of your old blog posts, prioritize them based on how much monthly traffic they get, handpick the most popular ones, and link them to your newest offers.
Focus On the Journey, Not The Destination
Writers often get obsessed with making more by delivering less because it’s tempting to make the first bucks with your content.
However, if you want to make blogging a long-term hustle, don’t question when your efforts pay off. Instead, focus on how to make your content creation process sustainable and pleasant.
Readers can feel the vibe behind your content and the real purpose of why it was created—better focus on your writing and what you give, not on what you’ll get.
If you enjoy your writing journey, opportunities will come along the way. Believe me! It is what I’ve learned after being an active writer for over a year.
As Richard Bach, an American writer, once well-said:
“A professional writer is an amateur who didn’t quit.”
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