Are you looking for top ways to make money
online that are not scams?. Or maybe you are searching for ways to earn extra
money. Are you passionate about something that people consult you all the time
and you quickly solve it? Are you looking for ways to monetize your
passion, problem-solving abilities or day-to-day hustles that Kenyans go
through – be it applying for a Kenyan passport, visa, a national ID or even
worse, obtaining the new digital driving license.
No matter which category you’re in, making money with a blog
is possible – of course when done the right way. Many Kenyan bloggers on
WordPress have succeeded in this venture, why not you?.
First, a cautionary word: in no way is blogging a get
rich quick scheme. If you’re looking for quick ways to get rich online then I’m
sorry to be the bearer of bad news – that is not practically possible. Any
online get-rich-quick scheme is a scam. Don’t be wooed by these phrases ‘make
money fast in Kenya’, ‘quick ways to get rich in Nairobi,’ ‘stay at home mom
makes Ksh 100,000 per month through online schemes’ or ‘make money from home by
doing nothing.’
Please do not in any way be enticed by pictures of expensive
cars, mansions, ‘net-workers’ sand bathing in Dubai, and in actuality, most of
those pictures are photo-shopped (in an ugly way to say the least)!. Follow any
of these scams, and you will end up squandering your savings, and you will
waste so much time doing it.
Far apart from the other ‘make money online in Kenya’
articles, this is the only guide you will need. It’s comprehensive and easy to
implement.
A few techniques mentioned in this article will require time
and money to jump-start your career in blogging. However, passion and the
willingness to put an extra effort is crucial to reaping better rewards.
Before you start implementing any of these methods mentioned
below, you will need a couple of things that we will gladly set up for you
quickly.
You will need a:
1. A domain name idea ( this will be the
name of your blog e.g. optomita.com/tuko.co.ke/mpasho.co.ke etc.).
2. A web hosting account (where your
website will ‘live’ on the internet).
3. A nice website theme that outlines your
passion (WordPress has free and premium themes for your choosing).
4. Your undivided attention, dedication, and time.
Alright, then let's get to it! These are undoubtedly proven
ways to make money with your blog in Kenya.
1. CPC or CPM Ads
Easily monetize your blog by placing ads on your site, it’s
one of the most commonly used methods by bloggers. There are two ways you can
do that:
CPC/PPC ads – Cost per click/pay per click ads
as the name suggests, are floating/static banners that you place strategically
on your website either in your content or the sidebar. You get paid every time
a website visitor clicks on that ad.
CPM ads – CPM ads are ‘cost per 1000
impressions’ (an impression is counted each time an ad is shown in a result
page). Each time a CPM ad is served to your website and a visitor views it, you
earn revenue. They usually pay you a fixed amount of money based on how many
people view the ad.
Google is the ‘mother dragon’ of all search engines in the
world has a top-rated network for placing these types of ads; Google
Adsense. With Google Adsense, the heavy lifting is done for you since you
don’t have to be in direct contact with advertisers; all you need to do is
place the banner in your website. Google will choose ads relevant to your
content, and your viewers click on the ads. If in whatever way you feel AdSense
does not suit you, there are countless alternatives like media.net,
PropellerAds media, Revcontent, Chitika, etc.
2. Sell Private Ads
Do you hate middlemen/brokers? So do i. With private ads,
you get to eliminate all the middlemen and work directly with advertisers. If
you end up with enough traffic, advertisers may come directly to you and ask
you to place an ad on your website. You can even contact them directly and
discuss payment details, length of the banner, where it will be placed on your
site and how long.
You can sell ads in the various form to maximize your
revenue: banners, buttons, links in your blog posts something like ‘proudly
brought to you by..’.
3. Sell eBooks on Your Website
Remember your passion or hobby, the one that just turned
into a blog? Well, you can monetize it further by creating digital products.
And the easiest way to do it is through creating eBooks. Ebooks are relatively
simple to create and write, especially if your WordPress blog is about a hobby
or a job that you do daily.
If you have been blogging for some time and you have written
some articles, then you can assemble them into a chapter or two or create a
mini-series of help articles into an attractive eBook.
Since your blog is your passion, then the information will
flow easily such as a chef creating ‘Kitoweo cha pwani recipe’ or ‘easy ways to
cook Mukimo’ wouldn’t be hard, will it? Or ‘how to quickly apply for a Kenyan
passport no mistakes, no hustles’ or maybe a tax accountants ‘a beginners guide
to file itax KRA returns.’ The possibilities here are endless.
You can create a video from the mini-series of your eBook
and post it on YouTube, which is also a high revenue-generating income stream
for passionate people who follow their dreams and utilize their skills really
well as demonstrated by @blessednjugush,@churchill, @the green calabash @mandi
sarro among others who distinctly turned their hobbies into revenue streams.
They are also top WordPress bloggers in Kenya who have a massive following on
Facebook, as you can see blogging through your website is a cyclic pattern that
can earn you money.
Once you have written your ebook, its time to turn it into a
professional-looking attractive design, countless tools can help you design
beautiful eBooks some are free while others have free trials or you can opt for
a paid version for more features e.g. canva, pic monkey, adobe spark, pictochart,
etc.
What is left is for you to integrate some WordPress plugins
(free) to your website, this will enable you to sell your eBooks and also make
it easy for people to download them. You can also set up an email campaign
software that sends purchased eBooks to recipients, such a strategy will allow
you to track and monitor your sales.
4. Get Paid to Write Product/Services Review
You get approached by companies or individuals to first try
out their products or services for free within your blog niche or industry. You
can also contact brands launching services or products and offer to review what
they are starting per your blogs’ fan base, not just any niche. A big
percentage of Kenyan bloggers on WordPress earn easy money this way.
Companies usually do a lot of market research and testing
before launching a service or product, but not all have vast marketing to pay
for newspaper or TV ads. Such a company will approach a blogger who is working
within their industry to write a review on their product for a fee. Since
you’re a passionate, attention to detail person and you have created a fan base
who will take your opinion as a well crafted expert opinion about the product,
more people get to try the product or service, and you get paid for it.
5. Sell Sponsored Blog Posts
Assuming you don’t like displaying ads to your audience, and
yet you want to make money through your blog. The thing is some visitors in
your website will get annoyed and irritated especially if you use a a big
banner that covers half of your home page! Some may even get offended and use
and ad blocker which basically blocks any sort of ad and you end up losing
revenue.
You can still monetize a blog without ads through
sponsorships. Most blog post sponsorships work almost the same way as a normal
TV or radio ad. What it means is that just like a product review, a company
will pay you to represent their product/service, talk about paying attention to
simple details and finally promote it to your readers.
So many products and services are launched every now and
then and companies find it hard to reach potential customers especially if
their marketing muscle is not as big as Safaricom and
their new service fuliza, or the national government bonds
initiative M-Akiba.
If you are approached by a company to write a sponsored
post, it’s crucial to know in detail the ins and outs of the product, ask for
the product to experience and use it for a while. Also pay attention to rules
and regulations pertaining to the product/service, any by-laws or consumer
regulations in Kenya should be followed to the letter if there are any.
6. Create a Directory / Listing Website
Just imagine how much money the likes of Pigiame, Olx,
EatOut, TripAdvisor, among other website make from charging businesses to
advertise on their websites. Better still how they make money from individuals
who want to put up an advert for a few hours or a few days and yet all they had
to do was to set up a professional website and use the right ingredients
to make it functional to their customers’ needs in a customizable manner.
Here are a few directory ideas you can explore:
(I). Create a Paid Business Directory
Remember Yellow-pages let your fingers do the
walking? The big ‘business directory ‘bible’ loved and hated in equal
measure by many. Love it or not that humongous book was handy to businesses and
individuals alike almost every company was listed in it. If you create a
directory within your niche or local industry, it can be instrumental.
Such a directory may gather reviews of local businesses,
focus on particular geographical niches that sell similar products or list the
best products within that niche and thereby attract a specific audience
interested in the product/services and maintain a focused clientele for you.
(II). Paid Job Directory Website
Are you a passionate, HR professional? Do you find joy
connecting job seekers to potential hiring firms in Kenya? Or would you like to
offer a solution to the ever-present employment situation in the country? Then
a job portal directory is what you need. Companies looking to hire recruits
would find a job portal very useful, they will avoid so many expenses,
including the time to schedule interviews, interview candidates, prepare
interview questions and answers, advertisement costs, etc.
Your job board will have plenty of candidates with ready
resumes in their profiles, well created personal profiles, candidates whose
profiles are industry-specific. So being approached by a hiring firm to provide
them with several qualified recruits will be easy peasy. Companies can
advertise for a position in your blog, and you charge them on an hourly,
weekly, daily, or monthly basis.
It’s even easier to create a successful job board for the
Kenyan market if you narrowed down to a specific industry or niche. That way,
you will be able to minimize competition since you will be the knowledgeable,
go-to site for anybody who is looking for a job in that industry.
Someone who is looking for a job in let’s say the
‘accounting,’ ‘nutrition,’ ‘banking,’ ‘coffee barista’ industry will be
directed to your job board since you’ve narrowed it to a specific niche.
(III). Real Estate Directory Website
The real estate market in Kenya might be a little bit
confusing; the boom was experienced a few years back has all of a sudden become
a nightmare to investors and real estate agencies alike. But that shouldn’t
hinder you from setting up a properties listing. It can have different
categories and sub-categories like rental properties, properties for sale,
bungalows, apartments, villas, cottages with catchy phrases like ‘Buroti maguta
maguta’ ‘spacious bedsitters along Waiyaki way,’ ‘hottest plots in Kajiado’
etc.
In essence, a real estate directory will have a feature for
agents accounts. Making it easy for them to register on your site and create a
profile stating their category of interest and area of expertise. The property
broker will be able to list his/her properties available for sale or rent,
regularly update if they are sold or no longer available for rent.
Anyone looking to sell any property would be able to
register and sell it in your website for a fee, commission or any other
arrangement that you may find appropriate. Even those looking to buy property
will peruse through and through your site looking for a property that suits
them.
(IV). Events Portal
Kenyans party hard, almost every event be it a sad or a
happy one calls for a celebration. A listing that focuses on any event in
different locations, with categories and sub-categories of where the event will
be, who will host it, the price package if any and the age gap.
You can expand the events portal to include multiple
categories like sports, weddings, medical, career fairs, music events,
competitions, etc. You can also concentrate on one niche like a
non-governmental charity event website or a university website that focuses on
all activities conducted by every university in Kenya.
Also, you can list event organizers, planners, event
companies, or a store to sell certain products related to events like party
supplies, banners, posters. And to top it all you can sell event tickets direct
from your website.
7. Offer Freelance Services
Since you’re already blogging about your passion/hobby, that
means you are an expert in your niche. It’s high time you offered your skills
and expertise as a freelancer. Freelancing in Kenya will enable you to showcase
your skills, be it cooking, tax expert, accounting, immigration, research,
translation, graphic designing, etc. Online writing/ academic writing jobs in
Nairobi are one of the most sought after money-making streams by university
students in Kenya.
Since you have already set up your blog, all you need
to do is list your skills and area(s) of expertise, and you will not
necessarily require any upfront investment or capital. You can start offering
your services to your audience right away.
To a freelancer, a website is your office. You can invoice
your clients directly from the site, send quotations through emails, create and
sell online courses, request for orders, and organize meetings which you can
easily hold through Skype or conference calls.
8. Become a Life Coach
Do you find joy in helping people achieve something? Do you
often get calls from friends or relatives to help them solve an ‘easy’ problem?
Or maybe you went through a traumatic thing that completely changed your life,
and you would like to help others avoid that trauma?
Just about everyone has expertise in something because
through experience and a lifelong learning process, and we gain knowledge and
skills that can guide someone in becoming better in something. The thing is; as
long as you’re one step ahead of someone and you’re better at something, then
you can reach back and coach how to be you or even better.
As a life coach, you can offer advice, guidance, and
accountability for changing one’s life to the better or even an easy way of
saving money on a daily or weekly basis. Ever heard of 52 weekly
savings challenge? You can use your blog to teach people how to write
amazing articles if you’re a good writer, create dietary plans for people
looking for weight management tactics, etc.
WordPress has plenty of plugins making life so much easier
for bloggers. It comes with tools that help you set up booking forms so that
your audience or subscribers can schedule coaching sessions right from your
blog. Its time saving and convenient for you and your clientele.
9. Use it To Build Your Credibility
Blogging can help you build credibility in your area of
work. For instance, say you’re a social justice lawyer in the frustrating
Kenyan judicial system or a land surveyor in this era of investors who lose
their hard-earned life savings to scammers who sell them ‘air’ instead of a
greenhouse. With your expertise in survey or law, you set up a blog focusing on
the many challenges faced by us.
People start reading your content, and you become famous.
People begin to consult you on matters land or law. People frequently visit
your blog and share your articles to their various social media profiles. All
of a sudden you’re the go-to macho man!
Once you stem that authority and offer well-researched
advice in your industry of interest, people might approach you to represent
them in court or to do survey work for them. You could charge to speak at
conferences, chamas, SACCOs where members need crucial information on contracts
or how to secure their investments to avoid scam deals.
Definitely, this is not a direct way of making money as
compared to others I have mentioned above, but it has worked for many bloggers,
and it can work for you too. In essence, it could be the most accessible avenue
to making money blogging while at the same time working in your day job. Since
you are already an expert in your field and you work every day lets say in the
banking sector chances are you know almost everything to do with banking, best
savings accounts, how to open a fixed account and earn an interest, comparison
of packages offered by various banks outlining any hidden charges again
possibilities are endless here.
10. Bonus
Making money through blogging can take a lot of persistence,
hard work, dedication, and sweat, but it can pay off in the long run. The
biggest thing to keep in mind is that making money blogging is not possible if
you put up your site and let it sit there. You need to create good content,
share it on social media, frequently post articles, engage your audience, etc.
You can explore these areas too:
1. Accept donations button on your blog
2. Affiliate marketing
3. Create an online store
4. Sell online courses ‘1 week barista
coffee course’
5. Create a forum ‘ujenzi kenya forum’