The Sway

Last night, in the midst of a great big internet mess, a group of lovely people met in Great Eastern Dining Rooms to talk about making money from blogging. The irony wasn't lost on any of us. I'm not sure who came up with the idea of The Sway - it was either Miramus founder Katie Lee, or those lovely folk at Skimlinks. Either way, it's an excellent idea.

The Sway was excellent last month when it kicked off. Lots of interesting people talking, and more importantly debating about what they can do to not only make money from their blogs, but also improve their blog. I've always been of the firm belief that the readers come first and content is key. But, if you want to start making money, there does have to be a point where these two things meet. And it's hard sometimes to tell where that point should be.

Katie asked me to kick off a debate at the event yesterday (I had to follow a bloody excellent presentation by Rob Hinchcliffe of Qype), which we decided would be about when the right time to start making money from your blog is. I'm pretty sure there will be a podcast of all the things that I said, but here's the gist of stuff that I talked about at various points throughout the evening, expanded slightly for the purposes of making me sound more eloquent than I was last night:

• Audience is always key. You can't go after the right advertisers if you don't know who your readers are. Which posts do your readers respond to? What companies get them excited? What unusual services would make them click through and make that advert worthwhile to the advertiser? The last person involved in all this, is you as the website owner. It's all about the readers and the advertisers. Even if you get people to advertise, if they're wrong for your blog, the % of return will be shit and they won't continue to advertise. No one makes money from one-off advertisers.
  
• You can get to know your readers IN REAL LIFE. Just because they're reading online doesn't mean they don't want to meet you in the real world. There's nothing nicer than talking to someone who reads you blog and enjoys it. It stops them from being passive readers and gets them involved. It makes them come back to your site. It encourages them to comment. It makes them talk about you to other people. Rob and I both touched on this point as Qype is so much about real life events - even though the community is online. It's so important. And so often over-looked.
  
• Paid for content is baaaaaaaaad if you don't disclose that you're being paid for it. Really bad. The worst thing you can do to your readers. Readers don't like being sold to. I don't think there's a grey area with this.
  
• But giving people something for nothing is no bad thing. Adding value to your website and getting returning users will always be more valuable in the long run than getting a few quid in your pocket. Prizes, surveys, discount codes are great, but there's no need to make money from this. It's all stuff that helps you interact with your audience.
  
• People never ask advertisers what kind of return they're expecting to get. Even as an advertising exec it was the one question we didn't ask enough. And it's probably the most important. If you're small, you'll be chasing companies who don't have huge advertising agencies helping them. They often have a very different idea of what to expect and what's realistic. If they're expecting a 50% return, that's never going to happen and you need to have that conversation with them beforehand.

Loads of great points were raised, loads of lovely people were met. It's such a worthwhile event if you really want to expand your blog. And it's not just for people who want to make money from blogging - the advice is just as helpful to people who just want to improve their blogging. So even if you don't get down to the next event, make sure you have a listen to the podcasts.

Although, that will mean that you won't get to eat any of the yummy canapes that the bar serve. Nom nom nom. Great venue, great event.