I want to make sure that I do not kill my credibility before the blog even gets off the ground. I want to state that blogging is NOT a significant source of passive income. Everyone (well except for full time bloggers) seems to think that blogging is a great source for passive income. The sad reality is that blogging is a full time commitment that has very few passive traits to it. In fact I started this blog to outline to others that blogging is 100% NOT the route you should take when pursuing passive income online.
Why is blogging not a solid source of passive income?
Because in order to earn enough money to actually not live in poverty, blogging requires a full time commitment in terms of time and effort. Seriously, do you think full time personal finance bloggers like Trent of The Simple Dollar or JD of Get Rich Slowly became full time over night? It took many months of hard work and trying to juggle two careers. The worst part is that these days it takes more time with the rise of so many great personal finance blogs and blogs in general.
The bloggers that are full time are obviously not slackers. Just reading about Trent’s schedule shows that he treats his blog like a full time job. I will go as far as to say that blogging can potentially be more work than your current job. Before I go off on a tangent on blogging compared to a “real job” I will stop myself.
There is the occasional “online marketing guru” that claims to earn thousands of dollars passively from their website. The thing is that these are usually websites that are setup for affiliate marketing or to sell some scheme of getting rich quick. Half of the time these people are lying and they could only dream of actually earning that much money.
Can blogging ever be a source of passive income?
I strongly feel that blogging will never be a significant source of passive income. You can make a few dollars each month off Adsense, text links, and affiliates long after you stop posting on your blog. The problem is that if you stop posting on your blog then people will stop reading your blog. Search engine users will still find your blog but that traffic will wane off slowly as you try to turn blogging into a source of passive income.
At the end of the day, yes you can make money off your blog. Blogging will never be smart passive income. You have to work for your money in the blogging world.
