15 Options for Monetization of Social Media for 2022 (Ranked) |
You've seen the ads. The videos have shown you how to make 6 figures in a month by leveraging your social media followers.
If you've ever tried it, you've discovered that 1. Everyone is doing the same stuff, and 2. The people making the most money are likely to be telling individuals how to make cash. Through our studies, we've discovered that many creatives struggle in the traditional ways of monetization.
Yet, the possibility of monetizing your popular social media account is feasible. And you don't have to be a Kardashian to be successful.
The good news is that there's a growing number of options to transform your existing following into a source of income. And there are more and more SAAS platforms that can help you achieve this.
Whether you're Tweeting to thousandsof people, or TikTok-ing millions or 40 friends in a Group on Facebook, we'll chat about how to monetize the social media fans you have.
All it takes is for you to to think a bit more ingenuously and take on a few innovative trends emerging in the present. Here are 15 realistic options for social media monetization. In order to be sure, these are classified from the top alternatives to the most expensive which means the ones with the highest payout to the ones that offer the lowest amount.
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The post...
15 possibilities for social media monetization
2. Selling and selling services
11. Posts sponsored by sponsors
13. Premium subscriptions to content
Direct Monetization vs. Third-Party
2 questions every artist should inquire about
15 possibilities for monetizing social media
1. Online Community
We may be and biased in this case, but online communities are a dang great method to make money from the social media users you follow.
And since we ARE a community platform, let's look at the facts that prove how communities can be a fantastic way to monetize.
Paying for a community helps you monetize your work (creating content) It gives people the things they're naturally inclined to desire (human feeling of belonging and connection) This then transforms into the ultimate business model (recurring revenue).
There is no need to be Warren Freaking Buffet to realize that this is an formula that is logical. We can turn it into a simple mathematical formula:
The creation of content is already happening and the connection that people crave + The ultimate business model is $$ Cha-Ching dollars
So instead of grinding through someone else's platform by feeding their algorithm and lining their pockets with your content creating - you basically contribute your energy and flair to create your own personal social network.
Most communities work on charging a per-month membership fee, but there are a bunch of different ways to make money from them. These include selling courses, charging for sub-groups, or upselling into an offering such as coaching.
It's up to you to discover what works for you.
How to make money from the community
It's important to have a good community platform - and no Facebook groups won't cut it. A REAL community platform lets you charge for memberships (or other items like classes) as well as allows you to create incredible user experiences.
That's why that we offer creators a beautiful base to work on. It features beautiful forums with groups, user profiles, integrated live events such as live stream, polls and queries with native analytics, and more... Everything is available through a gorgeous app.
It is also possible to choose Mighty Pro, which lets developers create fully branded applications that are tailored to your preferences. This is the path Adriene Mishler used to create an entirely custom community for her more than 10 million YouTube users who subscribe to her channel - Yoga with Adriene.
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2. Selling services
If community gives you regular revenue as well as paid membership at the scale of a business, social media selling and monetization lets you make high-value products for a few people.
It is an excellent way to earn money from your social media accounts.
Don't try to earn an income from all of your followers, and forget selling products of other people for a small profit a sale. Your own followers to market products and services. You can make a profit on your work. It also helps you distinguish yourself from the rest of your competition, and you get the fun of both building a following and also making money.
We should probably point out some obvious points here. Even though you're selling services, doesn't mean that you shouldn't be able to mix it with the other items that are listed here.
As an example, a career coach may offer a mix of courses, training along with membership in a community. Some coaches earn up to $500k a year using exactly the same model.
Below are instances of services that may be monetized from a social media audience and offered to consumers:
- Coaching
- Consulting
- Digital Marketing Strategy
- Facebook Ad Creation
- Content Writing
- Search Engine Optimization Consulting
- Graphic Design
- Lettering
- Design for Web Design
- App Development
- Financial Advising
The sky is the limit. If you run a service-oriented business and you build a following around the service, you are able to use that following to earn an income of a lifetime.
How can you make money from services
There will be a need to promote your services to your existing audience in addition to an online point of sale. This might mean using something like Stripe mixed with Calendly for a sales process for - perhaps a product for coaching. Or, you might be fishing for bigger fish, such as working as a consultant and invoicing your business clients with a number of thousands.
This is the path to build a successful business around your social media followers, and it's working!
3. Classes
If you've lived under a rock more than 10 years, it's clear that one method to make money from your social media following is through training courses. And it's real!
Making an online course is a fantastic way to earn paid to share your knowledge to the rest of the world. And, just in case you're concerned that there's not enough space for your skills... never fear. It is predicted that e-learning will continue expanding and will reach the value of $1 trillion before 2030.
A few things have changed with online courses is the choices for delivery. A decade ago, folks were adding an asynchronous course to the WordPress website - making it available and forgetting about itin hopes to "earn cash in bed."
Although there's absolutely nothing to be wrong with passive incomes however, the landscape of online learning is evolving. There are more cohort and live courses, and courses that are built within vibrant communities which offer course members a big bear-hug of encouragement for their efforts.
As we said above the courses are great when combined together with alternatives on this list (especially the community) for a complete business plan.
How can you make money from classes
Choose an awesome learning platform (like ) which offers classes and a community and trust us when we say there's an effective business model here. Choose your ideal member as well as your main goal, identify the transformation that you'd like to see students through, and start developing and selling!
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4. Mastermind Groups
Mastermind groups can be a great method to make money from your social media following. Unlike traditional coaching, mastermind groups are a meeting of equal-ish minds to support each other, to learn and gain accountability.
Mastermind groups that are top of the line charge quite a bit for a well-groomed group of like-minded people who are awed by business owners. at them.
How to monetize with a mastermind group
If you want to go through our article on how to start a mastermind group for more details, you basically require a group comprised of Ideal Members, maybe an online platform that they can come together and collect the membership fee, and you're ready to rock!
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5. Find a job
Here's a piece of unconventional tips. It is possible to use your social media following to find an employment. If you're an expert in something and have a following you're likely to find that developing your reputation has made you more attractive to a future employer. What better way to leverage your brand into a paycheck!
This is also true for building a following is something you can do for other people. It is possible to be paid to create material and put your social media chops into practice. We have people who create content! (Check here for a list of our available jobs.)
6. Physical products
If you're doing something that's interesting to you and the kind of people you follow about, you might have an audience for physical goods. Imagine you're a painter or photographer with an audience on Instagram. There is a good chance that you could create products that are based on your work, and market the work!
It's possible that there are people looking for you "Where can I get a print?"
Although there are some costs for getting a physical start-up off the ground - say getting prints made and buying shipping material There's no reason why the cost has to be prohibitive. As you do not need to buy a shopfront and any earnings you earn after manufacturing and shipping could be considered a profit. And if you have a following already and you have a following, it's possible to offer a higher price for the work you do!
How can you monetize your site using physical goods
It is possible to create your own Shopify store or develop your own website using an online store plugin that is built upon. You could also make use of a marketplace for products already in place like Etsy. Discover how you can collect from them, and then start selling!
7. Coaching for groups
Coaching was mentioned in the past, but another model that is ideal for social media monetization is group coaching. UNLIKE a mastermind group groups of people come together to share their knowledge with... YOU. If you've got an impressive social media presence who would like to learn from you and your group, it can be extremely well in monetizing.
The benefit is working with multiple members at the same time - which gives you scale. Coaching clients receive an advantage of working directly with you - often for less as compared to one-on-one.
Group coaching is also an enjoyable experience and can unlock the many benefits of community we talked about earlier.
How can you make money from group coaching
gives you all you need for a group coaching biz. It lets you bring a community together and charge for it or for subgroups - that's the cost of group coaching. Once you've got your group established, you'll be able to create events (coaching sessions) and live stream them, and keep the conversation in motion with discussions on forums or messages directly to each other.
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8. Sell merch
Merch is technically a kind of physical product, but it's worth mentioning on this page. It's because it's not just about making an item that is unique, but it's more about making money from your brand.
It could be a cute pair of novelty slippers that have your logo printed on the bottom, or even a coffee mug or t-shirt selling merchandise that matches the brand you're trying to promote could be an excellent option to earn money.
What is the best way to make money with merch
There are some platforms that offer merch included, which is awesome. The first is Patreon. Though it isn't without its limitations in monetizing your followers-not to mention the cut they takethe merch feature is quite cool! YouTube also deserves a mention in this article, as they've developed the ability to include merchandise to your YouTube channel.
9. Build software
Software development isn't an option for people who don't have the skills However, it's something that some people on social media are doing. If you've got a large audience and have gained a reputation for specific expertise, you might be an ideal candidate to start an enterprise that runs on your followers.
Need more ideas? Check out Neil Patel, who turned his SEO expertise and following into investing and partnering in companies such as Kissmetrics as well as Crazy Egg.
It's not easy making software, but it could provide a profitable way to monetize the social media presence of your followers.
10. Patronage
At the very bottom of the list, we're getting into things that are well known - however, they're not necessarily as profitable. It's the same for patronage models, best known through a little site called Patreon.
In simple terms, Patreon gives people who are convinced of your work the opportunity to back you. However, it's evolved its model to also include "perks" which you could offer to your audience... (When the business is selling perks and merch, Patreon looks a bit more like a traditional service or product-based company. But we digress. )
The most successful Patreon earners make bank. The podcast, for instance, True Crime Express notoriously makes around $240k monthly. But the bottom earners make only pennies or even nothing each month, from their work. There are lots of starving artists who joined Patreon but are struggling.
This means that your chance of recouping your earnings with a Patreon account aren't huge which pushes it further down the list.
How to monetize with patronage
We've got a guide for How to Be Successful on Patreon and you can go through. Additionally, there are Patreon alternatives with similar goals. However, to start, you basically choose your preferred platform, then get your account running Set your support levels and inform all your friends about it! Then you're ready to go to the races.
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11. Posts sponsored by sponsors
Sponsored posts are one of the ways you can monetize your social media fans that probably needs a large number of followers. However, even micro-influencers could earn money and free samples off of these.
Like it sounds, a sponsored post is where someone is paying you to post. It can feel quite satisfying if you've done your best to build a following and have an item you like and wish to promote. On the flipside, if you're trying to push something you don't understand or even like to the people you're trying to sell it to trying to earn a few dollars, it will feel pretty disgusting.
sponsored posts could earn you anywhere from a few dollars up to $1 million in the event that you've got a Kardashian-like followership.
How to get started with sponsored blog posts
There are many methods to get sponsored content. It is possible to reach directly to marketing teams at the companies you enjoy, while certain companies even have teams specifically dedicated to marketing influencers.
The bigger your following grows, the greater chance that these kinds of people will be contacting you with sponsored posts (but beware, there are a lot of spammers and fraudsters who are waiting to contact you when you have a big following too).
There are increasingly more platforms popping up which help businesses and influencers connect, and G2 has the list of influential marketing networks .
12. Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is another way to make money from content. However, unlike sponsored posts you're not paid to post - you earn money when the person purchases an item. Most often, agreements with affiliates define the amount you earn for each sale.
You'll share the tracking URL that informs which company referred to the sale. You are paid!
Cha-ching!
It has number disadvantages to earning money through affiliate marketing.
- It is essential to choose a topic that is logical. Links for "low-interest credit card" to the people who follows you for advice about pet care is an easy way to lose your followers.
- The amount of money paid out is usually correlated with the value of the product. There's a big difference between purchasing a book that has 10 percent payout as opposed to a premium $3500 course that has 10 percent payout. The trick is to decide what products are worth your time.
If you've got an audience that fits your product, and you've got items that are well-paying and you are confident in advertising, why wouldn't you? ?
How do I get started with affiliate marketing
Select a brand you love and google "THAT Brand Affiliate Program." It will show whether they've got one.
You usually need to join an affiliate program , and then get approved, probably adding some personal details and tax information to be eligible for the payments.
There was a time when many affiliate programs were operated directly by brands, but increasing numbers are managed by central platforms such as impact.io. This means you are able to sign up for several affiliate programs from one location, and they handle the payments too.
*By the way, if you enjoy the site and wish to spread the love there is an affiliate program, too! It's available here. *
13. Premium subscriptions to content
One of the ways to make money from your social media followers using content is by the usage of high-quality or restricted content. The past was when many of bloggers would create "members only" areas that gave people access to premium blogs.
It's the same concept that's now been adopted by some leading social media sites. Basically, you create content for users only, or those who pay a subscription. This is a great opportunity because it could be a source of recurring income if you can get it working for your business.
How do I get started using content subscriptions
There are two choices. In the first case, if you're using an app that offers subscriptions included, you can activate it and then go. For example, Twitter recently launched its "Super Follow" button that lets users with over 10,000 subscribers market premium subscriptions.
The alternative method of doing it, especially in a system that doesn't have it built in the first place, is to select a software solution for your premium content subscription. It's something like Substack is a good choice for newsletters and gives you the tools you need to start a business with a newsletter.
and, of course, it also provides you with a way to monetize your best content for paying customers as well as mixing it with different methods discussed above!
14. Advertisements
Below at the bottom is the method of monetizing social media that was widely believed to be the best the list: advertisements.
Advertising is a not always easy, but it's what most YouTube creators yearn for. There are rules that govern how to monetize your YouTube account and it requires a lot of time to make any real income from YouTube advertisements.
This is the case with display ads, when you directed your followers to a website that you owned. The low premium on ad duration means that it is likely that you will not be able to cover your expenses in the near future. However, if you're eligible to receive ads already, say through YouTube and employing the monetization techniques mentioned above, it sure as isn't a bad idea to turn on the advertisements!
15. Mix and Match
The topic has been touched on every step of the way and now let's just be clear. It is possible to mix and match many of these options to create a viable enterprise from what you have!
As an example mixing classes and communities are a really great method to reap the benefits of both approaches!
This combination creates a framework that lets your customers develop relationships and assist each other in staying committed to the new ways of life they're forming. The connections that they form on the subject matter that is most important to them are why they are motivated to return, and renew their subscription year after year.
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Direct Monetization. Third-Party
The last question to be answered in the whole thing is whether you should earn money from a specific social media platform or move your viewers to another. If you look at successful creators, you'll see that many of them do the latter.
The key is the following: If you are able to give your most enthusiastic and enthusiastic followers the chance to study a particular topic in a group as well as to get results from that subject by working together, you are able to make money off your social media.
What would putting a mastery of a topic in a group appear like? Let's look at an example.
Imagine that your Instagram account follows your adventures on the homestead, or making a living from the land, growing your own food, raising livestock on your own, as well as designing your own clothing (remember, we said "imagine" there! ).
You could monetize your Pinterest followers by creating the possibility of a membership-based paid annually that allows community members to can join to learn more about sustainable living through collaborating together in a community.
Or you could opt to monetize your Instagram followers by offering an exclusive online training course focused on the best methods to grow a flourishing vegetable garden.
Or follow Kathleen Drennan's example. Kathleen is a florist who has an online shop located in remote Australia, monetizes her Instagram fans with the hashtag #ForFlorists. It's an online school of business for florists. In her Instagram account, she runs an online community for members with a monthly subscription, and a paid online business course for professional florists who are aspiring, where members can master the business of floral design and design, all in one.
It's not so much about the strategies - it's more about the things that will give your followers the transformation they're looking for and want.
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2 questions that every creator needs to inquire about
If you're trying to figure out if you can also make money from your following on social media Ask yourself the following two easy questions.
#1. Which are my most passionate supporters?
Monetizing your social media followers doesn't mean you have to be all about your social media followers. It's about identifying and connecting people who are most motivated today to go more deeply into the niche and you.
Are your fans who might be interested in a greater program you create beyond what you offer in social media at no cost? Additionally, which are the followers you have who are most likely to want to meet each other?
Start by looking to monetize these social media followers first. They will be the easiest to reach initially and benefit the most from a paid membership or online course.
#2. What sort of outcomes and changes could I promise my most passionate followers with an online course, a training program, or annual membership?
What is it that your most committed followers want to create within their lives? And what can you do to help them get there faster with an improved structure and supportive community? Perhaps, for instance, can you assist your followers to grow in their career? Get an inside track on the most effective beauty techniques? Train for a 5K run?
When you've determined the characteristics your most loyal users share in common and what kind of results they're most eager to see today, you can take the next step toward making money from social media.
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Are you ready to earn?
There's a catch to monetizing your social media accounts: users will be willing to pay for results and transformation. If you're looking to make money from the social media users you follow, a Mighty Network will help you get there.
With a Mighty Network, you'll be capable of offering all these components with your own branding that is instantly accessible on the web, iOS and Android. Additionally, you can cost different membership levels or access to special online training, or both.
Within your private Mighty Network, you can charge per user access to your whole community. Make use of your Mighty Network free and charge just for an online class or group in your Mighty Network; create bundles of courses online or groups you could offer annually, monthly or in one time payments; and more.
It's an effective model that is easy for you to handle (especially when you're running your first site for membership or an online course) and also for your students to master your topic from one location.
Ready to monetize your audience?