This is a Guest Post from Taylor Shaw, the author of the Make Money Online Road Blog

The most basic goal for anyone trying to establish themselves in the make money online’ niche should be to drive traffic to their site. Without traffic, you don’t have conversions people clicking on your ads or buying your products — and without conversions you don’t have income.

How do you drive traffic to your site, then? How do you get the sort of traffic that the ‘gurus’ get? How do you start from no visitors and end up with thousands every day?

There’s no one answer anyone who tells you otherwise is trying to sell you something. It takes good content, lots of effort, and commitment. But you can produce certain content that will drive exponentially more traffic than other content.

And what content is that? Earnings reports.

If you arent familiar with earnings reports, you can take a look at an example of one on my site: Make Money Online Road.

It seems counter-intuitive that the one thing that seems to offer so little value to your readers would drive so much traffic, but think about it a little differently.

What is one thing that people really need to make money online? Commitment. They need to post consistently, invest the time, make the effort thats the only way to build a loyal reader base. To maintain that level of commitment, they need inspiration and hope they need to see that success is possible. Thats what earnings reports show them.

Earnings reports were what drove me to start my own site. I saw that people like Darren Rowse of Problogger, Pat Flynn of Smart Passive Income and, of course, Michael-John Wolfe of Residuals and Royalties were making real money online. But not only did I see they were making real money, I saw how they were making money. Its one thing for someone to say I make thousands of dollars every month with my site — and many do — but its another to show exactly how they make that money. It lends credibility to their claims and illustrates how you can replicate their results.

One thing I enjoyed about ResidualsAndRoyalties.com was the comprehensive breakdown of where Michael-Johns income came from. I think its a model to emulate and Ive attempted to do so on my site. When writing my own earnings reports, Ive decided to follow a few guidelines that Id like to share:

• Offer detail. I list all my revenue sources and expenses in as much detail as I feel comfortable with. That means an itemized list of every single source I attempt to generate income with and every single expense directly incurred through the operation of my site.
• Give concrete figures. Ive always preferred reading earnings reports when they provide exact numbers. In other words, how much money did you earn through Adsense, how much through affiliate marketing, etc?
• Use pictures. I havent had the opportunity to do this yet, but the most successful earnings reports offer photographic evidence to support their claims. Show a picture of your check from Adsense and blur out the confidential parts itll lend credibility to you and your site.

So, whats the take-away from this post?

First, earnings reports drive traffic. The top sites in the make money online niche prominently feature earnings reports and they are often some of the most visited posts on the site.

Second, theres a good reason for this. People need inspiration and hope to maintain a commitment and they need commitment to make money online. Earnings reports may actually be some of the most valuable types of content you can offer your readers.

Third, earnings reports are easy to write and require adherence to only a few guidelines to be successful.

If you have your own site, then try writing your own earnings reports. If you dont have your own site yet but are considering it, check out some earnings reports on successful make money online blogs and see just how much money you can make.

Taylor Shaw is the founder and author of MakeMoneyOnlineRoad.com, the site that follows a regular guy as he tries to make a living making money online.

Last month, the Residuals and Royalties blog had almost 12,000 unique visitors and 1,012 in one day on February 2nd.  I am doing everything that I can to make this number continue to grow.  A quality guest post should definitely get the author some traffic to his or her blog.  I am willing to allow one link within the body of the post and another link at the bottom of the post along with the posterâ??s name and the name of their blog. 

The chart below shows my visitors for last month…

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not all guest posts will be accepted to the Residuals and Royalties blog, in fact â?? the post should be something that really catches my attention in order to get published.  Below is a list of requirements for any guest poster who wishes to write for the Residuals and Royalties blog. 

1. Must provide the reader with a legitimate way to make money online or earn residual income.
2. No MLM schemes, PTC websites or other sketchy programs.
    
3. Must include one of the following keywords: make money online, residual income, royalties.
    
4. Must be your own original content that is NOT published elsewhere.
    
5. Can include two links â?? one in the body of the post and one in your signature.  Affiliate links are allowed.
    
6. Must be at least 400 words.
    
7. Must be highly readable and well written with excellent use of grammar.
8. Must not be written about a website or money making idea that I have already covered in a prior post.  (Go back and check my past posts before submitting!) 

I will only be posting about one guest post per week.  Feel free to submit your post to me at residualsandroyalties@yahoo.com .  Please include your name and the anchor text that you want used on your two links.  If you have a special photo that you want included in the post â?? please attach it along with your email.  

I think this can be a win-win situation for both the guest poster any myself.  I will be getting quality content and hopefully the poster will get an influx of traffic to his or her blog. 

I look forward to your posts! 

Best regards, 

Michael-John Wolfe 

Tags: Make Money Online, Residual Income, Royalties