Internet Blogs: Swift money making business

[Naveed Yaseen]

by Noor Aftab
At the time when finding employment opportunities have become an uphill task, there are many, who are using their skills and potential in style in order to themselves generate income by running different blogs on the Internet.

Blog culture is fast gaining ground in Pakistan and currently, hundreds of thousands of people daily visit different blogs on the Internet that provide them with the relevant information about their topics of interest.

As time is changing, so are the trends in online resources including blogs and forums, as now, these resources are aggressively and vigilantly providing platforms to people for exchanging views on a variety of topics, ranging from business, stocks, technology, telecom, culture, education, sports and many more.

Ahmad Bilal and Saad Hamid, living in Islamabad, provide enough evidence of the fact that lack of opportunities can never deprive the talented people of achieving what they really deserve. They developed their own online blogs sometime back, with each earning around 6,000 dollars per month. Their success stories do not end at this point, as they have much more on the cards to further increase their income.

Ahmad Bilal claims to be running the world’s largest soccer blog - soccerlens.com - on the Internet that enabled him to attract advertisements from leading institutions and individuals. While Saad Hamid, who came up with sizlopedia.com - a tech blog - succeeded in impressing online visitors with some useful information posted regularly on various important issues.

Kamran Yusuf, a software engineer, said that nowadays, a number of youngsters keep asking them about how to develop a blog on the Internet and the trend is becoming popular with each passing day. He said the educational institutions produce young and talented graduates every year, who often fail to find opportunities in their respective fields. “But many of them can now test their abilities in different ways, benefiting themselves from the new technological advancements.”

During this correspondent’s interaction with some online blog ‘experts’, it was learnt that developing a blog doesn’t need any kind of investment and anyone could start it just after going through a registration process to get enough space on the Internet for their contents.

Syed Amir Hussain, a senior consultant, said bloggers could generate income through advertisements, RSS advertising, sponsorships, digital assets, donations, consultancy and other network opportunities. He said in addition to the array of advertising programmes, there is a growing awareness among business circles about the value and opportunity that exist for them in advertising directly on Internet blogs.

Amir said the increasing numbers of bloggers have been developing their own digital assets to support and add revenue streams to their blogs, including e-books, courses and tele-seminars. “Always start from valuable and useful contents, as they are the heart of your blog. Without content, nobody will visit your blog and that will result in no money, as content provided is the prime reason behind people visiting your blog,” he said.

Referring to a Lahore based housewife, Maryam Nasim, he said she is running an online blog by the name of pinkwool.com and earning handsomely while staying at home. Her online blog offers free printable bookmarks, stationary, gift tags, candy wrappers, kitchen labels, calendars, gift baskets, baby shower games and notepads.