You can make money with your writing blog, especially if you pay attention to my tips for advertising Amazon products! These tips stem from a Big Mistake I made on “Quips and Tips for Successful Writers” — I live to serve as a horrible warning to other bloggers and writers :-). Making money blogging can help you fill in the financial gaps between your magazine writing assignments, give you something to work on between gigs, and improve your writing skills.

Before my tips, a quip:

“You must want to enough,” said mystery writer Phyllis Whitney. “Enough to take all the rejections, enough to pay the price in disappointment and discouragement while you are learning. Like any other artist you must learn your craft — then you can add all the genius you like.”

This advice for novelists, freelance writers, and poets also applies to building a financially successful writing blog! Bloggers have to slog through the rejections, disappointments, and feelings of dejection first. Then, after they’ve learned the ropes as bloggers, they can add their own brand of genius. For an unbeatable array of blogging tips, click Problogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income. And, read on for five tips for advertising Amazon products on writing blogs…

5 Tips for Advertising Amazon Products on Writing Blogs

1. Use a WordPress plugin to upload your products or books. I use the Amazon Reloaded plugin for this WordPress blog, which automatically uploads book covers and links. Alternatively, you could go through the Associates site to advertise Amazon products, but it’s a little more complicated.

2. Double check your Amazon Reloaded settings! This was my Big Mistake: when I uploaded a new version of Amazon Reloaded SIX months ago, I didn’t re-enter my Amazon Associates ID. This meant I lost six months of potential revenue from all three of my “Quips and Tips” blogs, because I wasn’t being credited when readers clicked on my book links. *&%$#@*!!!! And it also meant I had to go back and re-upload the book covers and links on hundreds of my old blog posts. #@&(())!!!

3. Find the benefits in your blogging mistakes. This isn’t exactly a tip for advertising Amazon products specifically, but it’s a great life tip: learn how to make your failures work for you. Since I had to fix all my Amazon book links, I decided to revive my blog posts at the same time — which will help attract more readers. I edited them to be more search engine optimized, cleaned up my tags, and strengthened “Quips and Tips for Successful Writers” as a whole. It took me five days of full-time work to clean up my blogs, but in the long run it’s time well spent!

4. Advertise Amazon products that match your blog posts. This seems like a no-brainer, but it’s one of the top advertising tips that Amazon gives. If you’re advertising products or books on your blog, choose ones that align with your content. My inclusion of Problogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income is a good example of an Amazon product matching my blog post. Even better would be tips on making money on Amazon products through your writing blog or Web site, but I couldn’t find such a book.

5. Review your ”orders report” for the best Amazon products to advertise to writers. What products or books that you’ve linked to are top sellers? If you can spot a trend – such as high sales on books that offer web writing tips from bloggers – then focus on those products and topics a little more often. Be aware of what your readers are looking for…and find ways to give it to them.

Do have any Amazon advertising tips for writing blogs and Web sites? Or, do you avoid advertising on your blog? I’d love to hear from you below!