Almost every day, I see an ad on social media touting someone’s methods for monetizing blogs. Â I haven’t clicked on one yet. Â When I started this blog, my motivation wasn’t to make money through Butchtastic directly, though I hoped my writing would get me there eventually. Â And ‘eventually’ has arrived because by the time summer is over, I’ll have made money from three stories, two published in anthologies.
In the early days, I did sex toy reviews and I’ve done some movie and book reviews as well. Â I didn’t get paid for reviews – which is proper – but I did get product and that was a nice perk. Â The sex toy companies I worked with back then have cut back or eliminated their affiliate programs and my interest had waned even before that point.
Other bloggers are finding ways to monetize their blogs. Â Sinclair Sexsmith of Sugarbutch Chronicles has been using Patreon to fund a post a week – chapters in a novella – the culminating work will be offered free to Patrons. Â Patreon is a crowdsourcing platform built on pledges of monthly payments. Â Sugarbutch had advertising at one time, but the cleaner format designed by rife is much nicer without all that commercial messiness.
Micah at NeutroisNonsense is also using Patreon to fuel a monthly feature involving a topic and guest contributors. Â People are invited to contribute as little as $1 a month for access to special features from Micah.
Creating and selling products is another way of monetizing our creative urges. Â BD Swain, another butch smut writer, doesn’t advertise or use Patreon or other crowdfunding, but recently created a deck of very sexy cards, 52 Pick Up – Play Dirty, for sale at $10 a piece. Â Photos by BD. Â Sinclair recently published an anthology of their work, Sweet and Rough (which I need to finish reading so I can post a review here).
Other blogs use advertising, sometimes with some of the previously mentioned tactics, to raise money. Â I’ve shied away from advertising – I find it visually messy and I have the privilege of being able to support my hosting fees without it. Â That said, things are changing in the coming year and I am looking for ways that my writing can start to pay its way in the world.
I met someone earlier in the week who introduced himself as a ‘working writer’ and that’s what I aspire to be. Â Getting paid for anthology inclusion is a great way to start. Â Finishing my eBook and getting that on Amazon would be another great step. Â I’m also going to explore Patreon and consider how I can leverage that platform. Â The initial goal is to pay for my hosting, which is about $120 per year and domain registration which is another $12 a year. Â So if I could earn $132 a year and just pay for the blog, I’d break even. Â The further goal is to have my writing pay for more and more of my kinky writer-life expenses: sex toys, registration for kink events, membership to the Seattle Center for Sex Positive Culture, registration for writing conferences, etc. Â That would be super cool and a step in the direction of being a working writer. Â I don’t expect all my income to be generated here, but I hope to use this as a platform for some of that monetary reward.
To recap, I’m going to finish my eBook and advertise it here and wherever else I can. Â I’m going to look into Patreon, which brings me to the audience participation portion of this post: Â What would you pay per month to support me? Â What would you want in return? Some ideas are access to special writing features, free copies of some printed collections, photos, exclusive newsletters, etc. Help me brainstorm! Â Ohhhh… and I had another idea, something Red and I have been kicking around – video taped pornscapades. Â I’m sure we could find a way to monetize that, though I need to talk to my wife and get her blessing and consent. Â Maybe we could use videos as a part of the exclusive Patron incentives. Â Hmmm… ideas.
I really do want to hear ideas from you reader, whether you are a long time loyal Butchtastic fan or one of my new readers. Â I’m looking for ways to creatively raise money through dirty stories and I want to make sure my investors are getting a good value back. Shoot me an email at Kyle at Butchtastic.net or comment here on the blog.
and THANK YOU!
Also in the thinking pan: Â giving this blog a much needed face lift, most likely paying someone to help me design and update the whole thing.
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