Money Blue Book

Reviews Of The Top Online Banking Options For High Interest Rates

If you’re searching for a list of the best online banks to deposit your savings in, then you’ve arrived at the right place. One of the most common, if not the most often asked question I get as a personal finance blogger, is which bank I would recommend to those looking to get the best interest rate of return for their money.

While some of us plow our personal savings into home mortgage payments or invest them into stocks, most of us invariably keep a certain stash into more accessible bank accounts for emergency fund purposes. Others like myself use high interest savings accounts to save up money for specific targeted purposes – in my case, I’m saving up for my future down payment for a house. So, if you’re keeping money in a bank account anyway, why not try to get the highest interest rate possible? To address this need – below, I’ve compiled a list of what I believe to be the best online banks available today – banks that offer the best deals for high interest savings and high yield savings accounts. Many of the recommended firms are also very competitive in the area of certificate of deposits (CD’s) and checking account rates as well.

Unfortunately, with interest rates at historical lows across the board given the current ongoing economic climate, the term “high yield savings account” is more of a comparative delineation than a descriptively absolute one. Just a few years ago during the glory days, one could easily rake in a hefty 5% to 6% APY rate with popular online savings accounts and high yield CD rates. But those days are long gone and today, the top online banks only offer anywhere from 2% to 3% tops. But despite the overall lower rates at the present time, the yields found at these Internet based banks still greatly exceed the nearly zero percent interest rates found at most local brick and mortar banking institutions. Think the best bank accounts are found at places like Citibank, Bank of America, Chase Bank, or  Wells Fargo? Think again. The APY rates offered by Internet based online banks almost always greatly exceed the paltry interest rate offerings of the brand name banks, while offering the same FDIC insurance limit guarantees and transactional security protections that are equal to, if not better than that offered by the big boys.

Benefits Of Online Savings Accounts: Impressive Rates With FDIC Insurance

Because of much lower overhead costs, online banks generally pay much better rates on savings accounts, checking accounts, and CD’s. Online bank accounts are also much less likely to have minimum balance requirements than ordinary retail banks. They also offer many conveniences and advantages over accounts at traditional neighborhood banks and credit unions. So long as the customer has access to an Internet connection, online bank account transactions can be performed, balances can be checked, and funds can be transferred in and out anywhere and anytime. The ability to keep 24 hour tabs on your account funds, pull up account history data on demand, and eliminate the need to conduct transactions in cumbersome paper form are some of the clear advantages of web based banking. To compete with the traditional big name banks, a large majority of online banks have eliminated their monthly fees and account minimums, and now offer a wealth of free financial services that include free bill pay, free budgeting tools, free fund transfers, and free out of network ATM usage.

Below is comprehensive review of what I’ve found to be the top online banks for high interest checking and high yield savings accounts. Each and every single one offers full FDIC insurance limit protection for account holders – guaranteeing the safety and security of account funds from unexpected loss.

List Of The Best Online Bank Accounts For Savings, Checking, and CD Rates

1) Lending Club - While not an online bank in the traditional sense, Lending Club offers a comparable peer to peer lending (P2P) program that matches prospective consumer lenders with prospective borrowers, all with a variety of disclosure safeguards to ensure a generally low default rate. While the program has gone mainstream and garnered quite a bit of positive feedback from the press and new members, it’s been able to stick to the fundamental basics and continue to offer its lending account holders the ability to reap a consistent 9.60% average interest rate of return. For those seeking an impressive high yield savings account alternative to online banks, Lending Club is worth a look. If you wish to know more, please take a look at my review of Lending Club where I explore in depth how the online program works and evaluate it to see if it truly is a legitimate non-scam way to earn a higher APY rate on your savings.

2) Everbank – I highly recommend Everbank if you’re looking for a top tier online bank that offers great rates for savings accounts and checking. EverBank’s product offerings are diverse and includes features like money market accounts, CD’s, credit cards, and even currency investments options. You may not be as familiar with Ever Bank as you might be with a few of the other banking names on this short list, but they’ve been around for some time. Since the beginning, EverBank has always earned awards and praise for its banking features and online services. Money Magazine rates EverBank as one of its “Best Of Breed Online Banks”, Kiplinger’s Personal Finance ranks the firm’s Everbank FreeNet checking account very highly, and even Forbes Magazine has ranked the bank among the “Best of the Web” for numerous years.

Everbank’s most popular account feature – the highly regarded Yield Pledge Money Market Account – requires a minimum initial deposit of $1,500 and starts out at an extremely high introductory rate that overwhelming tops most high yield savings rates in the market. After a 3 month introductory period, the rate automatically adjusts to a slightly lower rate, but one that is still competitively higher than that offered by other online banks. Thereafter, there is no monthly fee so long as a balance of $5,000 is maintained. For more details and commentary, see my Everbank review.

3) Ally Bank – Formerly known as GMAC Bank, the new Ally Bank markets itself as a new age approach to online banking – one that offers transparency and a reformed way of doing business with its flexible array of unlimited sub accounts, daily interest compounding, no minimum deposits, no monthly fees, no minimum balances, and no sneaky disclaimers. I personally have deposited quite a bit of cash with Ally Bank and have found their online banking services to be very straight forward and reliably clean cut. Ally’s banking rates are very high and there are no confusing tiered interest rates to contend with. What you see is basically what you get – with the usual assortment of high yield savings accounts, money markets, and high yield CD’s. However, what’s uniquely appealing about Ally Bank is its offering of no-penalty CD deposits that allow account holders to avoid paying any fees to transfer money out prior to the CD maturity date. For more info about Ally’s banking features, please read my Ally Bank review.

4) E-trade Bank – Known more for its online brokerage arm, ETrade is what I call a one stop shopping all-in-one banking/discount brokerage firm. They offer pretty much the full package in the way of banking and brokerage services – including high interest savings accounts, checking, credit cards, mortgage services, CD’s, Roth IRAs, and investment gudiance. Best of all, Etrade does not impose any minimum balance requirements to open a new account. While E trade’s Complete Savings Account is not currently the best online bank in terms of offering the highest interest rate for deposits, it makes up for this mild shortfall by offering an extremely broad array of services from one source. Those that want the ability to instantly transfer money back and forth freely between their banking and broker accounts will find Etrade to be extremely appealing as the company seamlessly integrates the two services into one. If you want to know more, see my Etrade bank review and my Etrade broker review for my opinionated take.

5) FNBO Direct Bank – FNBO Direct is the online banking division of the First National Bank of Omaha – a bank with a great reputation that has largely escaped the credit crisis that has plagued most of the other banks in some shape or another. FNBO Direct offers competitive rates for its account holders and imposes no fees or minimum balance requirements. Fund transfers are quick and links to other bank accounts are easy to set up via a series of test trial deposits. ATM card options are available for those that wish to access their account funds from traditional live automated tellers. The bank’s high yield savings account was one the first to start offering super high rates during the heyday of Internet based banks, and continues to be one of the most popular choices for its consistently high interest rate offerings. As with all of the recommended banks on this list, FNBO offers full FDIC insurance limit coverage for account deposits. Please check out my FNBO Direct review if you wish to learn more about the online bank.

6) HSBC Direct Bank – Named as the best cyber bank and having the best online savings account by Kiplinger’s Personal Finance in years past, HSBC Direct is a top tier bank in terms of reliability and name recognition. While its interest rate yields for its no-minimum-balance high interest savings accounts have fluctuated along with all of the other online banking names out there, HSBC’s rates remain very competitive. Along with its bank account offerings, the firm also offers a convenient array of banking features such as ATM debit cards and free online bill payments. Highly regarded for its commendable customer service reputation, HSBC also provides its banking customers amazing access to its growing network of convenient bank branches and ATM’s located all over the world (with new locations being constantly added). Check out my HSBC Direct review for even more insight.

7) Capital One Direct Bank – While probably much more famous for its lineup of “What’s In Your Wallet” Capital One credit cards and its popular build-your-own credit card Card Lab feature, Capital One provides its savings account customers with pretty competitive rates through its online direct banking program. With Capital One Direct Banking, members get access to InterestPlus Savings, high yield money markets, certificate of deposits, and even business money market accounts. While there are no mandatory account minimum requirements and no sneaky service fees, a balance of $10,000 or more is required to get the highest APY rate that Capital One has to offer. Online bank transfers are always free, and linking your Capital One savings account to existing external bank accounts for quick and easy transfers is very easy to do.

8) ING Direct Bank – As the grand daddy of them all, ING Direct has been around the longest since its emergence during the early dot com era of 2000. Since then, ING Direct has solidified itself as one of the best online banks with some measure of streamlined improvements to its online interface over the years. While the firm’s bank rates have fluttered around of late, its yields are still competitive and exceed the rates offered by most neighborhood banks. Overall, ING Direct banking products are easy to open, easy to use, and ideally suited for those new to online banking. One thing that most reviewers of financial products generally agree on – is how simple and straight forward ING products are to manage. ING offers a wide array of banking and investment products with its seamless union of ING Direct savings, checking, and investing features via ING ShareBuilder. The firm’s very popular Orange Savings Account offers a competitive interest rate with no monthly fees and no account balance minimums. Its Electric Orange Checking account also enjoys similar praise and positive reviews from the online critics. Another greatly appreciated feature of the bank is also the ability to utilize ING Direct referrals to refer friends and family members, allowing them to enjoy special first time member bonuses as new account sign ups.

9) Dollar Savings Direct – As a newly acquired online bank by much larger parent Emigrant Bank, Dollar Savings Direct continues the tradition of offering great high yield savings rates for its flagship product. New savings accounts are easy to open hassle free with no account maintenance requirements, no maintenance fees, and no hidden charges. New accounts do require an initial minimum deposit of $1,000, however thereafter, there is no stated obligation that account holders must actually maintain that balance. If you are an aggressive bank rate chaser like myself and desire the safety and security of full FDIC insurance coverage for your liquid cash assets with the added benefit of high rates, you should definitely click through and check out what Dollar Savings Direct Bank has to offer. For more details, take a look at my Dollar Savings Direct review.

10) WT Direct Bank – Chances are, you’ve probably never heard of WTDirect bank before as they are a relative unknown compared to some of the bigger names above. However, as the online arm of Wilmington Trust FSB, the parent bank has been around for quite some time since the early 1990’s.  Currently, WT Direct offers a pretty attractive high yield online savings account that features a pretty top tier interest rate. Best of all, there are no minimum deposit requirements, no account maintenance fees, no limits on the number of linkages to external accounts, and all deposits earn interest regardless of balance amounts. One caveat however, is that the highest tiered interest rate for the savings accounts require balances of at least $10,000. If all other savings account alternatives above don’t suit your fancy, savings account holders with at least $10,000 to store away will find WT Direct to be a solid high yield savings option.

Searching For Other Alternative Sources Of High Interest Rates

Generally if you want the perfect mix of cash liquidity, account accessibility, and competitively high interest rate yields for your bank account funds – you ought to stock with high yield savings accounts. But if you’re willing to exchange a little bit of liquidity and lock up your monetary funds for anywhere between periods as short as a month to periods of 5 years or longer, you might be able to get a better interest rate yield via certificates of deposit. Check out my list of the best CD rates for what some of the top online banks are offering in that department.

Speaking of rates, those of you who are disappointed with the pitifully low interest rates on checking account funds might be surprised to know that there are high yield reward checking accounts out there that offer extremely high interest rates on checking balances. The rates offered are frequently the same or even better than the best online savings accounts and top level CD rates. The catch with these high interest reward checking accounts is that they often have stringent maximum balance limits and frequently require account holders to execute a certain number of debit card transactions a month to qualify. But if you’re up to the task, they may be able to provide you an impressively excellent rate of return for your money.

Reviews of the Best Paid Online Surveys: Avoid Internet Survey Scams

If you are searching for a genuinely legitimate paid online survey, you’re at the right place. The following is a recommended list of popular online marketing firms that are offering free paid surveys and is a nice resource for people looking to make some money online from home or earn a little bit of extra cash on the side by filling out short survey questionnaires. After much research with a lot of trial and error, I’ve compiled a list of what I’ve found to be the top paid online survey programs that compensate participants with either cash or gift card rewards for completed surveys.

If you’ve already conducted an online search via Google.com or Bing.com for the best paid surveys, then you’ve probably already noticed that the vast majority (95%) of those search results invariably lead to some rather scammy looking links or to websites that try to convince you to fork over a membership fee for exclusive access to some secret list of paid surveys. It’s a sad and rather sobering sight to see, but the Internet is littered to the brim with such misleading resources and self interested clutter. Don’t buy the marketing hype or misleading online promotions that suggest that you must actually pay money to gain access to some super secret list. If a survey company starts asking you to pay an upfront charge, run away as fast as you can – lest you unwittingly succumb to the online scam. There is absolutely no reason that you ought to ever pay for such services as they can be legitimately and freely obtained online without cost.

Is It Really Possible To Make Money Online By Taking Paid Internet Surveys?

For starters and particularly for those of you easily misled or swayed by delusions of dancing dollar signs in your head, let me be very clear – the paid online survey websites listed below are not scams, gimmicks, or get rich quick schemes. No one is going to become a millionaire or earn enough money with these surveys to retire. Paid surveys can help you supplement your full time day job with some extra spending cash to pay the bills (up to anywhere from as little as $25 to as much as $200 or more per month), but that’s the extent of their financial usefulness. If you’re a stay at home mom, a full time student, a retiree, or even a working professional who wants to kill some time on a regular basis by knocking out a few quick surveys for some free money, these compensated surveys will definitely appeal to you. But those of you looking to turn online survey taking into some type of part time job are much better off working as a blogger and directing your efforts towards blogging to make money. At the very least, part time blogging has a greater potential to turn a simple hobby into a full time and sustainable online job than survey taking ever could.

However, in terms of earning a little bit of honest cash on the side, free paid survey offers are verifiably legitimate sources of income. Paid survey websites work by referring to their members survey inquiries provided by real companies. Most of the referring retailers are owners of consumer brands that you and I are probably already familiar with – brands that range from popular grocery food products and recognizable household goods, to manufacturers of popular electronic devices and automobiles. The retail companies rely on these regular survey samples to design and market their products, and are very willing to pay a small amount of money to compensate individuals for their survey taking time. Along with the usual assortment of survey inquiries based on your previous history of consumer usage and experiences, occasionally you also get lucky with a specific request to try out new and untested products. I enjoy it immensely when survey companies send out actual consumer products for me to review in person – items that include everything from experimental trial shampoos to shaving razors, to snack crackers and ear phones. After examining and trying out the products, you are expected to rate your experience on a sliding scale based on a variety of determinative factors.

The pay out rate for each online survey varies depending on the subject matter and the length of time that each is expected to take. The easy $1.00 surveys can take as little as 1-10 minutes to complete, while the more difficult but more lucrative $20 – $25 health care and fitness related paid surveys may take as long as an hour or longer. Depending on your personal demographics, you may or may not qualify for a large number of the potential paid online surveys out there – as it all depends on what the marketing companies are looking for at any given time. But if you want to fully maximize your online survey income potential, I highly recommend that you sign up and register for as many legitimate survey sites as you can. The more survey programs you have a relationship with, the more likely you will be able to maintain a steady flow of survey taking opportunities to make money from. As always, be sure to use a spare email account, lest you get overrun by survey emails (although you can always shut the survey messages down at any time by request).

Reviews Of Recommended Paid Online Survey Sites (All Are Free To Join):

1) NFO My Survey – The MySurvey Consumer Panel website is one of the very best free online survey providers out there and one that I highly recommend for aspiring paid online survey takers. Not only is their website very accessible and easy to navigate, their online surveys pay quite well. Since I joined as a panel survey taker years ago, they’ve provided me a consistent stream of paid survey opportunities on a wide array of interesting topics, including numerous fun product review solicitations that were mailed to my home for me to try out and opine on. Though the company utilizes a point system for dishing out reward incentives, the points are fully redeemable for cash checks and gift cards. The company also allows participants to earn additional money through referrals of their own.

2) Synovate – The Synovate Global Opinion Panel pays cash for completed online surveys and offers actively engaged participants the opportunity to receive a fairly steady burst of paid online survey chances on a regular basis. The Synovate survey company’s payout rate is quite competitive but dependent on the survey’s subject matter. Keep an eye out for those lucrative health care related surveys as they pay $10 and up. Synovate does provide product review opportunities as well and I’ve received my fair share of fun experimental bathroom products to review.

3) Ipsos I Say – Ipsos is a pretty big name in the marketing research world. While they focus primarily on in home product reviews and consumer product surveys, they still generally provide a reasonably balanced mix of of survey opportunities for their participating members. If you are interested in receiving freebies and getting free survey test products in the mail to review, you might want to give Ipsos a try. In regards to these in-home freebie products, you are generally free to keep the products regardless of whether you actually fill out the accompanied survey or not.

4) Survey Savvy – I really like Survey Savvy as the company is one of the best paid Internet survey sites in the market today and offers its participants a pretty lucrative referral program for their friends and family members. The company pays its members money for both personally completed surveys as well as completed surveys made by referrals. Payouts are dependent on the length of time and subject matter involved, but for friend and family referrals, you can earn $2.00 for every survey your direct referral takes and yet another $1.00 for every survey taken by their referrals. Based on the way Survey Savvy has things set up, online participants have multiple tiered opportunities to rack up income pretty quickly.

5) Global Test Market – I’ve been using Global Test Market to supplement my part time survey income for some time now. The company offers a fairly consistent number of survey taking opportunities for both American and international survey registrants looking to maintain a consistent stream of paid survey jobs. Even if you don’t qualify for a survey offer that is sent to you, you still get to accrue reward points simply by looking over it. Participants earn Global Test Market Points for completing surveys, redeemable for a variety of reward incentives. Like all of the survey companies reviewed on this list, Global Test Market is completely free and not contractually compulsory (you’re not forced to answer all surveys if you don’t want to).

6) Greenfield Online – If you are trying to find a legitimate paid online survey company that will provide you a significant number of survey gigs at a consistent pace, Greenfield Online is definitely for you. Greenfield has access to a lot of offers and provides payment in a variety of forms, including cash checks and free entries into their regularly renewed prize drawing. Here’s my little advice for registrants of Greenfield Online – stick to the cash payment only surveys and consider skipping the ones that only offer prize drawing entries. Cold hard cash beats raffle drawings any day. Sure you, might get lucky, beat the odds, and win the lottery, but your chances are slim to none that you will.

7) My Points – Want to get paid for reading spam emails? Then give MyPoints a try. The company is legitimate and at any time you want the emails to permanently stop, simply unsubscribe. MyPoints is not really a paid online survey provider per se, but they do offer survey opportunities as part of their reward earning system. The company offers a very large variety of ways to earn bonus points for future prize and merchandise redemption. If you are determined to make money online, I recommend trying out MyPoints as a resource. You can earn points by completing surveys (SurveyMail), reading e-mail advertisements (BonusMail), or even by signing up for online trial offers. If you don’t want to sign up for any unnecessary services, I recommend that you simply stick with the Survey Mail and Bonus Mail opportunities to earn reward points.

8) American Consumer Opinion Panel – The American Consumer Opinion Panel, or ACOP as it’s commonly called, is a personal favorite of mine due to the speed at which the company issues out compensation checks for completed paid surveys. Depending on the type of survey completed, ACOP participants can expect to be paid anywhere from $4 to $20 depending on the length, qualification requirements, and subject matter of the survey. If you desire to be paid more and reap anywhere between $25-$50 for each opportunity, you might want to consider signing up for ACOP sponsored online focus group reviews whenever those rare offers present themselves.

9) Lightspeed Consumer Panel – If volume of surveys is the most important factor to you, then definitely consider signing up with Lightspeed. The consumer survey company offers a tremendous number of paid online survey opportunities, paying out reward points for each completed survey. Reward points are fully redeemable for cash payments, gift cards, and other merchandise based prizes. For the professional survey takers out there who can speed read and crank through a large number of surveys in one sitting, Lightspeed has the potential to be quite a lucrative part time income cash cow for super active participants.

Updated List Of The Best Nationally Available Bank CD Rates Below

Below, I’ve included a list of the best CD (certificate of deposit) rates presently found online – periodically updated by yours truly whenever I am alerted to major changes in the rates. All of the bank CD rates listed below are nationally available and not restricted to residents of any particular state(s). While national annual percentage yield (APY) rates for banks have fluctuated and dropped across the board due to the economic troubles we’ve been experiencing, the interest rates offered by CD’s still remain consistently higher than that offered by other forms of FDIC insured deposits such as savings accounts and money markets.

For many years now, I’ve kept my short term cash and emergency fund money saved in a variety of online savings accounts and online CD’s – jumping from one bank to another in pursuit of the highest interest rate yields. To maximize my money to its highest passive income potential, I never keep my short term cash idle for too long. At the very least I always ensure that they are properly invested in the best interest bearing accounts offering me the most competitive yields based on what I’m willing to give up in terms of account accessibility and liquidity. While I keep my most short term emergency funds stored in ultra accessible savings accounts, I store the bulk of my regular cash savings into certificate of deposits, neatly arranged into CD ladder setups for maximization of return and liquidity.

Contrary to some views, CDs are not all that difficult to use effectively. They are nothing more than time deposit products offered by banks that offer fixed rates for the life of the CD term. The biggest difference they have with savings accounts is that the funds deposited into CD’s are held for pre-set terms that range in duration from as short as 1 month to 10 years or longer. In exchange for the customer’s agreement not to withdraw the funds for the predetermined period of time (and consent to face an early withdrawal penalty fee if he or she does), the servicing bank pays the CD account holder a higher rate of interest on the deposited funds than it would otherwise pay for a readily accessible savings account. It’s a trade-off consideration between the customer’s preference for instant account accessibility versus interest rate of return. Typically, the longer the CD term the bank customer agrees to, the higher the CD rate offered in return. Obviously, one should not put funds into a CD that one would expect to absolutely need within a very short period of time.

Online CD Deposits Offer Much Better CD Rates Than Traditional Banks

While anyone can easily visit their local bank or neighborhood credit union and open a new certificate of deposit account, you’ll find that the rates these brick and mortar sources provide are rather limited compared to the higher rates that online banks and Internet based lending institutions are able to offer. The online banks can afford to provide their customers substantially higher rates on their CD deposits and investments due to the much lower overhead costs associated with running web-based services. Because they don’t have to maintain as extensive of a network of branch offices and don’t need to spend as much money hiring a large staff of employees and bank tellers to run their operations, online banks are better situated than traditional banks to pass on that extra savings to their depositors. As such, the high yield savings accounts, money market accounts, and CD rates you’ll find with online only banks such as EverBank, Ally Bank, and HSBC Direct will almost always beat out the interest rate offerings of more well known financial institutions like Citibank, Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase Bank, and Wells Fargo.

Even In The Event Of An Emergency, Online Bank CD Deposits Are Fully Protected

While these online banks perhaps don’t have the same brand name recognition and years of extensive and proven reliability as many one of the too-big-to-fail U.S. banking giants, all of the various deposit accounts they offer all enjoy the same equal protections and solid depositor guarantees afforded to the bigger name banks and credit unions. In the United States, the vast majority of bank accounts and CD deposits are fully protected from loss in the event of any unforeseen system collapse, theft, or potential run on the bank – backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. government up to the current maximum FDIC coverage limit of $250,000 per depositor, per bank. Unless the federal government suddenly collapsed, ceased to exist, thereby dissolving the entire nation into Armageddon and social anarchy – your money, whether deposited in a savings account or stored in a certificate of deposit account – is 100% safe.

List Of The Highest Yield Bank CD Rates For 12 Month Deposits (1 Year)

For consistency and comparison purposes, I have chosen to only list the best CD rates for 12 month certificate of deposits as opposed to listing every conceivable CD duration out there.

Compare CD Alternatives For Offers That Exceed Even High Interest CD Rates

Of course, you should never commit to any agreement until you’ve conducted some research, properly compared offers, and first shopped around for the best CD rates and deals. You should never solely take my word for it without performing your own due diligence. I highly encourage you to check out the various rate disclosures to confirm for yourself.

Alternatively, if you’re looking for a super competitive rate of return, you may wish to consider options beyond just high yield CD’s. Those willing to swap a little bit of the iron clad protections afforded to CD’s by FDIC insurance may want to check out P2P social lending networks where yields for investors are currently averaging over 9.60% APY for those willing to lend money out to prospective good credit score borrowers. The rates offered by sites such as Lending Club and Prosper.com tout APY offers that greatly exceed anything offered by bank CD’s. The impressive rates of return as reflected in this review of Lending Club are at the very least worth some consideration by prospective CD rate chasers.

Review Of How To Start Earning A Full Time Income With Just A Blog

Previously, I shared a little background overview of how I got started as an aspiring full time blogger and pursued my dream of working from home and making money with a blog. For many years, I worked a traditional day job as an attorney, whether it was with the federal government or whether it was in the private sector. A few years ago and rather unexpectedly out of the blue, I stumbled upon the idea of starting up a blog to make some money on the side. The idea was not to replace my seemingly stable and indispensable full time day job as a lawyer, but to supplement my salary with an alternative income stream. Little did I know and much to my subsequent surprise years later, my small network of profitable online weblogs would one day start reaping monthly incomes that greatly exceeded what I could earn as an ambulance chasing attorney. While I continue to balance my part time legal practice profession with my mixture of online businesses and other side ventures to this day, my blogging operations have finally grown to the point where they are now capable of providing me a stable and nearly free source of revenue – offering me a boost in a quality of life I never dreamed possible before.

If it’s one thing I’ve learned over the years, it’s that persistent adaptation, continuous self education, a strong entrepreneurial spirit, and the uncanny ability to function with little sleep – are traits that can truly be turned into financial success. Becoming a semi-full time blogger and giving up the tedious commute and traditional desk job – to work from home and earn a stable living is a reachable goal for many. The process is not easy and most of those who attempt to walk down this deceptively daunting and challenging path will undoubtedly fail miserably, but the fiercely determined and highly self motivated few will succeed – I’m living proof of that.

As entire books and trilogies can be easily written on the subject, the following is more of a quick summary for beginners who are interested in getting started with running their own profitable blogs than a comprehensive guide. Here are some of the key pointers that I’ve learned over time as a blogger who now earns in excess of six figures a year. I’m by no means an expert – just a guy who’s witnessed and endured first hand both his personal share of lucky successes and misguided failures when it comes to the subject of blogging online to earn a living.

If You Want To Make Money As A Blogger, Blog About A Subject Other Than Merely How To Make Money Online

This is not a blog about blogging, nor is it a blog about how to make money online per se. While I do occasionally dwell into ways how ordinary consumers can take advantage of arbitrage opportunities such as advantageous 0% balance transfer offers, reward credit card bonuses, and paid online survey offers that compensate participants looking to make some extra cash on the side – the primary focus of this blog has always been first and foremost focused on personal finance and long term financial planning and investing. The emphasis has always been on the nitty gritty elements of saving money, debt reduction, and planning for one’s financial future. One of the most recent endeavors of mine was to start sharing my personal net worth reports and income progressions over time. On this blog, I track and provide my own net worth tables for all to see, not to boast or demonstrate some ego-boosting bravado, but to show readers that I am just a regular guy, trying to work hard and turn my life’s fruits and efforts into a future retirement nest egg. I have had a tremendous number of failures in my life, whether they be personal, relational, or professional – but I have continued to strive for my dreams. That’s one of the essences of blogging – the sharing of personal viewpoints and the trials and tribulations of personal experience.

Those of you who want to quit your full time day jobs and end the seemingly endless cycle of trading hours for dollars, and start blogging online will do well for yourselves by picking a real world topic instead of dwelling in the saturated “make money online” tar pit. Not that there is anything particularly wrong with writing about your passion for blogging and generating income via your efforts on the web if that is your interest and true calling, but the fact of the matter is – it’s not a topical niche that deserves the type of massive attention and copycat imitation that it receives. Like the overrated careers that populate the professional landscape, the “make money online” niche is vastly over saturated, with supply outstripping the demand, and conversion rates (the ability to convert blog traffic into income producing sales) from its natural audience of extraordinarily tech savvy readers – too aggravatingly low. It’s not impossible, but I think you are better off choosing a less tapped into subject matter that’s not so exceedingly rife with scams and get rich quick junk products. Frankly, the same negative sentiment can be said for the technology niche as well, although fortunately for that area of tech based information, the content matter is more broad, more varied, and perhaps sufficiently diverse to accommodate new blogging entrants.

When choosing a subject to blog about – make sure you pursue a subject that is sufficiently broad and dynamic enough where you would be able to sit down and write out 100+ new blog titles on the spot if you had to. The world is currently filled to the brim with a tremendous number of subject matters and questions that still await to be responded to with updated information. Do you enjoy clothing and fashion trends? What about cooking, parenting advice, personal fitness, or outdoor activities like camping or fishing? How about coupons, shopping deals, lifestyle do-it-yourself tips, interior decorating, real estate news, home improvement, or celebrity gossip? Those are all interesting subject matters worth blogging about with plenty of advertisers to tap into for the passionate blogger.

How To Find Advertisers For Your Blog As A Beginner Blogger

Whenever I’m at a family gathering, with friends I haven’t seen for some time, or at some church function, one of the most common questions I get whenever I talk to someone about my online business (once I’ve overcome the blank stares after I tell them my self employment job title), is how I find relevant advertisers for my blog and how I actually get paid for my blogging efforts. Frankly, advertisers are everywhere and you just have to know where to find them. When your blog ultimately hits the big time and starts generating massive traffic, prospective advertisers and curious companies (and even advertising spammers) will naturally start tracking your contact information down. But until then, your best bet is to seek out and partner with the middle man companies out there – the affiliate marketing networks that consolidate and aggregate the various affiliate and lead generation offers out there on the Internet.

Through these affiliate marketing networks, you will be able to locate advertisers from a very wide variety of categories – all willing and able to pay you whenever you refer targeted sales or business to them through your blog or website. Many will allow you to access their affiliate product inventories and compensate you for a variety of sales referrals including – pay per click ads (PPC) which pay a tiny sum of money per text or banner ad click, pay per sign up or action type ads (CPA ads) which pay you a much larger referral cut in the way of commission percentages whenever you refer a prospective customer to them, and pay per impression ads (CPM) which pay a sum for a set number of website viewing impressions. For example, if I wanted to promote Monavie or any number of acai berry juice brands/scams for example (I don’t – but just giving this product as an example), there are plenty of companies out there willing to pay me a set referral commission (hypothetically, say 5-10% or $10.00 per lead) for every new customer I refer. Picking the right mixture of advertisers depends on your blog’s subject matter and your target audience.

Check out the following below recommended and popular affiliate marketing networks and companies for advertisers. Bear in mind, there are also quite a great number of specific advertisers and companies out there who also run affiliate programs, but are only obtainable if you contact them directly, and many frequently won’t deal with you until your blog reaches a certain traffic minimum (on average at least 5,000 unique visitors per month).

List Of The Best Affiliate Marketing Network Companies (Pay Per Click and Pay Per Referral):

Remember to negotiate for the best commission rates and learn to leverage your ever steadily increasing blog traffic to your advantage. Your negotiation clout will slowly increase as your blog traffic increases with time – be patient. Compare affiliate payout rates and offers and go with the best rate provider. All of the following affiliate networks below provide similar banners, ads, and website scripts you’ll need to get started, but each differs in the exclusive offers each carries in its inventory cache of advertisers. Many of the individual offers overlap between multiple affiliate network providers, but each of the following networks offers uniques. Be forewarned, it will likely take many, many, many months of very hard (but frequently fun and interesting) trial and error work before you’ll figure out how to maximize your ad revenue, but if you are persistent and are constantly learning, you’ll figure it out in time. Trying signing up and tinkering with each affiliate provider to get started:

1. Google Adsense: The most well known and best pay per click advertising network is run by Big-G. Google’s highly targeted contextual advertising program is a must have if you are a beginner to blogging. Just run the Adsense script on your blog and ads relevant to your content will automatically be displayed. Pay per click income is great for beginners but its usefulness tapers off in income potential after your site gets bigger.
2. Amazon Associates: With this popular and versatile program, simply link to Amazon.com related products for affiliate income earning potential. Very useful and scalable for even mature sites.
3. Ebay Partner Network: With the eBay affiliate publisher program, you can link to any specific eBay auction or link to an eBay ad based on keywords to get a commission cut of the sales generated.
4. Linkshare: Lots of very nice ad exclusives but less customer support and attention then I’d like. But in general, the exclusive affiliate offers are worth signing up for as you can’t get them anywhere else.
5. Commission Junction: The 800 pound gorilla of pay per action ads. Like them or not, they are the biggest of the advertising networks.
6. Flex Offers: Run by the same guys who run CardOffers.com. A personal favorite of mine as my longtime rep has consistently offered me the best affiliate payout rates. Lots of great exclusive affiliate offers for a diverse selection of categories.
7. CardOffers: A very popular choice for credit card sales and affiliate referrals if you are into the financial niche. The best credit card payout offers have all but dried up recently however. The economy is to blame.
8. NCS Reporting: Owned by Bankrate.com, it’s one of the biggest credit card referrals company. However, payout doesn’t seem as consistently high as CardOffers and account security was a problem for a while (major breach of my account by cunning online thieves).
9. Acclaim Network: Allowed me to run Citibank credit card links as a new start up blog when the other card affiliate companies wouldn’t permit it. Payouts are pretty low though.
10. Commission Soup: Invitation only affiliate company that offers great service and good payouts on most of their affiliate offers.
11. Market Leverage: Great referral program and an up and coming affiliate network company. Market Leverage is big among big name bloggers.
12. PepperJam Network: Another up and coming ad company that’s popular among established bloggers and affiliate promoters.
13. ShareASale: Provides a variety of affiliate companies to pick from.
14. Chitika: Touts quite a number of search targeted ads similar to Google Adsense
15. Google Affiliate Network: Seems like a blatant conflict of interest to me, but Google does offer a few exclusive deals. Not a well developed affiliate network as of yet however.
16. Text Link Ads: Used heavily during its heyday, but has grown somewhat taboo these days as a means to build up page rank based search engine authority, but some sites still use them. I personally don’t, but that’s because my site’s been around for a while now and I don’t need to use such services, which are better suited for beginners perhaps.
17. Azoogle Ads: Affiliate network that allows publishers to buy and sell text links and various ad space.
18. Clickbank: Offers primarily text links, random ads, and e-books of all sorts (big chunk of those offers are targeted at the make money online MMO niche).

How To Start Blogging For Money and Generating Blog Traffic

As there is simply no way I can write down every single advanced blogging technique and trade secret strategy I have about how to make money online and generate money with a blog (there is just too many), I’ll share just the basics as this is a post primarily to serve as a call to action for beginners. Here is how you can get going if you want to start getting serious about blogging as a way to replace your existing full time job and for you to start working for yourself. As entire blogs and books can be devoted to the subject, the following is just a basic primer to help newbies get started on the road to blogging for income. Please don’t fall for those stupid and utterly useless Shortcut To Internet Millions and related eBay type scams that promise lots of money with no effort and no computer know-how. Don’t be misled – you will need to work very hard, for months or years, but making money online with a blog is possible.  The following are the entry level steps I took to get started blogging:

1) Register A Domain Name and Purchase A Monthly Web Hosting Service: I recommend starting out with a free Blogspot.com or Wordpress.com account as a way to get your feet wet into the wonderful world of blogging. However, for long term brand name and website setup purposes, if you plan on making this whole blogging deal into a serious venture, I very strongly recommend registering for a formal domain name and choosing a paid web hosting service sooner than later. After all, doesn’t MoneyBlueBook.com seem much more professional than say – moneybluebook.blogspot.com?

• Get A Domain Name: Go with GoDaddy.com for your domain registration needs if you want to go with the service that most people are using at the moment. GoDaddy is a very popular registrar choice for bloggers just starting out. I personally use Dreamhost.com for my domain name registrations – but that’s only because they’re the company I started out with and I want to stay consistent. Good luck finding a short domain name however – it seems like all of the juicy domain names are all taken, especially the coveted “dot com” ones.
• Get A Reliable Web Hosting Provider: MoneyBlueBook.com is currently hosted on a dedicated LiquidWeb.com server. I pay about $150 a month for excellent and very reliable hosting, but that’s because this blog generates pretty decent traffic. Liquidweb is more expensive than other companies, but I’ve found their service to be extremely reliable with an excellent uptime track record. Most start up blogs can probably run sufficiently on a cheap shared server at least for some time with a hosting company like BlueHost, GoDaddy, or DreamHost for about $10-20 a month. But ultimately though, you get what you pay for. Cheap hosting equals unreliable up time. It’s not a big deal when you’re just starting out, but it’ll kill your business when your sites start generating serious traffic.

2) Install and Learn To Use Wordpress: Wordpress is the best and most reliable blogging platform to date. Some popular blogs out there are still operating off of other blogging programs like Blogger, but most are steadily migrating to Wordpress. Most professional web host providers can help you install this very powerful and versatile free blogging tool for you. It will take time for you to truly master the ins and outs of Wordpress blogging and learn how to fully utilize all of the Wordpress plugins and widgets available, but once you get the hang of the versatile blogging tools at your disposal, you’ll find the free Wordpress software to be quite indispensable.

3) Start Blogging On A Daily Basis and Pace Yourself As A Writer: The key to surviving as a blogger and building a sustainable future as a blogger capable of making a living online through blogging – is to stay consistent and not get overly burned out too soon. At the start, there is a natural euphoria of excitement as you start witnessing the blogging traffic fruits of your efforts, but don’t let the initial excitement force you to over exert yourself. Similarly, during your blogging journey, at some time or another, you are likely going to get stricken with an affliction of what’s popularly known as blogger’s block (aka, writer’s block). But fear not – even seasoned bloggers experience this feeling of laziness and lack of motivation on frequent occasion. Cut back on your blogging activities if you have to but don’t give up.

When you first start out, your readership will be pitifully few, but that’s absolutely normal. Don’t stop writing quality content as that is the only way you will generate readership in the very long run. This feeling of blogging loneliness and frustration caused by lack of traffic may persist for many months, but if you are to succeed, you must give it time. It takes a lot of time to get accepted into the good graces of the search engines and for strangers to organically discover your blog through the series of tubes of cyberspace. From the time I personally started blogging with the intention of ultimately making money online, it took 12 months or so before I finally started to generate a substantial income from my blogging activities. Blogging is easy to get started but difficult to truly master.

4) Learn To Monetize Your Blog Readership and Increase Your Blog Traffic: Blogging should always be a work in progress. You should always be adapting and finding ways to do existing things better. Even after you’ve started to generate traffic and establish a cadre of readers, you should be constantly trying to figure out ways to increase that traffic and tweak the effectiveness of your advertising pitches. Strategic Google Adsense placement, targeted blog titles, and improved search engine optimization updates are ways to boost your income and traffic.

Getting listed in search engine submissions, blog directory listings, exchanging blog rolls, swapping reciprocal text links, participating in blog carnivals via blogcarnival.com, guest posting on other blogs, writing comments in popular online forums, participating in popular and related blogs, article marketing, as well as engaging in social media sites like StumbleUpon, Digg, Facebook, mySpace, and Twitter – are all valid ways to get traffic but you’ll need to experiment with each one to find out what truly works in terms of improved monetization and what methods are just ways to generate exciting blog traffic numbers, but that don’t actually convert into tangible sales. Tip: Social media marketing is vastly overrated for monetization purposes as social media readers are not looking to buy or have their specific questions answered – thus targeted, organic search engine traffic is key. If you want to make money blogging, you had better be praying to the great temple of Google and figuring out what the Google gods want in the way of blog content and optimization.

5) Never Stop Learning, Experimenting, and Examining Your Competitors: You should never be trying to re-invent the wheel. One of the best ways to improve your own blog and blogging approach is to learn from the techniques of others. Take a peek at your competitor’s blog or visit your favorite blogs to see how they monetize and how they structure their blog content for clues as to their success. Don’t worry about feeling like a spy – after all, more likely than not, they are peeking right back at your website as well. That’s what smart businesses do – they examine their surroundings, learn from the best, and constantly improve. After all, if you owned a struggling ice cream shop, wouldn’t you secretly visit competing ice cream stores that are more successful than yours to figure out why and how those shops are able to generate more ice cream sales than yours?