Fame and popularity is a common dream of the average blogger and a life reality of only a few. As millions of bloggers in this virtual world we call the blogosphere try to make money using their blogs, there only lies a few that can no longer make any more. Popular king of bloggers, John Chow, mentions that there is a calculated possibility that his personal blog could reach levels exceeding $300,000 USD per month. “I had Unique Blog Design give this blog a complete makeover back in September so I can accommodate more private advertising” , says John Chow.

The only stipulation for Chow is the fact that his blog holds him back from collecting. Chow mentions, “All the ad spots are almost always completely sold out so there is really is no way to increase that unless I add more ad spots or increase prices” John Chow is one of only a few bloggers who is faced with the problem of not being able to increase income on his blog due to the limited space within a blog. Chow admits that his blog is already heavily saturated with advertisements and the option of adding more really isn’t an option.

This leaves Chow with only one remaining option: Price Increase. Chow announced on his blog today that he feels his current rate card is very affordable and he offers a better bang for his advertiser’s dollar compared to the rate cards of other competing blogs. “My ad prices are on the cheap side at the moment. The Cow next door charges $200 for a review. I charge $450. On the surface, I seem to be more expensive but I have over 10 times the readership Cow has.”, say Chow.

The Cow that he mentions is another upcoming blogger that has entered into the blogger of fame category. The site is call John Cow and was launched as a copy cat spin off of John Chow dot Com earlier in 2007. With a level of explosive growth riding the coat tails of John Chow, John Cow now has enough traffic and advertisers to sustain the site. Recently, within the last few months, John Cow was able to break free from the coat tail of John Chow and redesign his blog and focus more on his own unique branding.

The point John Chow makes is that even though the cost to advertise on his blog will be increasing, it is still a very good deal when comparing traffic numbers with other competing blogs. Chow claims to have 10 times more readers than John Cow.

At the time of writing this article,

• *John Cow has an Alexa Rank of 14,944
• *John Chow has an Alexa Rank of 3,980

Many people have adverse reactions to Chow and other leading bloggers collecting in on all the money. As it may be perceived as expensive, their advertisement services are effective as mentioned by Gyutae Park, a recent satisfied customer of John Chow, “If there was any doubt in my mind about the worthiness of this investment, it has been completely erased. John Chow brings a huge influx of high-quality traffic to Internet-related sites.” Time and time again, leading bloggers have no problem selling out and having a back order on their advertisement slots.

Commonly, among the circle of inspiring bloggers who want to make money, jealousy is formed. Bloggers lash out and get disrespectful and vent frustrations out on these leading bloggers. They fail to realize that leading A-List bloggers help keep the market high for the entire blogging industry. By holding strong to their rate card and continuously increasing rates while still maintaining a full book, the result is that advertisers are hungry to spend money on blogs.

The title of this article, “What Happens When A-List Blogs Can’t Make More Money?” has a simple answer. If the cost to advertise on leading blogs continue rise and also continue to be maintain a back order status, the demand for advertiser exposure is high. There are not enough leading blogs to supply the demand for advertisers.

Advertisers are interested in exposure, numbers and results. As there is only a handful of blogs who can accommodate and fulfill the mass needs in these attributes, there is no reason why advertisers would not have an interest in advertising on smaller and lower volume blogs with a proportionate decrease in price. Again, numbers are numbers and if smaller blogs can provide 25% of the typical level of exposure found on an A-List blog, then an advertisers would have no problem paying 25% of the typical fee of an A-List blog to advertise on a B-List or C-List Blog.

My suggestion to B-List and C-List bloggers are to visit the A-List blogs and review their rate card and review their traffic stats and use these numbers as a base standard to calculate the cost to hold advertisement on your blog.

Example:

John Chow dot Com claims to have 200,000 unique visits per month. Consequently he offers a 468×60 graphic advertisement for $1000 / month. This same slot is shared with a total of three advertisers. If your blog gets 20,000 unique visits per month, that equate to 10% of the exposure an advertiser could get when advertising on John Chow dot Com. 10% of the cost would be $100 dollars / month. Multiply that 3x would be $300 / month. Many B-List and C-List bloggers feel that is excellent money, I concur.

Focus less on setting the standard and allow the experts, the A-List Blogs, to control the blog stock market. Focus more on creating an advertisement rate card on your own blog that replicates the prices of the leading blogs. Understand that there is a high demand and huge market for blog advertising and start taking advantage of this advertiser’s backlog.

Sell Yourself and Your Blog:

1. Make an advertisement rate card and import it into Adobe PDF. Make it look professional, shiny and appealing.
2. Don’t manipulate your numbers. Be honest. Include snippets from Google Analytics or other trusted traffic analysis programs.
3. Include comparisons from A-List blog rate cards and illustrate the % of exposure that can be gained from your blog.
4. Visit the A-List blogs and jot down the names of the current advertisers.
5. Do a Google search for published testimonials related to previous experiences advertising on common A-List blogs and collect their names.
6. Compile a decent size list of current and previous advertisers who are advertising or have advertised on A-List Blogs.
7. Send out individual emails to these advertisers and sell your service.
8. Follow up after a few days if certain ones don’t contact you back.
9. Don’t fear rejection. You will not die if they answer back with a “No!”. If you are faced with rejection, ask the potential advertiser to make you an offer. Remember, “bad breath is better than no breath”, so $50 bucks is better than ZERO!

The worst thing a B-List or C-List blogger can do, is sit in front of their computer and wish that they were like John Chow or other popular A-List bloggers. Get off your ass and be somebody. Your blog has traffic and there is a value to that traffic. If you want to make money online, the money is truly growing on a tree and is waiting for someone to pick it off. John Chow and other leading blogs can not supply the demand from advertisers. These advertisers will spend money on B-List and C-List blogs. Most advertisers have a message to communicate that has a very short shelf life. Meaning, they don’t have time to wait and being on back order is not an option. Advertisers would be very willing to advertise on 10 smaller blogs that equate to the typical traffic found on one leading blog.

Collaborate Your Efforts Together:

Niche blogs are all about socializing, networking and creating friends. Collaborate your advertising efforts with multiple friends. Lead your niche and create a multiple blog advertisement campaign. Talk to your friends and explain to them that you want to create a mass advertisement campaign within your niche and ask if they want to be on board. Very easily, you can get around 25 to 30 of your friends who will participate.

In the world of blogging, there truly is no limitation to what you can do.
The only limitation are the barriers that you put in front of yourself.