How To Get Paid From Your Website

You make a website. It has 30 pages of content, it looks great and it gets a 100 visitors a day. But how does it get money - how do you get paid?

How does money get from the person visiting your website to you?

It is easy to see how you get paid if you own a shoe store in the mall:

  1. You wait in the store for people to walk in
  2. People walk in
  3. They pick out a pair of shoes they like
  4. They walk up to the cash register
  5. They open their wallets
  6. They give you the money
  7. You put their money in your cash register

Its simple to understand with a shoe store, but how does it work with a website? How do people give you money when there is no cash register?

Before we answer how people pay you money, let answer the question - why do people want to pay you?

Why Do People Pay Your Website Money?

You Get Paid Because You You Have A Product To Sell

The classic example is a eBook.

Let imagine that you write an eBook about shoes. It is a perfect guide for anybody who needs to know more about shoes. With chapters like: The Running Shoe, The Walking Shoe, What Color Shoe Is Best and the most informative chapter, How To Tie Shoes. It is unique, exciting and has lots of pictures. Your mother says its the best eBook she has ever read.

So you make a website called shoes.com. The website has basic information about shoes, but for people who need to know more they will have to buy your eBook.

On your website you have a special page about the eBook (called a landing page). The page describes the eBook, how many pages it has, list of chapters, why everybody needs it – basically a page about how great your eBook is.

Somewhere on the page is a button for the visitor to click if they want to buy the book.

Sample Buy Now Button

How Is An eBook Similar To Having A Shoe Store?

With a shoe store you sell shoes. Shoes are the product you sell, just like the eBook on your website. In a shoe store people take a pair of shoes and pay you money for them. On a website people take your eBook and pay you money for it.

Who Pays You?

The visitors who wants the eBook pay you. The buy now botton on your website is like the cash register in a store. When they click on the button they are saying I will give you money if you give me the eBook.

How Often Do You Get Paid?

You get paid every time somebody buys your eBook. When someone clicks the buy button they send you money and in return you send them a eBook.

Where Does the Money Get Sent?

It depends how you set it up, but normally the money goes to an online bank account like Paypal. Once the money arrives in your Paypal account (usually a matter of minutes) you can tell Paypal to send the money to your bank account.

Example on This Website

A product I sell is the Prague Air Jar. The selling page talks about how great the product is and why you need to buy it. At the bottom of page is a button you can press if you want to buy it. If you press the button you will be asked to send me money. As soon as the money arrives in my Paypal account I will send you the product.

You Get Paid Because You Sell Someones Else's Product

Selling someone elses product is very similar to selling your own product. The only difference is that instead of selling the product on your website you send your visitors to another website to buy the product.

It works like this:

  1. You have a website about shoes.
  2. Bob also has a website about shoes. On his website he sells his own eBook about shoes.
  3. You and Bob make a deal. If you send people to his website and they buy his eBook then Bob will give you money.
  4. On your website you create a page describing Bob's great eBook. At the bottom of the page you have a link to Bob's website.
  5. A visitor on your website clicks the link to Bob's website. They arrive on Bob's website and buy the eBook.
  6. Bob sends you money because the person who bought Bob's eBook was sent from your website.

This might sound complicated. How does Bob keep track of who bought the book and if they came from your website? How can you trust Bob to be honest and admit when an eBook was sold to somebody who arrived from your website?

Fortunately you do not need to worry about any of that. There are sites like e-junkie.com that keep track of all of that for you and Bob. You and Bob sign up at e-junkie.com and e-junkie.com keeps track of who sold the book and how much money Bob needs to send you.

How Is Selling Bob's eBook Similar To A Shoe Store?

Unless you are a cobbler and make your own shoes, the shoes you sell in your shoe store are made buy somebody else. In your shoe store you are selling somebody else's shoes.

People come to your store and you sell them Nike's shoes. People come to your website and you sell them Bob's eBook.

Who Pays You?

Bob pays you. At the end of every month he looks at how many people came from your website and bought his eBook (using a service like e-junkie). If Bob agreed to pay you 10$ for every eBook sold to a person coming from your website and 100 people come from your website then Bob will send you $1000.

How Often Do You Get Paid?

Depends on the agreement you make with Bob. There are two main approaches. Either Bob sends you money once a month, or he sends it when a certain limit is reached – for example Bob sends you money as soon as he owes you $100 dollars.

Where Does the Money Get Sent?

Depends on the agreement you make with Bob. Bob can send you a check, or he can send money directly to your bank account, or as is most common, he sends the money to your Paypal account.

Example on This Website

WorldForWebsite.com is an example where this website makes money by selling someone else's product. If you click the link and buy something WorldForWebsites.com will send me money.

The agreement I have with WorldForWebsites.com is that they will send me money at the end of every month. They send the money to my Paypal account.

You Get Paid Because You Put Advertisements on Your Website

Placing advertisements on your website is simple. All you need to do is sign up with an advertising company like Google Adsense. They will give you a piece of code that you place somewhere on your website. When people visit your website they will see advertisements. If they click on the advertisement they will be sent to the advertiser's website.

That is it. That is all there is to it. It is all about letting someone else place a link to their website on your website. Advertisers want the people on your website to go to their website – so they will pay you if you place a link to their website on your website.

How is Advertising Similar In A Shoe Store?

A man walks into your shoe store. He introduces himself as Fred from the shoelace store at the other end of the mall. He has a business proposition for you. He will pay you $50 a month if you put a advertisement about his Shoelace store in your store. You agree. He gives you a big colorful “Come Visit Fred's Shoelace Store” sign and you hang it on your wall.

That is it – you just hang it there. And every month Fred comes and gives you $50. You are happy to get the money and Fred is happy because after buying shoes at your store people are going to his store and buying shoelaces.

Same thing happens with advertisements on your website. You put advertisements on your website for somebody else's website and they pay you for it.

Who Pays You?

Depends. If you sign up with a program like Google Adsense then Google Adsense will send you money. Or if you make a private deal with someone to place a advertisement on your website then that person will pay you directly.

How Often Do You Get Paid?

Google Adsense pays you whenever they owe you more then a hundred dollars.

If you have a private deal with an advertiser then it is whatever arrangement you decide to make. It could be that the person pays you once a month, or every time 1000 people click on the advertisement, or when 1000 people see the advertisement. It is really up to you. Its your store – you make the deal.

Where Does the Money Get Sent?

Google will send the money directly to your bank account.

If you have a private deal with an advertiser then anything is possible – but most common is for the money to be sent to your Paypal account.

Example on This Website
This website uses Google AdSense for advertising.

How Do People Give Your Website Money

Gaid Paid With Paypal

In the physical world you have a wallet and a bank account. If someone wants to give you money they give you cash and you put that cash in your wallet – later you deposit that in your bank account.

But how do you get money in the online world. How do people give you money and where do you put it?

By far the most poplar is Paypal. You set up a Paypal account and it becomes your online bank account. When people need to send you money they send it to your paypal account.

If you are selling a product on your website then you place a Paypal button on your website which people click and pay for your product. You do not care how they pay, they can pay using the balance they have in their account, they can pay with credit, or debit card, it does not matter to you – Paypal takes care of all that. To pay you they send money from their paypal account to your – that is all you need to know.

After the money arrive in your Paypal account you can do whatever you want with it. Keep it it the account and buy something online with it, or ask Paypal to send it to your physical world bank account.

Paypal is a must if you want to collect money from people on the internet.

Get Paid Into Your Bank Account

Companies like Google Adsense will send money directly to your bank account. When you reach the $100 limit Google will send the $100 to your bank. All that is required is that you provide Google Adsense with your bank account number.

Of course, you can give your bank account number to anybody that wants to buy a product from your website. But that is not a good idea. Its too complicated especially when the bank is in another country. Its just simpler to use Paypal.

Get Paid By Cheque

Google Adsense use to send cheaks and for some countries they still do. But more and more Google AdSense is sending the money directly to bank accounts.

You can ask your visitors to send you a check. But what would you do with a $20 cheque from The National Bank of Botswana?

Get Paid With Cash

Cash is great for buying coffee at your local diner, but useless in the online world. Nobody is going to send you cash in the mail.

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If this website has helped you, or if you believe in Karma, or most importantly if you want me to feel good:

Thanks!

Roman

My name is Roman and I want to provide you with an honest account of what it takes to make money with a website.

When I started this website in January 2009, I thought I would be rich by May.  I was wrong - really wrong. 

At the beginning I did not know anything about websites, SEO, blogs, and how long it takes to make money with a website.

Since then I have learned a lot. By revealing my journey I hope this website will help prepare you for yours .

Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments and visit my Google+ page.