Investing in the best blogging courses (and actually doing the work) can lead you to a lucrative blogging career.
I know this because, after four years of working my butt off, I’m earning a ridiculously healthy income from my blog.
To help you succeed with blogging, I wanted to write all my thoughts on the best courses about blogging I’ve taken in the five years I’ve been at this gig.
(Please note: I’ve taken many more blog courses than the ones I mention below. These courses are the only ones I recommend for people who want to blog for a living. There are a lot of crappy courses out there).
No time? Here’s the rundown
- Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing – best for total newbies
- The Pinterest Launch Plan – create a Pinterest strategy from scratch
- Traffic Transformation – perfect for established bloggers who need help to level up
- Dare to Conquer – the whole shebang – from niche selection, content creation, using WordPress to getting traffic and growing your income with Pinterest.
8 Blog Courses That Skyrocketed My Income
I’m still actively taking courses (never stop learning, y’all!), so this post will be a living thing. I’ll update it when I come across a killer blog resource.
Best Blogging Courses for Total Beginners
It can be tough to find the money to invest in a course on blogging when you’re just starting out. You’ve paid for hosting and a domain, perhaps a theme and logo design, maybe a Pinterest scheduler – at least $150 before you even make a dime.
The thing is, unless you learn the right skills, you will waste time and actually cost yourself money.
Case in point – I started this blog in 2015 and didn’t make a dime until after I started to invest in courses in 2016.
Now that I have the skills from investing in the right blogging courses I can monetize a blog instantly (I started two new blogs – one in August 2017 and another in January 2018, and both are making a profit already).
If you could get your blog to the level of making $500 a month within 6 months by investing in a good blogging course, then, of course, you’d do it. That said, you don’t have to spend a fortune on a beginner blogging course to see results.
In my experience, there are two things a new blogger should focus on to get a blog fully functioning and making money – affiliate marketing and traffic generation.
For affiliate marketing I recommend taking one of the following two courses – Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing or Affiliate Marketing for Bloggers; Everything You’re Missing.
For traffic generation, Pinterest is the easiest place to get traffic as a new blogger. For that purpose, I recommend The Pinterest Launch Plan.
These courses complement each other perfectly. Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing shows you how to set your blog up for affiliate income, how to find and contact affiliate partners and the best way to write posts around affiliate links. It also includes a Pinterest module which is great for beginners.
The Pinterest Launch Plan then shows you how to set up your Pinterest profile for maximum traffic generation, and set in place a strategy that will get clicks to your blog (the only Pinterest metric that matters).
Keep reading to see why these courses are some of the best online courses to make money.
1. Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing
Price: $197
Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing was the course that took me from $0 per month to $1000 in affiliate sales. I enrolled early on and drank up the information.
For me, MSOAM was the right course because Michelle (the course creator) is in my niche and successful. I took MSOAM after Elite Blog Academy and found the advice to be more practical than Elite Blog Academy (which I consider more of a business-building course) at a much more palatable price (currently $197).
I learned that although I’d had some early success (mainly viral shares) the content I was creating was not easily monetizable.
After taking Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing I learned to write posts that converted like this one: How We’re Using Ebates to Save Big on Our Travel Bookings
The reason I still promote MSOAM years after taking it is that the information is constantly updated and the price is excellent for a beginners course.
Plus, the active community on Facebook makes bouncing ideas back and forth simpler.
If a course has an active Facebook group, that is a huge plus for me. Networking with other bloggers is a great way to build success and collaborations to get both of your names and blogs more eyeballs.
What I didn’t love
I want to be completely upfront with you here. Michelle makes most of her income from one post on her site that promotes a website hosting service I don’t believe offer a good service (they *might* rhyme with pootoast – just sayin’).
There’s nothing wrong with making money from hosting, (I love and recommend Siteground and occasionally people buy the hosting and I make $50) but it perpetuates the myth that the only way to make money blogging is by encouraging people to start a blog (not true – I address this in another post)
I can see why that bothers other people, but Michelle still makes well over $10,000 per month from non-blogging affiliates.
I chose to go into the course focusing on the other stuff. That way, I still got great info from her course, and that’s why I’m recommending it.
In my full Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing review, I mentioned that experienced bloggers may not get a lot from this course and I stand by that.
If you’re an experienced blogger, you need a more advanced course (see more below).
The course also doesn’t go deep on SEO or the next-level stuff you need to explode your income. But it can get you to the level where you’re earning a decent part-time income so you can invest in more advanced training (which is going to cost way more than the $197 Michelle charges).
Learn more about Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing here>>
2. Affiliate Marketing for Bloggers – Everything You’re Missing
Price: $79
I had to include this affiliate marketing course for bloggers as it’s a strong competitor to the Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing course.
Now, technically I didn’t take this course to get me to the level I’m at today, but I was a beta tester when Carly first released the course and had it been around when I enrolled in MSOAM, I would’ve taken it because a) the price is super competitive and b) Carly Campbell is an understated blogging legend and she’s never given me bad advice.
Her course is thorough, and I definitely think that you would have the same results (if not better) from this course, than the one above, especially if you are not in the personal finance niche.
In the course, Carly focuses on her mom niche (she writes a lot about postpartum and other mum/mom stuff) to show that you don’t need to blog about blogging in order to succeed at blogging.
She’s also wise to which kinds of posts get page views in order to earn ad revenue (she’s with Adthrive but the same applies to Mediavine and other ad networks) and how to then funnel those page views through to posts that are well-monetized with affiliates.
For well under a hundred bucks, this course is excellent value.
Learn more about Affiliate Marketing for Bloggers – Everything You’re Missing here>>
3. Pinterest Launch Plan by JenniferMaker Academy
Price: $27 (an absolute bargain!)
This course is technically an e-book but it’s delivered via Teachable so I’m calling it a course. In her own words “…this is a strategy, not a full-fledged course. You get the 101-page ebook, three videos, several printable worksheets, and a blank spreadsheet to track your progress.”
This (not a full-fledged) course will show you how to use Pinterest from absolute newbie stage and how to best set up your boards and profile for success and then how to create and launch new pins to drive traffic to your blog.
If you’re a blogger and not currently using Pinterest because it seems confusing (as I was when I first heard about Pinterest) this book will change your life. It’s only $27 which is a steal for the value given in the book.
(JenniferMaker is a craft and DIY blogger who makes over $100,000 per month online. This woman knows her sh*t!)
I recently recommended The Pinterest Launch Plan to a friend who is brand new to Pinterest and she is loving how clear the instructions are and finding it easy to implement. I use the strategies taught in the Pinterest Launch Plan to launch my new pins and it works really well for me.
Learn more about The Pinterest Launch Plan here>>
4. The Perfect Pin: How to Create Viral Pinterest Images
Price: $27 reduced to $9
If you understand how Pinterest works but just need help designing pretty pins, you need to take The Perfect Pin: How to Create Viral Pinterest Images by Jeff and Ben from Breaking the One Percent.
Now, confession time. When these guys came out I had total envy at their beautiful pins. I saw them EVERYWHERE! And I just knew they would be successful, because their pins were engaging and eye-catching, and their content was too.
At first, I wanted to hate them for being so good, but then I did what any self-respecting entrepreneur should always do – I got close to them.
I took their course, I joined their Facebook group, I learned to love their no-BS way of describing their Pinterest strategy. I gasped out loud when I found out all those beautiful pins were designed on Powerpoint (no, seriously).
These guys have a Pinterest course that shows you how to create a beautiful pin and they only charge $27 $9 for it.
I once made $80 in ad revenue in one day after a pin I made went viral, so trust me when I say that this is the best $27 $9 you’ll ever spend. A good pin can bring you traffic and ad income for years.
Learn more about The Perfect Pin here>>
Blogging Courses for Intermediate Bloggers
You’ve got the basics down pat, but need help to level up your traffic. Once bloggers graduate from beginners to intermediate level, knowledge gaps tend to be filled when needed. Just in time training, if you will.
Whether it’s traffic generation, social media, search engine optimization or email marketing, each strategy requires deeper training. Here are my top picks for more advanced blogging training courses.
5. Traffic Transformation: 21 Strategies I Used to Go from 17k to 400k Page Views in 10 Months
Price: $79
Traffic Transformation by Lena Gott was a game-changer for my traffic. Using the strategies in this guide, I was able to go from a plateau of 15,000 page views a month (I honestly thought I’d never get past it and strongly considered becoming a bloggers VA instead), to reaching the threshold for Mediavine and blasting right on past it.
Now, there are people out there that will tell you traffic doesn’t matter. They’re wrong. Let me tell you why. You need the traffic to qualify for a premier ad network (Mediavine requires 25k monthly sessions).
Once you qualify for an ad network you get REGULAR MONTHLY INCOME.
I cannot emphasize enough how much of a shift in your business regular income makes. Regular income means you can invest in new tools, maybe a VA, or just more courses.
Back to the guide. I reread this guide regularly. It’s worth at least triple the $79 Lena charges for it plus I love that it’s PDF so I can read it on my Kindle in bed on lowlight while the kids are asleep next to me – #mumbloggerproblems
The book contains 21 strategies to increase your traffic without doing a ton more work (it kinda emphasizes working on your current content more, actually).
If you’re spending a lot of time on your blog and not getting anywhere, this is the guide for you.
Step 3 of the guide details some low payback tasks you can just quit right away. I stopped all of these (grind) tasks – hello pin all threads! – and saw no drop in traffic, and got 5 hours a week back. 5 hours a week that I could use to focus on tasks that grow my business. That is a big deal to a WAHM!
I really think the best thing about Lena’s guide is that it forces you to use the data you already have to improve your blog as it stands.
Improving existing posts, driving more page views from every single visitor and then showing how to replicate your successes over and over again.
If you’re working your butt off and still the traffic isn’t moving, this guide is a must-buy. I’d stop everything you’re doing right now and work on these strategies.
Click here to read more about Traffic Transformation>>
6. Stupid Simple SEO
Price: $297 or $497 (open to enrol Nov 11-15 2019)
Stupid Simple SEO by Mike Pearson is the SEO course you need if you are prepared to work hard and grow your passive income. I say ‘passive’ because although you will do a lot of work upfront, Google traffic can pay dividends for years afterwards.
This course will teach you how to make your site relevant, how to rank for multiple topics (especially important for lifestyle bloggers with lots of niches), how to do keyword and competitor research, how to write epic content (by far my favourite module) and loads more.
The Facebook group is full of heavyweight bloggers who are extremely helpful so any questions asked in there tend to get answered quickly.
Pricing is in 2 tiers. Here’s what is included with each:
Standard: $297 (or 4-month payment plan of $87/mo)
- The Complete Stupid Simple SEO 2.0 Course (8 Core Modules)
- Private Students-Only Facebook Group
- Trello Course Roadmap
- Lifetime Updates
Advanced: $497 (or 4-month payment plan of $137/mo)
- The Complete Stupid Simple SEO 2.0 Course (8 Core Modules)
- 7-Bonus Content & Link-Building Modules (not in standard)
- Private Students-Only Facebook Group
- Trello Course Roadmap
- Lifetime Updates
The course only opens four times a year. If the course is not currently open, use the link below to register for Mike’s excellent and FREE 5 Day SEO Bootcamp. You’ll then be notified when the course opens for enrolment.
Learn more about Stupid Simple SEO here>>
Overall Blogging Courses
As you can see I’ve taken multiple blogging classes to get where I am. But there is an alternative – taking a course which shows you everything.
The blog courses listed below are complete in that they discuss starting a blog from scratch, niche-selection, writing content, promotion and monetization.
7. Dare to Conquer Lifetime Membership
Price $1297
If you only take one course – make it this one. Dare to Conquer (formerly Billionaire Blog Club) is a complete blogging course which covers everything from setting up your blog, branding, Pinterest, SEO, landing pages, product creation, sales funnels, email marketing and so much more.
Paul Scrivens (Scrivs) runs multiple blogs successfully which is the reason I signed up for the course. I wanted to know his system for automating and managing multiple blogs, plus I saw lots of successful bloggers taking the course.
I knew they were successful because they were monetized with Mediavine (minimum 25k sessions per month) and some of the blogs were less than six months old (I checked their archives). That is a seal of approval right there.
I really like that Scrivs encourages new bloggers to write popular content to establish their blogs and get decent traffic from Pinterest.
His training is very specific, step-by-step, in video format.
This course also teaches a bunch of super-practical stuff like how to make your first $1000 and runs challenges around getting to 10k page views or writing a certain number of words each day.
The community on Slack is very-supportive and collaborate regularly. They have places where members can sign up to each others group boards on Pinterest (highly niched group boards with low contributor numbers are still helpful) or offer a guest post, social media promotion and loads of other cool stuff that really helps when you’re new and nobody knows your blog.
Click here to learn more about Dare to Conquer/Billionaire Blog Club>>
8. Build Blog Freedom Fast Track
Price: $597
Build Blog Freedom is one of the best blogging training courses I’ve come across.
I’ve followed Sharon Gourlay for five years now. I remember when I went travelling in 2014, she was blogging about her Amazon affiliate niche sites and I was intrigued.
Almost all of her traffic to her Amazon sites was from search engines and she made a huge passive income while travelling the world with her family. She gives away a ton of free value in her Facebook group and on her blog, Digital Nomad Wannabe.
Needless to say, when she released her SEO course as part of her new blogging course, Build Blog Freedom, I was in.
I implemented the strategies and saw immediate improvement. In fact, one of the testimonials on her site is mine – about a niche site I started which was making over $250/US a month with only 7 published articles and zero social media presence. I’ve since applied the strategies to all my other sites and my income has skyrocketed.
Click here to learn more about Build Blog Freedom>>
So there you have it. The best courses for running a profitable blog, in my opinion. Don’t waste another moment flailing with no guidance.
I hope this article has been helpful. Please let me know if you have any questions in the comments.
Read next: 9 Commonly Asked Blogging Questions Answered: Help for New Bloggers
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