Which is Better, Blogging vs Vlogging?
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According to a study, a staggering 7.5 million blogs are posted every day! Tubefilter also made a report in 2019 that 500 hours of video are uploaded on Youtube every freaking minute! And that’s only on Youtube.
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Bloggers and Vloggers wouldn’t be doing this if they’re not getting anything from what they’re doing! Because of this, maybe you’re captivated and therefore wanna finally decide whether to start blogging or vlogging right now!
So which one is even better? Should you start blogging or vlogging?
Should you start vlogging because most people have been saying that blogging is dead and for that matter has been replaced by vlogging? Which the report stated above already discredits that.
Do you want to know the one which could give you financial freedom really fast and increase your influence?
You may be a marketer trying to promote your business online to get more leads, or even a college student who has something to share with the world – but you’re unsure whether you should choose blogging or vlogging.
By the end of this article, you would finally get to know whether vlogging is better than blogging or vice versa.
What is the difference between blogging and vlogging by definition?
Blogging involves the writing of articles to explain a particular topic, whiles Vlogging involves making videos to explain a particular topic.
Read this article for further explanation of the definition.
The Differences between Blogging and Vlogging
1. In order to have substantial growth in blogging, one must have a personal website which comes with a cost, but vlogging requires no personal platform. (Youtube, Facebook, TikTok, etc all free).
2. Blogging requires no expensive gear, you only need your website, personal computer, and internet connection, but vlogging requires some expensive gear like a fancy camera, mic, lighting, tripod, as well as editing software.
3. The influence you get on your audience in blogging isn’t as strong as in vlogging. Since blogging involves the writing of articles, you cannot fully attach your personality to it but in vlogging, your audience can hear and see you – so they can easily be connected to you.
4. In blogging, freelancers can write most of your articles for you, you just have to pay them. But in vlogging, if you’re unavailable to film your videos, nobody can do that for you. You are also expected to put on the show every time you’re filming your videos in order to get your viewers intrigued – which isn’t the case in blogging since your mood cannot affect what you write.
5. The time commitment you must put in to write and edit your articles is not much compared to that of vlogging. After filming your video, you have to edit it very well if you want your video to get the attention of your viewers.
6. It would take almost a year for you to see results in blogging. Google has to crawl and index your articles before it starts ranking them for search queries. On the other hand, vlogging results are pretty quick – if you upload a great video today on Youtube, it would get traction right away.
Are Blogs Dead?
Although within the past 5 years, the Google trend graph shows a drop in the interest in blogs across the globe – We shall find out soon from marketers and other reports to finally conclude whether blog is dead or not.
This same Google trend showed a steady rise of the interest in podcasts worldwide when blogs and podcasts were compared.
Well, do you know that according to research out of the top 200 Fortune 500 companies, almost 100 had a corporate blog?
In an interview with Ross Simmonds, the CEO of Foundation, a content marketing agency, and a B2B marketer, he confessed that blogging has helped his company to make millions of dollars.
Databox also revealed a report that adds enough weight to what Ross Simmonds said. According to them, companies with blogs produce an average of 67% extra leads per month than companies without blogs.
Databox continued that 96% of companies planned to raise their budget for content marketing in 2019. 46% of these companies had higher content marketing budgets in 2018 than in 2017.
The age distribution is also encouraging. With 53.3% of bloggers within the age of 21- 35, I don’t foresee blogs becoming obsolete any time soon.
However, because of the competition, bloggers who want to win must consistently create valuable content that is better than what’s already on the internet.
Which Earns More Money, Vlog or Blog?
Vlogs and blogs both have the potential of generating more money!
Glassdoor revealed that bloggers in the U.S. earn about $32,692 on average. Bloggers who are found at the bottom of the ladder are those that have a 9-5 job and take blogging part-time, and these bloggers on average still make $42 per hour.
Bloggers who run their own websites make decent money – a handful of them earning $2,000 – $12, 000. Others even earn more than that every month!
For instance, FitSmallBusiness makes over $7 million per year! This is a blog that was founded by Marc Prosser and David Waring in 2013.
Look, people are making so much money from the internet! But there are still people out there that are still skeptical about it.
Let’s look at how much vlogs can earn. This is only for Youtube and not other vlogging platforms.
Some Top Earning Youtubers
Back in 2014, Olga Kay, a Youtuber who runs multiple channels from her home in Encino, California got her story shared by New York Times. Olga Kay was making between $100,000 to $300,000 from Google Ads. But this was pre taxes and Youtube’s 45% takeaway. Olga’s take-home after all deductions was then around $31,000 per year.
This wouldn’t be enough for someone living in an expensive area.
Not forgetting that she had over 1 million subscribers and she was constantly uploading at least 20 per week.
But Kay continued with NY Times that when advertisers noticed the number of subscribers she was gaining, many approached her. For instance, Ford gave her a car and free gasoline for a year just for her to feature the car in a video once every month!
This then brings us to how vlogs and blogs make money.
But as a matter of fact, both have the ability to change your entire life – if only you do it well for the long term. (Without quitting so soon!)
How Vlogs And Blogs Make Money
There are so many ways vlogs and blogs make money. Here are some of them: Affiliate Marketing, Google/Youtube Ads, Sponsored videos and posts, Courses, Consulting, Books and Printables, Patreon, etc.
Let’s have a look at how some of them work.
1. Affiliate Marketing
Many vloggers and bloggers use affiliate marketing as one of their main sources of revenue. Affiliate marketing refers to recommending a useful product for someone and afterward getting a commission if the person makes a purchase of what you recommended.
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That’s how affiliate marketing is done.
It’s one of the easiest ways to make money vlogging or blogging.
Vloggers and Bloggers create valuable content that relates to the product they wanna promote and then recommend the product where necessary.
2. Ads
Vlogs and blogs can also make money from Advertisements.
The banners you see when you get onto a blog are all forms of Ads. How blogs make money from ads is different from that of vlogs.
A newly created blog can have ads displayed on the site by joining the Google Adsense. Depending on a website’s traffic, audience location, and click-through rate (CTR), the CPM can range from $0.30 to $2.
CPM stands for Cost Per Mille, that’s the amount you shall be paid per 1000 viewable impressions on your blog. There are also other Ads companies that pay higher than Google. These are Ezoic, Mediavine, AdThrive, and many more. But unlike Google Adsense that has no minimum traffic requirement, Mediavine for instance requires that your website gets at least 50,000 monthly traffic before you can join.
Youtube Ads are generally video ads that are displayed once a youtube channel reaches this threshold.
That’s:
4,000 watch hours on all videos on a channel in the last 12 months and 1,000 subscribers. Making long and engaging videos would help a channel to reach this milestone pretty quickly.
Youtube sends an invitation for vloggers to apply once the channel gets to that threshold.
3. Sponsored Posts
Content creators are paid by companies to either produce videos or blog posts promoting the products or services they’re offering. It can be done by showing your audience the product in a form of a product review or just giving a shoutout to the brand at some point in your videos.
For you to be approached by a company for sponsored posts, you must have authority in your niche. For YouTubers, I think around 10,000 subscribers and above is when companies would start to notice you.
4. Courses
Content creators create courses to teach their audience about a particular topic. A typical example is the Project64 course by Income School for bloggers and bloggers.
For new blogs, creating a course wouldn’t be profitable since you have no authority yet.
15 Most Successful Niches On Youtube
No matter how talented of a vlogger you are, you have to be in the kind of niche that people are attracted to. Here are some of the niches that are known to be the most successful.
- Gaming
- News
- Products Review( Tech & Gadgets)
- Celebrity Gossip
- Unboxing
- Fail compilations
- Life Hacks
- Health and Fitness
- Cooking
- Pranks
- How To’s
- Beauty and Makeup
- Traveling
- City Tour
- Fashion
11 Most Successful Blog Niches
- Personal Finance
- Food
- Blogging
- Parenting
- DIY
- Travel
- Business & Marketing
- Education
- Health and Wellness
- Lifestyle
- Fashion
Blog vs Vlog, Which One Is Better?
It all boils down to you – you alone can decide. If you want to grow faster choose vlog. If you want to sell your business for a huge sum of money in the future choose a blog.
If you have enough time to shoot and edit videos then choose vlog, otherwise, choose blog; because blog articles can be outsourced. If you want to become a celebrity or an influencer whose followers are well connected to, choose vlog.
If you don’t have money to invest in expensive gear, choose a blog. If you’re ready to show your work to the world but feel shy to talk to a camera then choose blog.
Either blog or vlog can make you very successful, so just go for the one you love and do it with all your heart!
Final Words
I’m sure by now you have decided on what to start with. What have you decided on at the moment?
Leave a comment.
Manuelo is an entrepreneur and a personal finance nerd. He is the founder of Dollars And Freedom. An expert in side hustles, online gigs, and everything about making money. His works have been featured on major financial publications, like Business Insider, GoBankingRates, Investopedia, Entrepreneur, and more. When he’s not busy with his blog or writing for others, you’ll catch him hanging out with loved ones or reading books on stoicism and self-development.
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