Bloggers For Hire
There are nearly as many people making their living as bloggers than as lawyers — and more than as computer programmers or firefighters. At least according to a report by Mark Penn (with E. Kinney Zalesne) in today’s WSJ.
The best studies we can find say we are a nation of over 20 million bloggers, with 1.7 million profiting from the work, and 452,000 of those using blogging as their primary source of income. That’s almost 2 million Americans getting paid by the word, the post, or the click — whether on their site or someone else’s. And that’s nearly half a million of whom it can be said, as Bob Dylan did of Hurricane Carter: “It’s my work he’d say, I do it for pay.”
[…]
Demographically, bloggers are extremely well educated: three out of every four are college graduates. Most are white males reporting above-average incomes. One out of three young people reports blogging, but bloggers who do it for a living successfully are 2% of bloggers overall. It takes about 100,000 unique visitors a month to generate an income of $75,000 a year. Bloggers can get $75 to $200 for a good post, and some even serve as “spokesbloggers” — paid by advertisers to blog about products. As a job with zero commuting, blogging could be one of the most environmentally friendly jobs around — but it can also be quite profitable. For sites at the top, the returns can be substantial. At some point the value of the Huffington Post will no doubt pass the value of the Washington Post.
I’m quite dubious of these figures. They are likely self-reported and inflated. $75,000 a year is $6250 a month. Who is it that’s getting paid $6.50 per thousand visits? At that rate, Andrew Sullivan and Glenn Reynolds, who average around 4.3 million and 10 million monthly uniques, should be atop the Forbes 500.
UPDATE: Daniel Solove is skeptical as well: “At Concurring Opinions, we get 100,000+ unique visitors per month, and sadly, our take home pay is far far south of $22,000. Where’s all the money? If it’s out there, it sure ain’t in our pockets, I’ll boldly state that we’re all keeping our day jobs!”
UPDATE II: Apparently, writing about blogging is good linkbait. The piece is climbing the charts at Memeorandum, getting mentions at And So it Goes in Shreveport, Simply Left Behind, Gawker, Clusterstock, American Power, Scott Rosenberg’s Wordyard, CANNONFIRE, The Other McCain, and BuzzMachine. Little Miss Attila is on the case, too.
UPDATE III: In an addendum to the piece, Penn responds to his critics, further demonstrating he understands neither simple mathematics nor the basics of research.
Story via Jonathan Adler. Image: NY/NJ Bengali.
So am I, James.
I am particularly suspicious of the sources employed.
From the WSJ-linked Technorati survey, emphasis mine:
The WSJ has often proven it can’t cite facts correctly (see Marc A. Thiessen’s column today, for instance). But to get figures wildly wrong too…
Regards, Steve
That has to be way high. Assuming the self-reported numbers are fundamentally honest (big assumption) I suspect the 452,000 who claim blogging as their “primary source of income” includes a lot of people who meant to say “earned income.” In other words, they make a few bucks from blogads or the like and have no other regular job. But they are also retirees collecting pensions or SS, housewives/stay at home dads, students living off loans and handouts from their parents, and etc.
Speak for yourself, dude. I get a three figure salary from Richard Mellon Scaife just for posting stupid comments on this blog.