So, you’ve been publishing original and valuable content on your website for a while. You’ve built a loyal audience that keeps returning to your website. It’s time to start capitalizing on that engagement.
Monetizing your website is an excellent way to earn passive income – or at least semi-passive income. Whether you’re selling bundles of consulting hours, digital products such as eBooks and printables, or branded merchandise such as T-shirts and phone cases, you can use your website as a high-performing revenue stream.
If you’ve built your website on WordPress, you can use a wide array of plugins to start generating revenue. You’ll find a WordPress plugin for every monetization model, from affiliate marketing and display advertising to premium content and appointment booking.
But the variety of WordPress website monetization plugins available on the internet will leave you spoilt for choice. We’ve handpicked the best WordPress plugins for different monetization techniques to help you get started. Let’s take a look.
1. vcita’s Scheduling Plugin
A management platform for small businesses in the service sector, vcita offers a host of feature-packed plugins to enhance the functionality of your WordPress website. If you’re looking to monetize your website, you can use vcita’s WordPress plugin for lead capture and appointment booking.
The user-friendly plugin lets you add a calendar to your website with a list of services you offer. Also, you can include your fees, service locations, and the names of staff members. Website visitors can use the calendar to schedule a call or book an appointment to avail your services.
The best part is that your clients can check the availability of individual staff members before scheduling their appointments. The plugin will send a confirmation email to you and the client whenever they book an appointment.
Also, they’ll receive automatic reminders before their appointment. The plugin even lets them reschedule their appointment. You can use vcita’s WordPress plugin for payment and invoicing to collect payments from your clients as well.
This WordPress plugin is ideal if your website offers services, such as one-on-one consultations or online classes. You can even use the CRM and contact management plugin to organize client details and improve customer engagement.
2. WooCommerce
When you think about website monetization plugins, WooCommerce is one of the first names that’ll come to your mind. The powerful plugin lets you add eCommerce functionality to any WordPress website.
If you’re planning to sell physical products, such as branded products or merchandise, on your WordPress website, WooCommerce is the plugin you need.
Configuring WooCommerce is as easy as downloading the plugin and installing it on your website. After that, you’ll need to add a few more details about your products to get started.
Once you’ve configured the plugin, WooCommerce lets you add new products to your website and accept and track orders. It supports established payment methods, including PayPal, Stripe, credit cards, and bank transfers. You can even add different shipping options to product pages and manage your inventory using WooCommerce.
3. Easy Digital Downloads
As the name suggests, Easy Digital Downloads is a WordPress plugin that lets you sell digital products on your website.
It’s a lightweight plugin that brings the eCommerce functionality of WooCommerce, but made for the express purposes of paywalling premium downloads – without the complexities of shipping and inventory management, which are only relevant for physical goods.
Easy Digital Downloads is an excellent choice for bloggers and content creators who want to make money by selling eBooks, whitepapers, printable templates, audio files, music clips, stock photos, etc.
The plugin lets you track the sale of individual products to identify bestsellers. Also, you can let customers re-download a product multiple times once they’ve bought it. You can even integrate the plugin with email marketing platforms like Mailchimp to strengthen your relationship with existing customers.
4. Baluu
If you are looking for a feature-rich booking software that provides more than just a WordPress plugin, then Baluu is certainly an option you should be considering.
You can integrate it as an iframe on your WordPress site which provides well-designed, fully customizable booking tools. They are particularly popular because their timetable view allows customers to easily choose a date and book - all payment methods are included (Visa, Mastercard, Google & Apple Pay, etc.).
Customers adore the tool's ease of use and intuitive UX, which allows you to display all of your events and availability on a single page.
In addition to front-end booking pages, Baluu includes a plethora of useful back-end tools to make running any booking business easier. Analytics, multiple ticket options, and custom forms are included by default. Bookings can also be easily rescheduled, and your customers will receive automatic updates as things change.
5. MemberPress
If you’re looking to add paid membership plans to your website, MemberPress is the right plugin for you. You can use it to offer courses, a community forum and other modules on a subscription basis
The user-friendly plugin converts your website into a membership site with multiple membership plans. It even lets you restrict content access for different membership plans.
Also, MemberPress integrates with standard payment methods, such as PayPal and credit cards. You can even explore additional monetization opportunities with email marketing, podcasting, affiliate marketing, and other features available with the plugin.
In Conclusion
Monetizing your WordPress website isn’t rocket science. The diverse array of website monetization plugins available on WordPress makes it easy to generate revenue from your website.
All you need is a clear understanding of the different monetization techniques. Choose one that’ll appeal to your audience.