5 ideas for making money on a flash fiction site
365 Tomorrows is a flash science speculative fiction blog that publishes a new story every day. It’s audience is lovers of science fiction and people who are interested in the process of writing science fiction. Currently they have a sidebar that features links to related sites and books for sale. What would you do to monetize this blog?
Online writing workshops
One idea would be to capitalize on the segment of the audience that’s interested in writing science fiction. 365 Tomorrows could bring in well-known sci-fi authors to do online writing workshops. It’s a niche audience, but an audience that would be willing to pay upwards of $50 for the pleasure of being able to talk to a published author. This could be a monthly feature with different authors and different topics to encourage people to come back and try different seminars.
Audiobooks
The content itself has potential value too. A 365 Tomorrows compilation audiobook narrated by a professional voice actor could have a market to readers of the site and potential beyond.
Vanity Press
Writers want to be read - or at least published. Creating a companion vanity press (where people pay to get their work published) could fill a need for writers who want to see their stuff in print. The press could do ebooks or print actual books using an on demand printer (www.BestValueCopy.com has great prices).
Sponsored Contest
A great old timey promotion is to have people write why they like something in so many words. It’s also a tactic the Communists used to brainwash people… If you can find a sponsor that really wants to get their product across you can run a competition for the best flash fiction story that involves their product.
Thinking big
Beyond individual audiobooks and ebooks is the idea of creating a niche Audible for this kind of content. 365 Tomorrows could sell reasonably priced yearly subscription that provides well produced original content on a periodical basis. The key is making the subscription an impulse buy at the right price.
