How much do you think professional bloggers in Malaysia spend to maintain their website and work? Go on, take a guess.
I don’t know about the rest, but for me, the amout is RM1.1k per month on average.
How did I get that figure? Well, I know that I’ve spent RM56,438.67 in Business expenses from June 2015 until the time of writing (September 2019).
Fact: I started Ringgit Oh Ringgit blog because the content I wanted to read did not exist.
What I mean by that is I wanted to read personal finance content that is:
It turns out that many of you felt the same way, judging by the way Ringgit Oh Ringgit took off. I honestly didn’t expect it. I was so shocked, I wrote this article:[PERSONAL] What It’s Like to be a Personal Finance Blogger in Malaysia
Since I started Ringgit Oh Ringgit, I’ve been lucky enough to be approached by brands that want to work with me. I’ve done sponsored content for at least 10 companies now, including some pretty big names in the financial space.
Like I mentioned in my What It’s Like to be a Personal Finance Blogger in Malaysia article, I didn’t set out wanting to be a ‘KOL’ (key opinion leader), or an influencer of any kind. In fact, hearing people calling me a KOL/influencer is still weird.
It only sunk in after a friend sat me down and berated the shit out of me. Thanks friend for the tough love approach, I appreciate it, even if you did call me some unprintable words.
So with that in mind, I thought it would be fun to write about my experience so far, and a little bit about influencers in Malaysia. Here are some things I learned.
This whole blogging thing. It wasn’t intentional. I mean, it was, the whole writing part was. But the recognition that comes with it, the knowledge that what I write and say has some form of influence… that part wasn’t intentional at all. Truthfully I’m still shocked by this blog’s success. The total number of visits crossed the one million mark recently. One million!
As of August 2018Here are some personal thoughts, observations and reflections on being a personal finance blogger in Malaysia.
According to a website report, Ringgit Oh Ringgit blog is A- grade, or ‘very good’. I have As for SEO, Usability, Social and Security aspects. Only Performance aspect is not great, but that’s because my page size is big (due to the ads).
At the time of writing, Ringgit Oh Ringgit has been around for 2.5 years, more or less. Figuring out how to create a blog in the beginning was hard; I just wanted to write shit, and I didn’t know there are many other aspects I have to know and consider.
As I was adamant to generate income from this hobby, I had no choice but to learn as I go along. Here are some things I wish I knew earlier. This article is for you fellow bloggers and companies doing content marketing as a lead generation strategy.
Back in college/uni, I studied communications. That’s how I learned the fundamentals of content creation, ie delivering the message in a way that is suitable for the target audience. Freelance corporate writing work remains my main income channel.
That specialisation got me jobs, but the money only started growing as I learned how to sell myself and my services via digital marketing. Every cent I threw in digital marketing got me at least 10x return on investment. All that effort to self-learn digital marketing is worth it.
This post is a case study on Ringgit Oh Ringgit’s blog digital marketing strategy, including what works and what I still have to improve on. I figure this information might be useful for freelancers and small businesses looking to explore content marketing as your primary digital marketing strategy.
After all, I don’t think you see that many case studies from Malaysia-based content creators.
Developing Ringgit Oh Ringgit from scratch is truly one of the most fulfulling things I’ve ever done. Since its inception less than 2 years ago, I’ve made thousands in passive income.
Teaser proof to get you excited about the income potential – shared the below on Twitter. This is just from one source of affiliate marketing: referral from Shopback.
This is my highest payout redemption from @shopbackmy yet ? RM431.31. Half from things I buy anyway, half from referrals via RoR website pic.twitter.com/VnRXTwsKaD
— Suraya Zainudin (@surayaror) August 8, 2017
And here’s my screenshot from Google Adsense (taken on 15 August 2017):
