Blogger Rate Card: Average Sponsored Blog Post Rates

This post will be short and sweet –a blogger rate card for 2022 with updated sponsored blog post rates to show our readers how much bloggers make and what to charge for sponsored content on their own blog, based on our experience.

We’ll also share the email template we use to negotiate sponsored blog post rates with brands and SEO companies at the end of the article.

This article was updated on October 18, 2022.

How Much to Charge for Sponsored Content

Before getting into sponsored blog post rates, it’s important to consider whether or not working with a specific company is in your best interest –and if you’re in a niche that’s high value enough to attract sponsors that pay well.

On SEO companies;

Work directly with brands when you can, companies only interested in a backlink don’t care about your brand or your audience –they only care about helping their client rank on search engines.

In the dating world, they’d be a 3 out of 10 and they lower your real estate value.

And they talk; they often sell their influencers email list so if you make a shitty deal with one of them, all their friends will be emailing you for years to come.

Even if you just started blogging yesterday, never charge them less than $75 – $100 USD. The email back-and-forth alone is worth that. Often they only offer $35.

Read the comments after the article for more thoughts on them, and use the email template presented shortly to ensure you charge them what you’re worth.

Qualify the brand;

Is the company or organization that sent you the proposal an ethical company?

ie. Not one that could harm your readers, or make you look like a shill?

Are they “on brand“? Never shoehorn a sponsor into your content if it isn’t the right fit –your readers will smell the stink coming off it and you may lose them for good.

How about their affiliate program? Could you avoid the whole heap-on and make more money as an affiliate over the course of a year?

Qualify your blog;

The sponsored blog post rates discussed in this article are for careful brands that have wow factor and a pinch of je ne sais quoi. You probably already know what I mean; they’ve got “the look”, the metrics, and the right audience.

By “right audience” I mean a high value audience. Your blog is attractive to people who spend money and it discusses high value subjects.

In other words, you’re not a budget travel site or a cat blog.

Beyond that, how many sponsors have you already worked with in the past year?

Too many sponsors will lower your value over time, whether you’re aware of it or not. Make the ones you engage with count, right from the very beginning.

Exclusivity is worth money.

Value of an engagement;

The value of your sponsored engagement is often not cash –it’s going to be something of value to the tune of the sponsored post rates below, although it may be in product or services rendered.

That means it may cost the sponsor less (their cost) and you’ve got something with a suggested retail price that fits the value of the numbers coming up shortly.

New to blogging?

If you’re window shopping to see what’s possible and still need a little help qualifying your idea before you start a blog with WordPress, you’ve come to the right place.

We’ve got a bunch of articles in our “learn blogging” section, just for you.

How Much Do Bloggers Make?

Too few bloggers know the value of their hard work.

They settle for the first sponsors or SEO companies that come along –and worse yet, their first offer.

These sponsored blog post rates reflect what we’re charging in 2022, although we’ve been using them as a guide since Hobo with a Laptop was only 14 months old. SEO companies will tell you you’re crazy, but f*ck them. Brands get it, and that’s all that matters.

In reality, sponsored blog post profits can be a pillar of your monetisation strategy if done right, not too often, and in a trustworthy way.

Blogger Rate Card

This blogger rate card example needs little introduction, if you found us via Google, you know exactly what you’re looking for. If you still don’t know what a “Domain Authority (DA)” is, you can figure yours out here.

I know you’re likely going to average out how much to charge for sponsored content among the articles you find on the subject –but stick around for the email template further down this page to help you negotiate your sponsored blog post rates for brands and/or SEO companies.

Alright, folks. It’s full-disclosure time.

How We Got the Numbers on This Blogger Rate Sheet

These numbers are based on our own experience, and loosely translated from a similar blogger rate card on this blog post on AWin –a very respectable affiliate partner of ours, in addition to the experience of our peers who we’ve discussed sponsored content rates with on private Facebook groups.

Most bloggers likely shouldn’t get out of bed for too much less than as in the blogger rate card above. If you have a crypto blog, these rates are still a little low with ICO fever going on.

If you have any thoughts on this blogger rate card or how much bloggers make with sponsorships, please let us know in the comments at the end of the article.

Negotiating Sponsored Blog Post Rates

I’ve got a bonus for this article I didn’t mention in the title; below you will find our email template for how we respond to emails from brands and SEO companies to negotiate our sponsored blog post rates for a number of our websites.

The template also includes our own current sponsored blog post rates for Hobo with a Laptop after 14 months of semi-consistantly blogging.

Hello, Jane Smith!

Thanks for reaching out to Hobo with a Laptop.

We do work with commercial brands. You’ve got two options:

Get a brand mention on existing (already indexed into Google!) content for administration cost of $300 USD.

Get a 900 – 1,000-word article written for you, for an administration cost of $500 USD.

Pricing is a little above market rates to ensure mentions from our website remain quality, long-term. This is why businesses prefer working with us over other blogs.

We will not take every client that emails us looking for a brand mention or sponsored post.

At this time we only post sponsored content we’ve created ourselves in order to ensure Hobo with a Laptop retains a consistent voice. (Link to sponsored post examples here).

Let me know what you think.

Mike & Oshin

Some Points of Interest

There are a few additional points I’d like to pass on before you move on to another blogger rate card post on some other website to find out what to charge for sponsored posts:

• You will have to turn down sponsored post opportunities often if you stick to your guns –and that’s a good thing. It prevents you from becoming a sponsored post pin cushion!

  For every 5 to 10 “no thank you’s” you give, there’s going to be a sponsor who values your quality and discretion –and will appreciate that you’re not allowing your website or blog to become a low value SEO link farm or inauthentic brand-backing catalog of shillery.

  High quality sponsors are looking for high quality readership, and that’s hard to find when audiences feel they’re being bombarded with too many sponsored messages.

  Bloggers like you are the sweet spot for brands –you’re a micro-influencer, and chances are your audience is much more invested in you than say, Goop (and you’re cheaper, too).
• It’s your business, but we usually won’t let a sponsor write a post for us in full –especially not for blogs we put our actual names on. We write it for them, and it’s part of the fee.
• If a “fellow blogger” writes to you, shares a few links as writing samples on a range of unrelated sites they’ve written but shares with you no blog of their own and they’re “just starting out with their writing career” –they’re likely an SEO company posing as a blogger. Shady af, yet happens all the time.

  Hit them with the template above and you’ll likely weed them out and scare them off. If they stick around, maybe it’s meant to be.

• When a brand or SEO company counters your offer with a number much lower than you’ve proposed, let them know you mean business.

  In some instances we’ve reduced our cost, but still got $400 USD for a sponsored post rate when their original counter offer was only $35. It depends on the SEO’s client, and the person you’re communicating with may pass it forward to them.

• If anyone says “I can’t afford that rate, but I’ve got a lot of posts for you in the future”, tell them that’s exactly what you’re trying to avoid. (See “pin cushion” point above).
• Don’t fall for flattering messages from successful brands you recognize, like one we recently got asking for a brand mention for nothing.

For sponsors, a brand mention has a higher return on investment than an ad because it stays online longer, appears on a website that has already cultivated a following that’s relevant to them, they don’t have to transact with you ever again, it helps normalise their brand presence in your niche, and it has potent SEO value (if they’ve done their research). An endorsement is worth even more.

Even bartering is better than nothing.

A low-ball offer like $35 wrapped up in compliments is the equivalent of going into a grocery store and saying “hey, nice selection of apples, can I have free groceries for the next three years if I buy one apple?”.

Understand your value, and leave awful sponsors to your noob competitors. Rejecting low quality sponsorships keeps your quality high, while being bait for competitors who don’t know any better. It’s an edge, a blogging secret most bloggers don’t start with.

Do You Think These Sponsored Blog Post Rates are Fair?

How much to charge for sponsored content is a controversial subject for some; what did you think about this article? Let the world know in the comments and thanks for stopping by!

If reading this article felt a little sanity-redeeming, please share the Blogger Rate Card image above on Pinterest and let’s raise the bar for the everyday blogger, together.

Sharing and/or linking to this post will help unify bloggers on average sponsored blog post rates and be beneficial to the community as a whole. The comments below are just as valuable as this post itself!

Know what you’re worth, charge what you’re worth!

Still interested in selling merch on your blog? We wrote a massive guide that explains how we got started selling merch on Hobo with a Laptop and other websites with Printful. Check it out!