Having done similar research, two women sit down to write.

One writes a 500 word article, reads it over, sends it by email and turns off the computer.

The other, writes a similar 500 word article, reads it over, inserts it into a content management system, adds a series of supporting reference material through links, inserts a couple of photos, at least one of which needs to be sourced, edited, cropped and uploaded, confirms the successful publication, submits it for review to friends, partners, and search engines. She spends some time submitting the article to bookmarking and news sites, then returns to the article to respond to a series of comments & corrections, including visiting some commenters’ sites and leaving comments and feedback there as well. Finally, she turns of the computer.

Which one got paid?

Well, it is obvious really. The “journalist” in the first instance gets paid because she is part of a much larger organisation that not only allows her to focus solely on producing content, but also generates enough revenue overall to pay her salary, but to do so has to employ more people who focus on the task of revenue generating.

The blogger has to carry out these tasks alone, and hasn’t the time to also raise revenue, which means that she also needs a “day job” to pay the bills, further complicating the business of turning the blog into a business.

So how do you make money with a blog? I believe that if we try answering a couple of questions, we can identify some models:

1. How much money is it that you are expecting to make?
2. Are you planning on being a pop star, or an orchestra musician?
3. What are you selling, and is it something anyone will pay cash for?
4. What influence do you have?

There are direct and indirect ways to make money from wine blogging, and there are things you can do alone, and others that require collaboration.

The answer is not straightforward, so I will try and pull out some models and thoughts based on the questions above, but there ARE ways to make money blogging about wine, but there is really  no way of avoiding the fact that output (in this case, money) is proportional to inputs (writing, marketing, sales, design, creativity and passion).

Wine blogging is no shortcut to fame and fortune, in fact it could be argued at the moment it is a detour, but they are there for the taking.