Great story, Ben! I’m a Nurse Practitioner and looking to go the entrepreneur route. I was leaning towards the blog route and came across this post. It is a very inspirational story, and I can only hope to achieve the same success. Good luck with continued success and thank you for sharing!

Hey Janet!

Yay for finding a way to supplement the nursing gig. As you well know, monetizing a nursing blog can be somewhat difficult (on the affiliate side) given the relative lack of products available to pitch, so to speak. Obviously selling medical equipment (or anything like it) doesn’t exactly translate well so you’ll have to be somewhat creative in how you monetize your blog.

On the affiliate side:
– Continue to look at what blogs similar to yours are pitching (i.e. are there physical products that they seem to frequently promote).
– Look for those products on platforms OTHER than Amazon if possible — often the commissions will be higher.
– Get creative about tangential/”shoulder niche” type products you can weave into your content (i.e. organizational type stuff, items that would support a healthy nursing lifestyle, etc.).

As far general strategy:
– Think about the blog content you could create that would attract your ideal YouTuber. Your blog is a vehicle for finding your audience that isn’t on YT and building it (and perhaps using it to later grow your YT, as well.
– You may find that email list building and YT subs are your best friend as far as monetization goes (more so than affiliate even, although the passive income there is nice too). Brands will want to partner with micro-influencers on blog content especially. Sponsored posts about products/sponsored how-to tutorials (especially if you can make a YT video for it), will be especially appealing to brands. Even with a small email list (1,000 niche readers), you can make thousands and even tens of thousands off sponsored gigs. (Your blog content strategy will help you build your list, and eventually your YT/IG channels.

Hope that helps a little, feel free to drop more questions!

Thank you so much for this article. I read it 2-3x and took notes hahaha, you guys are inspiring!

I had a question (or two):

So I am an aesthetic RN who recently began a youtube channel and website/blog to supplement. I could do a blog post a week about “How to Become an Aesthetic RN” and varying topics, but HOW do I tie affiliate links into that?

I have an Amazon associates page as well and my niche on Youtube is mainly nursing students who aspire to do what I do.
I am slowly trying to convert these subscribers to followers on my IG (NURSEJANETG) but again I am having a hard time with affiliate links for what I do specifically. Any help would be appreciated!

My goal is to work a little less and gear more towards consulting/guiding nurses who want to transition into this field.

Hey Jessica!

Congrats on getting the blog up and running and getting things all set up. Since you’re past the initial setup and into monetization, I think it helps to take a step back and think about your strengths/what you’ve enjoyed so far.

– Do you like writing content/enjoy affiliate marketing (I see you’re set up with Amazon)?
– Have you started an email list/tried creating opt-ins and building rapport there?

If you’re creative/think you’ll enjoy list building, then creating freebies/mini-wellness courses could be your way to eventually work towards a higher-ticket course/wellness-based coaching program.

Let me know what you’ve liked so far/what successes (if any) you’ve had on the monetization front and maybe we can come up with some more ideas.

My blog is http://www.itsaberrygoodlife.com

That’s awesome!

It certainly sounds like you have some good influences in your life. Not that there is anything wrong with a traditional 4-year degree, but I think you’ll certainly save a lot of money going the associates route (especially if you’re in no hurry to get it done). Like you’re saying, entrepreneurship is amazing — and something I highly recommend if you’re as motivated as it sounds — but you’re right, secure your future, and attack being a business owner from a position of strength. It’s a lot easier to weather a storm/periods of business volatility [when revenue is down] when you’re financially secure.

Best of luck in whatever route you choose!

Hey Ben,
My name is Dev… I am from Chicago. I am Super super super happy by reading your article!!! I am 18 yrs old straight outta high school… I have completed shadow program of various fields in Health care and I am extremely interested in Respiratory Therapist ( RT )…
My family members works in Northwestern Memorial Hospital and Rush Medical Centre as Managers in RT. I love the way they work. My friends are going to Private University lol for RNs and RT and some of them have no clue so they are majoring in Biology and living in dorms. While I am going to community college Malcom x for getting my Associate Degree in RT and they also prepare us for CRT and also RRT. So, I am planning to get a job at Northwestern Memorial Hospital and they are hiring more RT and they pay them $33 from starting with RRT. It’s 36 hours a week and also provides overtime. Many people with Associate and RRT works 72 hours a week and makes more than Managers 😂!
Regular – 33 $ * 36 hours * 52 weeks = $61,776
Overtime – 49$ * 36 hours * 52 weeks = $91,728
Total = $1,53,504
Even this Hospital has tution reimbursement for Bachelor and Masters for Employees! I am 18 years old and it will take 6 months to complete pre req for program and 2 years for program and while I am 20/21 years old I can make 150k with no student loan ( off course I need to do overtime). Even my Masters Degree I have to pay only 20% and 80% is covered my Hospital and I have to score well.. I am blessed to have amazing guidance of my family members and I want to go in business and I was super excited to start a business but they advised me to secure you future first and they fly in the sky! So after RT I am super pumped to start my own business and will study super hard and work hardest and smartest. I will find out some new equipment or machine which helps RT and start my own company and sell this equipment To Hospitals. Or I will try to become CEO of the Hospital!! That’s my dream… CEO of Hospital or Find out any equipment or machine which helps patients and start a company! So my next goal is finish pre req and get Associate in RT with RRT Certificate!!!!

$36,000 is absolutely the extremely low end of the pay scale for an RN.

(You can have associates RNs and bachelors prepared RNs — same license, just a two year degree vs. four year. Pay is roughly the same (BSN prepared nurses make $0.50-$1/hr more but some regions may extend that every so slightly higher to the $1-$2/hr range)).

The median salary for nurses was $66,000 in 2016-2017 and that’s probably ever so slightly ticked up since then. That incorporates new grads and 20-year nurses alike, though.
Depending on where you’re from, you can expect to make low 60’s to start in bigger metropolitan areas, and mid 40’s to low 50’s to start in more rural areas.

I’m rural and I started with a company that definitely lags behind in pay when compared with competitors. Odds are you won’t come close to matching your current net income with software sales for several years. That’s not to say that it won’t be worth it as it depends how badly you want out of the other role. (Travel nursing can be super lucrative if you’re into that sort of thing — typically that requires at least 1 year of experience before you can land travel gigs, but those gigs generally start at $35-$40/hr and can reach well above $50/hr in many places).