How Does Investopedia Make Money? (You Can Do it in 3 Steps)

Investopedia.com generates around $14M in revenue per year with the finance-related industries, despite not selling financial services that require a big investment such as giving loans and issuing credit cards.

How does Investopedia make money?

This is a legit and important question to ask, because if you knew the answer to this question, then you have the potential of using the same business model of Investopedia in order to make money online without a big investment and without starting a risky business.

You are in the right place.

I will tell you in 5 minutes from now how Investopedia earns money online, and whether you personally can make money with the same model.

And at the end of this article, I will reveal to you the place that helped me start my own online business that is now generating me income with a very similar method to how Investopedia generate their revenue.

So, without further ado, let’s begin!

Table of Contents

How Does Investopedia Make Money?

Investopedia.com makes money online with three main methods:

1 – Showing Ads on The Investopedia.com Web Pages

This is one of the most basic and traditional ways of making money with a website.

The way this is done is that Investopedia sells an advertising space to Google through the Google AdSense program, which allows Google to show ads on Investopedia.com, and when someone clicks on any of these ads, Investopedia earns money.

The value of the money that Investopedia make with each click on any of the ads varies depending on different factors such as the country from where the click happened, the advertiser, the time of the day, day of the month, and month of the year, and on some other factors.

The earnings per click (EPC) could be $0.1, and it could go up to $1 or even $2.

This is one of the easiest ways to monetize a site, but at the same time it is one of the least rewarding in my opinion due to the usually low EPC and the fact that you need a lot of traffic in order to make a significant income with this method.

2 – Selling Online Courses

Investopedia has something that is called Investopedia Academy, where they sell online courses on topics related to the financial industry.

Some of the topics that Investopedia Academy offers courses about are:

Investing
Trading
Financial Modeling
Technical Analysis
Personal Finance
Excel for Finance

And more.

The nice thing about making money selling courses online, unlike offline courses, is that you usually pay the cost of preparing and recording the course itself, but then you make to as many people as you can and keep making money without re-creating the course.

You only need to do some updates on the course with time as things in the industry might change, and you need to spend some money on the support and the web hosting servers.

Investopedia sells courses for around $199 per course, which is more viable for making money through displaying ads like in the first method above.

The downfall of this method is that you need to keep an eye on the courses to make sure that everything works properly and that there are no bugs on the platform where the courses are being displayed.

Now to my favorite method that Investopedia.com makes money with:

3 – Promoting Financial Services in Exchange of a Commission

This is another popular way of making money online, and it is called affiliate marketing.

The way how affiliate marketing works is that the affiliate (Investopedia for example) places promotions for relevant service providers (like loan providers and credit cards issuers), and they link to these services through a unique link (called affiliate link), and when someone clicks on that link and go to the website of the service provider to apply for, or purchase the service, the affiliate will get a commission.

And the value of this commission depends on the service itself, the provider, the country, and some other factors.

To make this easier to understand, let’s take an example:

If we checkout the page on Investopedia.com that is titled: “Best Online Brokers”, we find that Investopedia has listed some of the top recommended online brokers to work with, and provided a short review on each one.

And they added a button that says “Open An Account”.

If someone reads the article, and clicks on one of these buttons to open an account with a certain broker, they get redirected to the website of that broker through a unique affiliate link, which helps the broker track that person and credit Investopedia a commission of the person completed the account creation.

And the same with loan and mortgage companies, and with credit card companies that Investopedia promotes on the website.

Investopedia sends people to any of these companies, and if any of these people became a client or even a prospect, Investopedia gets a commission.

And the commission value depends on many factors, such as the industry or the service (loan, mortgage, credit card, …etc.), the provider, the country, the time of the year, and some other factors.

Sometimes the commission is $20 per referral, $40 per referral, or even $80 or more per referral.

That’s how the affiliate marketing model works, and how Investopedia.com earns money with this method.

And the reason why I like this method of making money more than the first and the seconds methods mentioned above, is that with affiliate marketing, there’s a potential of making money more than what you could do through showing display ads as in the first method.

And when compared to selling courses online like in the second method above, affiliate marketing doesn’t require you to do updates and support like it is with selling an online course, and you don’t have to create the course in the first place.

With affiliate marketing you promote services and products, physical and digital (like courses), that others’ create and sell.

As an affiliate, you get a commission on the customers and prospects you bring, and the service provider takes care of the customer, the product, the support, …etc.

Many other sites make money with this model, and it is the same way how CreditKarma makes money.

So, these were the three methods that Investopedia.com makes money with, and that’s how their business model is built.

Now to the important question:

Can You Personally Make Money with Investopedia’s Business Model?

Yes. You can make money with any of the three methods that Investopedia’s business model relies on.

However, there are pros and cons for each method, and the third one (affiliate marketing) is my preferred method, and the method I personally make money with.

The reason I prefer affiliate marketing is that, compared to showing ads, it can make you more money if you knew how to place affiliate marketing properly on your site.

And when compared to selling courses online, affiliate marketing is better because you don’t need to create a course in the first place, and you don’t need to provide the updates and support by yourself.

Affiliate marketing is the best way for creating a passive income.

And the nice thing about this method is that it is a beginner friendly, and costs a low investment to get started with (less than $500).

3 Steps to Create a Business Like Investopedia

I will mention here to create a business that makes money with the third method that Investopedia.com makes money through, affiliate marketing, because this is the easiest to get started with, and the one that costs a low investment:

1 – Pick a Niche for Your Business

Creating a business about everything doesn’t work.

You need to focus your attention on a specific audience in order to make people trust you and to make your efforts work and make you money.

This is what we call choosing a niche (audience).

That’s how Investopedia succeeded in making money, by focusing on people interested in financial services and education.

And again, this could be in any industry that you like, it doesn’t have to be related to the financial industry.

But in case that you choose a niche that is related to finance, then you can make it at any size you want, you don’t need to start as big and divert as Investopedia.

For example, you can specialize in loans only, or mortgages, or credit cards.

Or, you can make your niche about personal finance for veterans, or seniors, or students.

Choose one audience and you will have better chances of connecting with them and letting them trust you. (and make you money in the process!)

2 – Start a “Mini-Investopedia.com” Website

Having a website for your affiliate business is a must if you want to succeed and make a sustainable income on the long run.

Don’t worry if you know nothing about building websites, it doesn’t require technical knowledge or coding anymore.

You can build an affiliate site in 30 seconds thanks to the tools I will tell you about in the following section.

The website is important because this is where you need to bring your audience to see the offers you want to promote to them through your affiliate links.

And this is how you get the trust and make your audience click on your links and make you money.

3 – Help Your Audience Like Investopedia to Earn Money

Investopedia makes money through helping their audience find the best deals on the financial services like loans, online brokerage, mortgages, credit cards, and more.

That’s why people take by Investopedia’s recommendations, which allows Investopedia.com to make money.

And you need to do the same on your site for your audience.

For example, if you choose your niche to be about Online Brokerage, then your audience might ask on Google stuff like:

Best low cost online brokerage
Best online brokerage for beginners
Best online brokerage 2021
Best online brokerage for day trading
Best online brokerage for options

And so on.

And for each of these questions, you need to create a simple article that lists the top options out there, and link to them through your affiliate link, so that when someone clicks on your link and goes to a certain broker and creates an account, you get a commission.

Here’s a screenshot for examples of some of the brokerage related offers that you can promote, and how much you can make per lead (customer/prospect) with each offer.

And with these three steps, you can start a website that makes you money like Investopedia.com makes money to its owners.

And if you like the process and you want to apply it in order to make money online like Investopedia, but you want someone to walk you through a detailed process with tiny steps, then the following section will tell you where to go.

A Step-by-Step Plan with Training, Tools & Support?

Sure!

I’m going to recommend for you here the same plan that I personally followed when I first started with affiliate marketing without any experience and with a very low budget.

And now I make most of my income with the method that Investopedia.com uses to earn money, affiliate marketing.

The place that provided me with everything I needed is called Wealthy Affiliate.

This place is an all-in-one stop for anyone starting, or struggling with affiliate marketing, as they give you:

The complete plan on how to create and grow an affiliate site.
A step-by-step detailed training that would help you apply the plan.
A set of research tools that would help you find the best offers to promote and the ways to promote them.
The Amazing website builder and premium web hosting so that you don’t worry about the technical stuff.
Most important, the community of more than 2 million entrepreneurs that are willing to help you whenever you need.

And much more.

And all of this is provided for a very affordable investment that allows you to make money like Investopedia through affiliate marketing.

Even better, this platform offers a free plan to start with it and try the tools, in addition to get the first level of the training (10 lessons), before paying anything.

If you are serious about creating a business that makes money with the Investopedia business model, then check out this review of Wealthy Affiliate to learn more about how they can help you, and how you can get the free plan at the start.

Or just click here to get started with the free account and training NOW!

Conclusion

I hoped that I explained very well the Investopedia.com business model, and that now you understand how Investopedia makes money online.

If you are interested in creating a business that makes you money with the same model, then the recommended platform in the previous section is the place to go.

If you still have any question about anything I mentioned here, please, leave it in the comments’ section below and I will be happy to answer you asap 🙂

How Does Investopedia Make Money? (3 Ways You Can Do)