John Gruber’s Daring Fireball is a recipe that is working and the cooks are busy in the kitchen adding a pinch of this, a pinch of that and seeing what works for them.

So far none of these recipes have become better, in this blogger’s opinion, than its master recipe but several have certainly managed to create their own dish that works well enough to feed their own mouths.

What is the Daring Fireball recipe? It consists of the following:

• 1 multiple-times-per-day updated link log.
• 1 not-so-frequently updated blog with longer, well-written posts.
• 1 (or two) audio podcasts (to taste).
• 1 weekly RSS feed sponsorship.
• 1 well-curated image-based ad on each page view.

From outward appearances this recipe nets Daring Fireball a very decent sum – which is why the cooks are in the kitchen. With no inside information here is what one can surmise based on what is public knowledge.

The three main ways Daring Fireball generates revenue is through its weekly RSS feed sponsorship, The Deck Ad Network, and sponsorship of 5by5 Network’s The Talk Show. Daring Fireball also uses affiliate links and sells Tshirts from time-to-time but I do not believe these to be major contributors to its profit. They may both contribute to its ability to generate revenue but I believe the bulk of its profit come from the three channels I’m covering here. Without knowing more about how The Deck Ad Network and The 5by5 Network distribute revenue it is impossible to know exactly how much revenue goes to Daring Fireball but we can do exactly what the other cooks are doing; make assumptions and get close.

Daring Fireball currently charges $6,500 USD per week to sponsor the RSS feed. This recently increased from $6,000 within the last few weeks, and increased to that not too long ago from $5,000 USD and so on. So to figure out the yearly revenue generated through this single sponsorship program would depend on where you start and end the year. But, lets jump out on a limb and say that a weekly sponsorship has cost at least $5,000 for the last year. That’d be about $260,000 USD per year from the RSS feed sponsorship. At $6,500, should it maintain or go up higher from here, it’d be $338,000 USD for the next year.

The Deck, of which Daring Fireball is only 1-of-52 members, has a current cost of $8,300 USD per month. Or, sponsors can pay to buy a day, called a “roadblock”, for $8,300 per day. With 27 sponsors in the month of September that is about $224,000 USD generated. (Assuming The Deck had sold absolutely no “roadblock” ads. If they had it’d be significantly more.) I’m assuming that The Deck distributes revenues based on a traffic-based model of sorts (more page views == more moolah) but I don’t know exactly. But even if you were to split this revenue evenly among all parties that’d be nearly $8,300 per month for Daring Fireball. Based on nothing other than my gut Daring Fireball’s 4M+ page views per month make up a fair amount of The Deck’s overall traffic and so, one could assume, that Daring Fireball gets a slightly larger share than my math suggests.

5by5 is currently charging $3,000 USD a month for its Livestream sponsorship (which The Talk Show does each week) and $3,000 for its bandwidth sponsorship as well as individual show sponsorships which they don’t publicize the price for. It is very difficult to tell how 5by5 would distribute this revenue but, again, I’ll make some assumptions. I assume that a bandwidth sponsorship is all for 5by5. Bandwidth is a bill that goes to 5by5 and not the hosts. Bandwidth for a show as popular as The Talk Show could easily be a few thousand dollars per month (not to mention editing costs, etc.) So if we take the bandwidth sponsorship off the table I can only assume that The Talk Show generates about $9,000 USD per month. $3,000 for the Livestream sponsorship, and $6,000 for the two episode-based sponsorships that are within the show. Plus donations, Tshirts? I think I’m underestimating the revenue-generating power of The Talk Show but I can’t be sure.

Not counting the revenue Daring Fireball generates with its affiliate links and tshirt sales; it is my assumption that Daring Fireball could generate upwards of $550,000 USD per year (going forward). And I believe I’m underestimating because my assumptions are probably low. Again, the affiliate links and tshirt sales are probably fairly good revenue generators but the bulk of Daring Fireball’s profit likely does not come from these two channels.

Why go through all of this to figure out how much revenue Daring Fireball generates? Because it is exactly what wannabe-pro-bloggers are doing every single day. They do this math based on the information they can gather and decide to take a stab at it themselves. And with Daring Fireball’s RSS feed sponsorship increasing every few months why wouldn’t they? And good for them. The more the merrier. I just have one request.

I hope that those that decide to use Daring Fireball’s recipe decide to do whatever they can to make it all their own. Don’t just add a little more salt and pepper – change the main course from fish to beef. Make every ingredient from your own garden and don’t use the same brand ingredients Daring Fireball does. Make something unique that will inspire others to do the same. Be a good cook not a copy cat.

I believe the price for a link and write up in his feed when first launched was around $750 per week? I know in October 2007 it was $900 per week. I remember looking only a few days ago and it was $1,250 per week. Now I look and see it is up to $1,750 per week and that it is sold out until at least 2009.

Two quick points. I guess the price should have been higher eh John? Second, this is so well-deserved and justified that I’m really happy it is happening to such a hard working “blogger”. And, from out of the mouths of those who have opened their wallet to sponsor Daring Fireball, completely worth it.

Congratulations John for all your success with Daring Fireball. You have absolutely earned it.

Hopefully today’s announcement will be seen as a big step in the right direction. One of the challenges that faces us all is the motivation to continue on a strict course towards our goals. I’ve failed at dieting on more than one occasion, and so I was hoping that each of us could provide each other with the motivation to continue. Some of us have stronger wills than others, since this past weekend I didn’t do so well, while others like James Mathias are thriving on the diet.

Still going strong, super proud of myself I’ve made it two weeks and one day without cheating on my diet, and since I got the [basketball] hoop I haven’t missed my exercise either. — James Mathias

Official sponsor: The Diet Channel
Learn more about them, and the sponsorship.

As with all things though, this diet of ours could get stale – people could move on and some have yet to really participate. (I’m looking at Bryan Veloso here). So I thought, what could I do to keep everyone involved? How could I build incentive to stick with the weigh-ins, the updates, the overall participation each and every week? That is where our first official sponsor of the diet, The Diet Channel, comes in. After a little noodling, Brad Prescott (General Manager for The Diet Channel, you can read his personal letter to all of you) and I were able to put together a program that I think will help to keep everyone involved with the diet.

We’re going to start “a contest” of sorts. Not necessarily a weight-loss challenge because our goal is not to shed as many pounds as possible, but rather to stick with our diets to reach our goals and maintain a healthy weight far into the future. This takes time, discipline, and support. So, how do you participate in this contest? We’ve put together a simple set of instructions on how to be eligible for this contest. Simply put, you need to weigh-in each and every Tuesday, and link to both The Diet Channel’s web site, and the diet’s web site. Quick and easy.

But what do you win? Well, we thought about this for awhile, and rather than give away traditional prizes we’d rather give all of you something useful – that would help you succeed on your respective diets. Remember, this isn’t “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire”, this is Colin’s diet. So bear that in mind.

We’ve put together a list of “prizes” which are diets that you can choose from that The Diet Channel will sponsor you to do. In effect, if you’ve ever wanted to try out the South Beach Diet (as an example), we’ll fit the bill. For each month that you continue to use that diet, let The Diet Channel know about your progress, and they will continue to sponsor you. It really is a win win, and hopefully everyone will find a diet that fits their needs.

So, as a recap – each Wednesday (since our weigh-ins are on Tuesdays) we will pick two “winners” by reading all of the entries written on your blogs. We’ll notify the winner, and The Diet Channel, and you can choose if you want to get involved with any of the specific diets on the list. But there’s something more… Each month, we’ll pick one winner for another prize. This prize will be some sort of tangible product, though we’re not releasing any information about that prize just yet.

If you have any questions about this contest, please feel free to email me and hopefully I can help you out.

We also have a few new dieters that were added to the all new dieter listing page. It is absolutely crucial that this list remain as up to date as possible. So if you are on this list, and you have a web site that I did not link to, please send me a quick note. If you are not even on this list, send me a note right now! And, if you have not given me your full name – please do so – as we’re all friends here.

The entire diet page has been updated with tons of information and I ask that each of you participating in this diet take a few minutes to review the new information. If I missed something, it probably means I forgot about it and so you’d do well to inform me. I’m really hoping that these moves will really help everyone stay involved, keep dieting, and ultimately remain healthy.

Buttons for your site – So, Ana thought it’d be cool to have some buttons. I couldn’t agree more. If you would like to put some buttons on your site, linking to either the diet page or The Diet Channel (as Ana has done) – you can use these graphics. If you need any specific sizes, just ask.

[tags]diet, the-diet, sponsorship, the diet channel, contest[/tags]