How to Sign Up for the HubPages Earnings Program

This guide will cover:

• Instructions on signing up for the HubPages Earnings Program
• An introduction to the HubPages Earnings Program
• An introduction to the HubPages Ad Program
• Tips on viewing your Ad Program earnings

For information on establishing accounts with our various affiliate partners, visit our guides to signing up with Google AdSense, the Amazon Affiliate network, and the HubPages Amazon Program.

The HubPages Earnings Program enables you to:

• Accrue revenue from several different affiliate sources in one place
• Enjoy a lower minimum payout threshold ($50)
• Receive winnings from HubPages contests and special programs
• Earn from premium ads on your articles via the HubPages Ad Program

To sign up for the HubPages Earnings Program:

1. Visit the signup page under My Account > Earnings > Settings
2. Click on the "Sign Up for the HubPages Earnings Program" link
3. Associate your PayPal account

The HubPages Earnings Program combines a number of revenue-generating opportunities that enable you to earn from the traffic to your articles. It also provides one consolidated gateway for us to make payments to you.

The HubPages Earnings Program, along with the ad and affiliate Programs underneath it (currently the Ad and Amazon Programs) each have a set of requirements for participation. Activating the HubPages Earnings Program alone simply means that you have enabled the payment mechanism, but it does not automatically enroll you in any of the revenue-generating programs. We also use the HubPages Earnings Program to distribute contest earnings. Once you have successfully enabled the HubPages Earnings Program, you can pick and choose which programs you want to use to make money.

The HubPages Earnings Program requires you to associate a PayPal account.

If you participate in a HubPages contest and are the lucky winner of a cash prize, you will receive your payment through the HubPages Earnings Program. Contest winners do not need to have a Google AdSense Account associated with HubPages or need to participate in any of the other earnings programs; they only need a PayPal account.

For most users, the HubPages Ad Program is the bread and butter of moneymaking on HubPages. It provides an optimized mix of premium ads from multiple ad partners to run alongside Google AdSense ads on your articles (You will need a Google AdSense ID to participate in the HubPages Ad Program). HubPages has partnered with a number of premium ad sources, which we have special access to as a very large publisher. Our size allows us to secure large website ad rates for you. When you opt into the Ad Program, for your share of impressions on your articles, additional advertising from these premium ad sources will appear.

Revenue generated with The HubPages Ad Program is paid via the HubPages Earnings Program as explained above.

In the usual AdSense arrangement, you’re permitted four ad units on both desktop and mobile. If you opt in to the Ad Program, you're given up to eight full-size ad units on desktop and six on mobile. For the desktop ad layout specifically, you will still keep one AdSense ad unit in the footer. You will get paid by Google AdSense directly for that one unit.

The Ad Program ad units might be filled with Google AdSense ads, if these ads outperform other ad partners' ads, and you will be paid for these via the HubPages Earnings Program. In the graphic below, the blue rectangles represent your direct Google AdSense units, the orange rectangles represent your Ad Program units, and the red rectangles represent additional ads on the AdSense-only layouts where HubPages gets 100% of the earnings (AdSense regulations only permit you to earn from 4 ads per page, which is why HubPages earns 100% of the revenue from the other 4. We've kept the same ad layout across all articles for consistency but we've given Hubbers the highest-paying ads that fall within AdSense's guidelines on the AdSense-only layout.)

NOTE: If you turn on the Ad Program, you should see a decrease in your personal Google AdSense earnings because HubPages will now be managing and paying you directly for the majority of the ads on the page. However, when you combine your Google AdSense earnings with your Ad Program earnings (and adjust for traffic) you should see an overall increase in earnings.

The HubPages Amazon Program tracks referrals from your articles and the resulting purchase activity on Amazon. You accrue into your HubPages Earnings Program balance from this activity, based on a commission from transactions on Amazon that occur after a referral from your articles.

HubPages offers a very high Amazon commission tier because the volume of sales across the site is aggregated for the benefit of all participants.

If you already have an external Amazon Associates ID that you use outside of HubPages, you can opt to use it here instead of joining the HubPages-specific Amazon Program (please see "The Amazon Affiliate Network" section below).

The Amazon Affiliate Network enables you to list Amazon products (via the Amazon Capsule and by adding links in the Text Capsule) in your articles and earn from purchases resulting from clicks on those items. The only difference is that you sign up using your own Amazon Affiliate ID. For instructions on associating your existing ID, please see our guide to signing up with an Amazon Affiliate Account.

NOTE: You will be paid by Amazon and not by HubPages if you sign up with your own Affiliate ID rather than through the HubPages Amazon Program.

You can view your earnings for the Ad Program by going to your Google AdSense home page and by visiting My Account > Earnings > Earnings Report. From your Earnings Report page you can use the drop down box to view each program's reports, e.g., All Programs, Ad Program, Amazon, eBay.