Blogging is still one of the most lucrative online businesses In the world. Not only is it lucrative, but it also offers you the freedom to travel to wherever you want in the world while still engaging in what you love doing.
With blogging, you make yourself available to an unlimited number of people anywhere in the world thanks to the power of the internet.
Also, with blogging, anybody in the world can become your potential customer as long as they have an internet connection. It's just amazing how you can grow your influence to an unlimited number of people In the world, that's the beauty of blogging.
But all blogging activities can not be categorized into the same group, there's professional blogging and there's amateur blogging. So in this article, we'll discuss the following topics
1) What's amateur blogging
2) Factors that determine your success as an amateur blogger
3) How to monetize your blog
4) Conclusion
Let's Dive Right in
What's Amateur Blogging?
Amateur blogging is simply the habit of starting a blog online based solely on the passion that you have for it. As an amateur blogger, you don't expect money from your blog especially at the beginning because that's mainly the stage where you test your feet in the waters and of course, you can be sure to make mistakes during this stage of your blogging journey.
Factors that Determines Your Success as a Blogger
Just like every other profession, blogging is not a get-rich-quick scheme. It takes a high level of discipline and hard work before you can achieve success in blogging. Along the way, you're sure to hit a few rocks, but that's part of the learning process. Those mistakes are what will give you the needed experience to succeed. So don't be scared to make mistakes in your blogging journey, but use them as the needed motivation to achieve your goals.
There's no guaranteed magic formula for success in blogging but there are some proven techniques that other experts in the field have followed to get to where they are, and of course, if you follow the same methods, you'll achieve success just like they did. But what are these factors? Let's consider each of them.
a) Be Unique
About 7.5 million blog posts are being published every single day. More than 70 million posts are being published on WordPress alone every month.
That's a staggering figure to consider. So in light of that figure, you need to be unique in your content creation process or you'll end up doing exactly what others are doing.
If you create the same content as other bloggers, guess what will happen, your content will be stocked between millions of other blog posts out there and they will have the upper hand over you.
Readers like unique and fresh content. Nobody wants to read the same thing over and over again. Even though you want to discuss a topic that's already covered by other bloggers, be sure to discuss and target vital ideas that are missing in their content. Approach your discussion from a different perspective. Doing this will make you unique in your field and make your readers always return for more.
Moreover, always keep in mind that whatever it is you're writing about there are other contents out there on the same topic. Always ask yourself: if I'm the one searching for this information, what exactly will I be looking for. Be sure to have your reader's interest in mind before creating blog content.
Endeavor to differentiate yourself from the crowd by developing a writing style that will be unique to you and your audience. Doing this will help you remain relevant in the industry and also help you to satisfy your readers needs.
b) Be consistent
Blogging is the kind of business that requires consistency, time, and patience if you want to see any encouraging results. You don't want to open a blog, put one content there and return in the next ten years. If you do that, then you should consider doing something else because blogging is not for you.
Let's assume you have one awesome content on your blog that has to solve your reader's problems, what will happen? They will come back to have more of such content and if it takes you forever to meet their needs, they'll ignore your blog and set their eyes somewhere else where they'll get the necessary information to solve their problems.
You should also know that having passion alone for blogging will not help you remain consistent for a long time because there are times you don't feel like doing things, even the things that you love most. Well, I know that passion is so much needed to succeed in anything that you're doing. But in blogging, passion alone will not get you there. You need to treat your blog as an investment that's worth your time and effort. It is your business and so you should treat it seriously like your life depends on it.
A better way to be consistent in blogging is to set a daily or weekly posting schedule. In the beginning, try to post at least one new piece of content on your blog every week. You can set a weekly reminder for this in case you forget. This is exactly what you need to grow your blog especially at the starting, then when you start recording some level of success, you can adjust your schedule.
c) Be Persistent
Okay, you've done everything to grow your blog, you've stuck to your daily or weekly posting schedules, you're unique in all your contents, and yet, there's no traffic, nobody is giving attention to what you're writing, should you give up?
Let's be honest, it is human nature to give up on anything that doesn't seem to meet our expectations especially when we've put on a lavish amount of time and effort to it. But this kind of habit doesn't support success in any way.
Like I said earlier, blogging is not a get-rich-quick scheme. it takes time and effort to record success with your blog so you must be prepared for all the troubles. Forget about what others want you to believe. You should expect at least six to one year before your blog starts getting some decent amount of traffic. Some even take longer than this but with effort and time, you'll start seeing the fruit of your hard work.
d) Choose a niche
The majority of amateur bloggers make the mistake of writing about almost anything and everything. There's this popular saying that a jerk of all trades is master of none. This is the kind of mistake that you should avoid from the very beginning. Before you even open a blog, you must have already settled on what niche you'll focus on.
A niche is simply a category or area on which you'll specifically focus your blog on. Choosing a niche is one of the most important aspects of blogging. If you write about anything and everything, you'll end up confusing your audience and search engines because they'll find it difficult to figure out what your blog is all about.
There are so many niches out there like relationships, religion, sports, agriculture, fashion and design, finance, tech, and so on. Just choose the one that you have a passion for and center your blog around it.
Choosing a niche will convince your blog readers that you're a specialist in that field and not just a random writer who talks about anything. The beauty of it is that the above-mentioned niches also have sub-categories. For instance, under the sports niche, you can decide to focus only on football or basketball or gulf instead of targeting all of them at the same time. This is how to choose a niche and buy the heart of your readers.
Here at Netkash, we specifically talk about the different ways of making money online, that's our main focus. So if you're a first-time reader of our blog, once you read a few of our blog posts, you'll be able to tell exactly what the blog is all about even without reading the blog description. That's how to go about blogging and that's exactly what you should do if you want to succeed in blogging.
But most times, it can be very difficult to write about one topic for a long time because you might run out of ideas if the niche is not broad. So the best way to approach this is to focus on a broader niche and then narrow it down to a smaller category later on.
For instance, the tech niche is a broader one that covers topics related to phones, mobile networks, inventions, computers, and so on. You can decide to write on some of the popular topics first on the niche before narrowing it down to sub-niches like phones or computers. I hope the idea is clear.
Think about it this way, how will someone feel to read about football in one of your blog posts, and then in another one you talk about relationships. Sounds absurd right? Sure it does. That's more reason you should focus on one niche. If your niche is technology, focus on it, and then with time, you can move on to a smaller category under the same niche If the need arises.
e) Optimize your blog for SEO
Being a successful blogger is much more than writing a blog post and then throwing the link on social media in the hope that people will flog into your website in large numbers. It simply doesn't work that way.
Though social media is a good place to share your blog post and drive traffic to your website, nothing compares to organic traffic. Organic traffic is the traffic that comes to your website directly from search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing.
To have an organic website on your blog, your site must be well optimized for search engine optimization ( SEO).
Consider your blog/ website as a business that's meant to solve people's problems. Daily, people enter millions of search queries on search engines, what do you think they are looking for? Solutions to their problems.
So if you set your blog in such a way that it solves people's problems, what do you think will happen? They will always come back for more even without you sharing your blog link with them. This is why SEO is very important if you want to succeed as a blogger.
Below are some important on-page SEO tips that you should implement on your blog:
I) Create awesome content.
I'm sure you've heard several times that content is king. Blogging is much more than creating a website and updating people on what you'll have for breakfast or launch.
Now there's nothing wrong with updating people about your favorite meals but you have to understand that the main idea behind setting up a blog is to spread useful information and solve problems and the majority of those needs will only be met through your articles or blog post. So do well to create awesome content that will benefit your readers. In so doing, traffic will flow to your blog naturally.
Let's assume you have a blog on how to make money online and you want to write on five ways to make money on Fiverr as an affiliate.
If you tell your readers hey!! Go to Fiverr, sign up for their affiliate program, and yeah, you're gonna make money. You'll not perform well.
But let's assume you take your time to explain to your readers what Fiverr affiliate is all about, the advantages and disadvantages of joining the program, a step by step guide on how to sign up for the program (with pictures and videos if possible) you'll rank faster because you've created a well-detailed content that solves users problems.
That's exactly how to create awesome content and that's what you should do to outrank your competitors. Create irresistible content that will solve users' problems and you'll make it to Google's first page.
ii) Do proper keyword research
Keywords research is the process of analyzing the data behind people's search queries on search engines on Google to use the data to your advantage.
Don't ever write a blog post without conducting proper keywords research on that topic.
With keywords research, it will be easier for you to determine the volume of people that are searching for a specific key term in your niche. The higher the volume, the more chances of having more blog visitors to your website if you create content around that topic.
However, you have to understand that topics with higher search volumes always have higher keywords difficulty which might make it very hard for you to rank on Google's first page if you create content around that topic especially if your blog is new.
Asides from the monthly searched volume, always endeavor to check the keywords difficulty of any searched term before deciding whether to Target that keyword or not.
As a beginner, always go for the lower difficulty keywords that you can easily rank on Google's first page and as you grow your website, you can decide to Target the keywords with high searched volume.
iii) optimize your title tags and meta descriptions.
Whenever you perform a search query on Google or other search engines, you'll notice that the displayed results always have the following features
I) A heading that bears the title of the page you're searching for
2) A brief description of the page below the heading.
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| Arrow in red= title tag Arrow in blue=meta description |
The heading is known as the title tag while the description below the heading is known as the meta description.
Now think of it this way, if you search for the phrase Affiliate marketing, and you don't see the keyword ( Affiliate marketing) in either the title or the description, will you click on the result? Not likely.
Of course, you want a result that's related to what you're searching for. So why on Earth will you click on something that's not related to your search query?
Also, have you ever searched for a term like online dating and you notice that the word is in the title or description? That's because Google tracks
who's clicking on that listing, and they've learned that when a keyword you're searching for is in the listings, you're way more likely to click through.
So in your title tag and
your meta description, make sure you include the keyword. But that doesn't mean you should spam your page title with the blog link so that people will know that's what the page is all about.
Yes, you have to include the keyword in your title and your description but it has to be appealing. If it doesn't flow in a sentence, it will be hard to read and if it doesn't evoke curiosity, no one will click through.
The title and meta description of your blog posts is what determines whether users will click through to see what you have on your website or not. Always try to keep your blog tile attractive and modest. A boring title tag brings little or no traffic to your website because it tells users that your content may simply not be what they're looking for.
A typical title tag should be around 60 characters long on average while the meta description should be around 150 characters on average.
iv) Submit your sitemap on Google Search Console.
Do you know that Google has already given you a tool that teaches you how to rank no 1 on the search engine results page? It's called Google search console.
This tool is completely free. You don't have to pay a cent to use it. Submitting your site map on the Search console will help Google to index your post faster so that you can get more organic visitors to your site.
A site map is a page on your blog/ website that contains the URL of all your blog posts. Submitting your site map to search engines is the number one step to get organic traffic to your website.
Search engines like Google make use of sitemaps to crawl your website and index your posts. The video below will teach you more about search console and how to submit your sitemap to search engines.
Another cool thing about the search console is that it contains all the data regarding the performance of your website. It shows you all the related keywords that your website is getting impressions for.
Not only that, but it also shows you the pages of your site that are bringing you the most traffic and what you can do to improve your blog's performance.
So head over to the Google search console and submit your sitemap if you haven't done so yet.
v) Choose your blog name/ title wisely
This is an important aspect of blogging that most amateur bloggers ignore at the beginning but end up paying for it bitterly later. Your blog name directly or indirectly contributes to your success as a blogger. Your blog name should In some ways, be able to tell your readers what your blog is all about even without them reading your description.
For instance, even before you don't visit the website soccer24.com, you'll be able to tell that it is a football-related website because of the name or title. But supposing you click through the same website and discover that the majority of their articles are about relationships, wouldn't you have doubts about the blog because there's nothing in the blog title that's related to relationships? Of course, you will.
You should name your blog in such a way that anybody would be able to know what it's all about even Before they click through the URL.
Choosing your blog name or title shouldn't take you forever to decide. If you want to treat your blog as a brand, then you can easily go with your name. A typical example of this is Neil Patel com. The founder of the website is Neil Patel and he uses his real name as the title of the website. Right now, Neil is killing it big time with his company.
Another way to choose your blog name is to combine your name with your niche. For instance, if your new is James and your blog is all about recipes, you can simply go with the name jamescooks.com, it's that easy and plain.
Consider this when choosing your blog name
Whatever it is that you choose as your blog name, always remember to keep the name short and simple. Remember that your blog name is a part of your URL and shorter URLs load faster compared to complicated URLs.
Also, users easily remember blogs with shorter names. For instance, if you have two websites on SEO and one has the title rankmywebsitehigherongoogle. com while the other is simply seo.com, which one will users easily remember? Of course the one with a shorter URL. So choose your blog name wisely.
In most cases, you may discover that your preferred website name is already taken by another user, try and choose something similar to that but make it shorter. Avoid using a name that's already taken by another user no matter how short and good it might sound.
How To Monetize Your Blog
So at this point of your blogging journey, you've started getting some level of success with your blog. You've learned from different mistakes along the way and now you've got some experience in the field. The traffic starts flowing and your readers are now falling in love with the content you're providing them.
Now, what next? It's time to start reaping the fruit of your labor, it's time to convert those blog readers to money!! But how can you do that? In this section, we'll talk about 4 different ways that you can monetize your blog.
So let's dive right in!
Affiliate marketing
This is one of the most profitable ways to earn from your blog. Affiliate marketing is simply the act of selling or referring people to other products that are not your own for a commission.
The idea is simple, just sign up to one of the affiliate marketing networks and get your unique affiliate links. Now place those links in your blog post, each time someone purchases through those links, you earn a commission.
Sell ads space to advertising companies.
Otherwise known as sponsorship deals, selling ads space is one of the easiest ways to earn from your blog. Let's assume a company or big brand notices your website and love your content. So they decide to pay you to publish a post on your website advertising their products/ services to your audience. This is how you make money from your blog through sponsorship deals.
Create and sell your products
If you're much knowledgeable in your niche, you can create your products like online courses or ebooks and sell them to your audience.
Use an ads network on your site.
Google and other ads companies are willing to pay you some commission to place ads on your blog, each time people view or click the ads, you earn money.
So these are the ways you can earn money from your blog.
conclusion
Blogging is one of the most profitable online businesses out there. But you have to be patient and consistent to see the results.
A better way to speed up your success as a blogger is to add value to your readers. Put yourself in their shoes and create contents that will some problems and I guarantee you that money will flow naturally.
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