Making money with blogs
The first thing I should do is to explain what a blog is. The word blog comes from ”Web log” which started out as a personal online journal of someone. These days there are millions of blogs on the internet and together they cover pretty much anything you can think of. Be it personal blogs or commercial blogs, you can find anything you want in blogs.
If you intend to make money online but you don’t have a website, or hosting, then a blog can be a good way to start. There are a few services on the internet now that offer free blogs, the biggest being Blogger and Wordpress. The two work a bit different and it’s a matter of personal preference on which to pick, both have their benefits.
Using one of these free services can be a good way to see if blogging is really for you. If it is, then you can get your own hosting set up and get a blog software installed. Personally, I would always suggest going with paid hosting from the start if you can afford it.
Blogs really are a great way to keep a site that is going to be updated often. The system behind the blogs can seem a bit confusing at first (especially on the blogs you host yourself) but once you get used to how they work, it´s really a smooth system.
What you need to think about when you start blogging is that you are often building a community of readers. In a best case scenario you will get a discussion going on your blog about the things you blog about. With this I mean that people take part and comment and give feedback on what you do on your blog.
Blogs get bookmarked and subscribed to often if the content on the blog is good and the blog is frequently updated. This is a key thing with blogs. Update frequently, and I mean really frequently. Many blogs gets updated daily or even several times per day. The more often you update the better. Now don´t just post three lines of text in order to keep the blog updated, post content that will have real value to your visitors.
The first thing you need to do when you start blogging is to pick a topic, or a niche if you will. If it´s something that you are already familiar with, great. If you are less than familiar with what you want to blog about, now is a perfect time to learn more.
Research your topic, learn what people talk about in relation to this topic. If possible, find hot subjects related to the topic and try to either answer questions or discuss about it. You don’t need to be an expert on the thing you write about, but if you are, you will most likely boost your sales a lot. People like to read things that experts say.
A good way to research is by visiting other blogs and see what they are posting about. This will also give you a feeling of how people structure their posts and the general layout of the blogs. Getting familiar with the environment of blogs is always a good thing when you intend to run one yourself.
If you haven´t already, you should now find a product related to the topic. This is the product you will promote to make money from your blog. Promote this product but don’t write pure sales letters or similar about it. Your visitors will not like this and you might lose bookmarkers and subscribers.
The most important thing to think about when you are blogging is quite simple, but it’s often overlooked. Stay on topic. Always. Your visitors are there because you are blogging about things they are interested in, if you wander too far off topic for too long, you will lose loyal visitors.
Blogging is fun and it´s often about meeting people who are interested in the same things. Grow relationships with your readers, you will be able to teach them things just as well as they will be able to teach you.
