If you're like so many other people who've gotten the 'blogging bug', congratulations, you're in for a lot of fun! People start their own blogs for many reasons, sometimes they just want to be able to share their life with family and friends far away, sometimes they like sharing their knowledge about one of their hobbies, and sometimes they want to make money.
Blogging isn't a difficult thing to learn, as a matter of fact, most people can easily learn all they need to know in an hour or so. Here are some key points to keep in mind as you begin your online blogging adventure:
1. You can start your own blog for free. There are many blogging platforms that will host your blog for you for no charge, Wordpress.com and Blogger.com are two of the most popular. Even with the free versions, you'll still have access to hundreds of different designs, or themes, that you can use for your blog. You can also use plug-ins and widgets, basically just like apps for a smart phone, that will allow you to do many different things with your blog, these are usually also free.
2. The topic of your blog should be based on two major considerations: what do you love and whether or not you want to use your blog to start an online business. Sometimes these two things will overlap, your business blog can be about something that you love. Other times you won't be able to make money with your hobby because there just aren't enough other people who love that topic enough to pay for products related to it.
3. When you start your blog, especially a business blog, you will want people to return frequently and read your new posts. In order to keep them coming back you'll want to make sure that you make your posts and the other information on your blog related to the topic of your blog. For example, if your blog is about gardening you really don't want to start going off on tangents about all kinds of other topics. Occasionally it's ok to stray a little bit but the bottom line is that the readers of your blog joined because they were interested in that topic, so give them what they want.
4. If you want to use your blog to make money and start a business you should consider at least buying your own domain name and if possible get your own hosting account. Don't worry if this sounds foreign to you, it's easy and inexpensive enough. The reason this is important is that if you stick with the free versions you don't actually own anything, not the name of your blog or that little piece of internet 'real estate' your blog sits on. That's not a good way to structure your business. Buy your domain name and you will own it and you can decide what you want to do with it.
Blog For Money – Don’t Make It Hard
Even though the economy is running extremely rough right now, we are still lucky because the internet has opened up so many new income generating possibilities. The ugly thing is that so many people are unfamiliar with the various ways of making money online and many people, who simply don't know any better, will infer internet income opportunities as scams. While it's true there are scams online, and offline, it's also true that you can make real money online and one of the best ways for a beginner to make money online is starting to blog for money.
A blog is simply an online journal, the name comes from the words “web log”, blog. You can start a blog for free and learning how to set up your blog is very easy to do even if you don't know anything about computers or websites. Most people will learn all they need to know in a few hours. You can pick various themes and there are several things you can add to your blog that will help you monetize it.
The first thing you need to decide is what the theme of your blog be. It could simply be something that you are interested in and know a lot about such as a hobby, or if you really want to make a lot of money, you could learn the secrets to picking an extremely profitable niche market and start your blog around that niche. This will enable you to get more leverage out of your blog and make more money.
When it comes to earning money from your blog you have several choices, the two main options are with affiliate marketing and Google Adsense.
Affiliate marketing is a business model where you sign up to become an affiliate, for free, for a certain product or service, advertise that product or service on your blog, and when someone buys that product or service from the unique URL of your site (which will have your unique affiliate id embedded in it) you will earn a commission.
Google Adsense is a process where you allow Google to place ads on your blog, ads that are related to the topic of your blog, when someone clicks on one of the ads you will earn a commission. With adsense the amount you make per click can vary dramatically based on the popularity (and thus the amount of money advertisers are willing to spend to place the ad) of a certain topic. The more popular the niche you're in, the more advertisers will spend on the ads and the more you'll make when someone clicks on those ads.
Don't let the ignorance of others scare you off of learning how to blog for money. Sure, it's true that there are a lot of scams online, just like there are anywhere else if you're not careful, but the reality is that if you're willing to invest some time to learn some simple skills you can turn your hobby into an income... maybe even a full time income.
Blogging for a Living
Online blogging platforms such as WordPress and Blogger are now a major tool for experienced Internet entrepreneurs to make money quickly. Although there has been some criticism of the “blogosphere” - as some people will insist on calling it - for being a window on a world of moaning teenagers, the simple truth of the matter is that not only are many blogs a more reliable news source than the mass media, they also present the budding businessperson with a way to get money coming through the door quickly. All it requires is a bit of thought, an idea and the motivation to make it happen.
You can run it one of two ways. You can make your blog a pure information/entertainment site that people will read for the enjoyment of it. A blog with a reputation can attract advertisers, just as any newspaper or magazine can. If your blog gains a reputation for being something that a lot of people read, advertisers may well approach you, or you can approach them offering a not-to-be-missed opportunity to get their product advertising space somewhere people are likely to look. This can be enough for an individual to live on, although this is not going to happen instantly.
Alternatively you can use the blog as a way of promoting a more conventional business. Blogs are easily navigable sites that are equally easy to update. So it is not necessary to have any great knowledge of internet technology to keep one running, and to use it as a way of bringing customers through the door. Then all you need to do is have something they are prepared to pay for – and that can be almost literally anything.
If you have any other idea about blogging please do share on the comment page here.
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