Blogging Tips: How to be a Better Blogger

Filed under Blogging by on May 26, 2011 at 9:34 pm {10 comments}

Blogging Tips: Be a Better BloggerBlogging is not just about writing, it is about connecting with an audience. Blogging can be fun and richly rewarding. Unfortunately, many bloggers do not realize the full potential of themselves or their blogs and miss out on many opportunities. Read these tips to be a better blogger.

Blogging Tip-1: Enjoy What you Write About

This is repeated very often but it is also very true. You got to find what you love and only then blog about it. Otherwise, it is very easy to give up mid-way. If the sole purpose of blogging is to make money, you might as well forget about it, as Steve Pavlina says.

If you need help coming up with the niche of your blog, just look around and see what you like. Not what you do for a living, but what you are truly passionate about. Sports? Cooking? Pets? You can be a successful blogger in any niche if you have people who share your interest. It really shows in your blog how passionate you are about what you are writing.

At least in the initial stages when you don’t have a grand audience yet, it really helps to write on what you like. This will allow you to continue writing quality posts for the few who do come to your website.

Blogging Tip-2: Bring Something Unique to the Table

Chances are, yours is just one among the thousands of blogs online on the same topic. However, don’t despair – just like every individual is unique, so is every blog. You can bring a unique flavor to your blog by just being yourself.

In addition, remember to bring something unique to the table. This is the only way you can be a better blogger than the thousands of others. Read up stuff about your niche. It is quite likely that there is something new going on in a related topic, so discuss it in your blog. Be yourself and be unique – this is my advice to be a better blogger.

Blogging Tip-3: Read. Understand. Present

Yes, you should be knowledgeable about your niche. You should know the latest developments and be able to convey it to your readers and followers. This is the way you build value. This of course doesn’t mean that you copy-paste. It means you should read about stuff, understand it, and present it from your own unique perspective.

Also, it really helps to write some general knowledge based posts for your readers. This gives an interesting historical perspective and keeps your readers wanting more. It is also a nice strategy for getting new content.

Blogging Tip-4: Share Fresh Ideas

It is very likely that you know your niche very well and understand the nuances of it. Share it with your readers. They can find a lot of re-gargled content online with the same old dull content, but you can give them more than just content. You can give them a story. Weave it around your own ideas. Bring a breath of freshness to your niche so that what you write can never be found elsewhere. It is not just the knowledge your readers are after, they are after value. And your story is a great way for them to find value.

Blogging Tip-5: Connect with your Readers

Connecting with your readers is an important part of blogging. This is unlike a website, which can just be a storehouse of content. You have to be more than an encyclopedia – you have to have a voice and connect with your readers. You should give them what they came here for. Know their needs, understand them, and provide them with something good, useful and interesting.

I’d love to hear your thoughts and your blogging tips!

Selling Banners on your Blog

Filed under Blogging, Make Money Online by on May 23, 2011 at 7:48 pm {1,998 comments}

How to Sell Banners on Website or BlogHow do you sell banner space on your website or blog? This is a common question that is asked by people who have relatively new blogs and want to generate some extra cash with it. On my blog, I sell banner ads for a good amount of money which generates a nice passive income stream for me. That blog is almost an year old and it gets some decent traffic, so it was only natural for me to try to monetize it.

However, when I first started off, I had no idea how to sell banners on my blog. I didn’t know where to start, whom to contact, if anyone would be interested at all or even how to price them. These questions are not easy to answer, so I’ll give you a guide on how to do it. Hopefully, it will help you sell banners on your own blog or website.

Why Banners?

There are many ways in which you can monetize your blog. Banner ads are a very good start especially for blogs that are relatively new and starting out. Banner ads bring a guaranteed income, unlike other monetization methods like affiliate marketing. If you want to promote your affiliate marketing products, you will only be paid when you make a sale. This is not easy for new blogs to accomplish. Also, the blogger might prefer a steady income stream instead of the possibility of getting paid. It might also happen that the blog or website is in a niche that is not really well suited for affiliate marketing.

Banners are sold directly to advertisers and thus they usually bring in a higher revenue than cost-per-click programs like Google Adsense. On my blog, I make about 3-4 times selling ads directly than through Adsense. This is not surprising because I negotiate a deal directly with my advertisers and they find value in what I have to offer.

If your blog gets a decent amount of traffic, you can always negotiate a deal with an advertiser and provide them value.

How to Find Advertisers

This is perhaps the biggest challenge that bloggers and site owners face and also the main reason why they don’t advertise using banners. So what is the solution? There are many ways to find companies that might be interested in advertising with you. Some of the techniques that I use are as follows –

  • Search for Google Advertisers: Do a quick Google search for your niche and a few keywords that you are targeting. You will find sponsored links which shows which sites are advertising on Google Adwords. Now, you know a few companies that have the cash and the inclination to advertise and you can now contact those companies directly. Do the same with other ad networks as well.
  • Look for Similar Blogs: If you go to blogs or websites in your area which have more traffic than you get, you might see some advertisers putting their banners. You can contact them directly to see if they would be interested in advertising on your blog as well.
  • Find New Companies: If there are companies that are starting out in your industry, they would like to gain more exposure and they could be very well interested in advertising with you, so they can reach a wide relevant audience.

Is it Easy?

Truth be told, it is not. You do need to work your way through many emails and contacting many companies before you can land a good deal. It is definitely going to be more work than say putting Google Adsense code in your blog. That being said, you will reap long term relationships and rich dividends in terms of making money from your blog right away.

How Much Traffic is Good?

It really again depends on the niche and type of blog or website that you own. If you command an authority over your readers, even if you have less traffic, you can bag some good deals. It is hard to give you an estimate off hand, but 50-100 unique visits a day should be a good starting point. Of course you should also price your banner in a relevant way. If you get 50 unique visits a day, you may just make $20-25 per month (again, really depends on the niche and blog, but just as a rough estimate) so you might want to sell multiple ad spots.

In my next post, I will discuss pricing, how to write the email and what you can offer additionally to bag your advertising deals.

Blogging Ideas: Untapped Niches

Filed under Blogging by on May 21, 2011 at 2:50 am {one comment}

Blogging ideas Blogging nichesThis is part of my series on blogging ideas. There are all kinds of bloggers out there – those who write for fun, those who write for fame, those who write to share a story, those who want an outlet for their ideas, those who want to make money, and a thousand other reasons. If you are just blogging for fun, you can write about anything that you like. However, if you are interested in professional blogging, you need to plan ahead.

If you are blogging professionally to make money, one easy way to start blogging is by finding an area in which you are an expert. This way you can share your knowledge and people will come. However, what if you just want to gain experience in blogging? How do you select a niche in that case?

Well, one way is to look for untapped niches. This is exactly what I did with my first (still running) blog when I started writing about entertainment auctions. It is also something that you can do too – find a virgin niche with not too many blogs or websites and you can dominate that area.

For me, this paid rich dividends and also provided me with invaluable learning experience. I make money in many ways from my blog but more importantly it gave me the confidence that I can make it too. In addition, my blog provided me with a perfect practical and hands-on learning that I couldn’t have learned otherwise. With absolutely no background in any internet marketing, I can now make a good amount of money from my blog.

So here is an idea that you can use as well – look for untapped niches. This is not too easy to find, so you need to keep your eyes open to find a new bubbling idea on the internet that might catch on pretty soon. A simple analysis of potential future feasibility is also a good idea. In my case, there were entertainment auctions coming up like crazy after I started my blog and since I already established myself as an authority in this field, I had no trouble getting advertisers through banners and blog posts.

Sometimes this can be risky because you don’t know how the idea will pan out eventually, but sometimes you just need to take the leap. If it succeeds, with minimal effort, you will have a wonderful resource at your disposal that can bring you some steady income every single month even if you don’t become a millionaire. In addition, it is a great practical learning experience.

Photo credit: eguidetravel

Top 5 Blogging Myths

Filed under Blogging, Writing by on May 20, 2011 at 5:05 pm {no comments}

Blogging mythsBlogging myths are all over the internet coming from people who have little or no idea about what blogging constitutes. This is sad because wanna-be bloggers get discouraged after reading this so-called advice. This simple fact is, blogging can cover a vast umbrella of things you do online, so it is not limited to one particular kind of writing alone. People seldom understand this fact. They think the kind of blogging they are involved in is the only kind of blogging, which explains a whole lot of myths about blogging floating on the internet.

In this post, I wish to expose some of the myths and hopefully help a few people to take up blogging and ignore the dismissive voices around. Here are the top 5 blogging myths that you are likely to see, and reasons why they are nothing more than myths.

1. I need to be an expert before I can blog

This is a common myth propounded especially by people who make money using blogs. They think you need to be an expert in a field before you start blogging. While this is true in many cases of professional blogging (blogging for money) it is not the core essence of blogging. If you think about the origins of blogging, you will see it started off as a personal diary that people want to share with others. There is nothing like being an expert – you just shared your story, that’s all.

Blogging can be of various different forms, and professional blogging might need you to be an expert in a field, but really, that is not necessary at all. Even if you plan to blog for money, there is no hard and fast rule that you should know the subject inside out. You can document your progress on the way and then build on to become an expert.

I know many internet marketers who do that – they try something out, fail, and write about it. Others love to hear these stories because they are more likely to relate to this than an expert telling them exactly what needs to be done. There is a personal touch in these blogs and they are in no way inferior.

2. A website is always better than a blog

This is a common blogging myth that is propagated by the “tech guys” who think blogging is an inferior form of a website and meant for those who do not know how to create and maintain a website. Dead wrong. While a website has its own functionality, a blog is not a substitute for a website. A website and blog are completely different in their functionality.

A blog is still something of a diary, in that the entries are entered in a reverse-chronology. Blogs are usually updated much more frequently than websites which tend to be static after a point of time. Blogs are much more personal in that the writer can really “speak” to the readers through a blog. He can share a joke, digress to an unrelated point or just be corny. It is all in the style and rapport the blogger builds with the readers. On the other hand, a website will always find this very hard to do, unless in very special cases.

3. It is a must to have great English skills to be a blogger

While it certainly won’t hurt, having good English skills is not a prerequisite for blogging. If you have something to share with the world and it has some value, people will come. They will not mind an occasional grammatical error. In any case, you should make an effort to better your language skills or hire a proofreader but you don’t need to give up blogging if you are interested and passionate about a topic.

The most common example that I can give you is tech blogs. A lot of non-native English speakers run excellent tech blogs that help non-technical people understand various concepts, help with coding and maintaining their website and a ton of other stuff. What people are looking for here is quality content in terms of it being helpful, not in terms of good writing skills.

4. Blogspot blogs are worthless and non-serious

This is a common blogging myth that people somehow have in their mind. They think having your own hosting and WordPress is somehow the first step towards blogging. It is not. People visit blogs for content and value they provide. It doesn’t matter if the blog is hosted free with Blogger.

There are several reasons why people might want to stick with Blogger. For starters, it is completely free, so it is definitely a very good resource for those without  commercial ambitions. Then, it is very easy to run and operate and extremely convenient for someone who doesn’t know a lot of technical details about running a website and has no interest in learning either. Don’t let the technical stuff interfere with your desire to blog – Blogger is just fine, make a start.

5. I must write daily to be a successful blogger

It is nice for a blog to be updated regularly with fresh content, but you don’t have to write every single day. You can update it as frequently as you like, but remain consistent. Another great way for a blog to get fresh content is with the help of guest blogging. You can have other bloggers blog on your blog, so that your readers get quality content.

These are a few blogging myths that I have encountered. If you have other things to share, by all means do so. I would be happy to hear your own experience.

Photo credit: Filipe

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