Did I say career? Yes I did. You may have gone into the world of blogging with the idea that you would be the 1 blogger that didn’t care about money. We all do that at some point in our lives when we take blogging seriously. But if you are human, you will most likely come to the conclusion that money can be, and should be made with your blog.
This article isn’t the usual junk about why blogging is good for making money, or any type of motivation article. This article simply talks about how you can make the most out of your blogging career as a whole.
All The Comforts of Home
As I sit here writing this article (or a piece of it, as it is massive), I have a can of mountain dew, a waffle blanket that makes me want to go to sleep, and a nice quiet atmosphere. If I wanted to disturb my quiet, I have a huge television in front of me with a PS3, and a Wii, and both of them have netflix installed for quick entertainment.
You can say…. I’m comfortable. I am not sitting at a desk in an office chair. I am sitting on a fluffy couch with my laptop on my (guess where) lap.
Do you want to stay in the blogging game for awhile? It is vital that you keep yourself comfortable. You will see a bunch of other bloggers tell you that you need to be focused, and not have comforts and distractions. I have seen those people around the blogosphere. I haven’t seen them lately… It seems that their rigid demeaner has failed them in many ways.
Keep in mind that blogging is tough enough without any comforts. You have to worry about blogging topics, marketing tactics, monetization, and whatever else comes your way. Why make it harder on yourself?
Take Your Articles to Another Level
I will admit, I have gone from the small post style, to the long, and back again. I am never consistent with the length of my articles. I have however, been angling more to the longer articles because I can include much more valuable information in them.
Let’s face it, subscribers want content. If you are not giving them what they want, they will eventually leave.
There was a time when I desperately wanted a thousand articles published here, and another thousand there. That was a flawed strategy. A proper strategy would have been to focus even further on the quality of content I published.
I am in no way admitting to publishing low quality content. I am however, saying that it could have been better on a regular basis rather than sometimes. Personally, I wish I wrote a bunch more lengthy articles than I have. While there are some gems on this blog, there will be huge improvements made from here on out as of this article.
The Money is in the Details
There are always improvements to be made to your blog. You may not know it now, but there is “something” on your blog that is lacking. I recently discovered a small item that when fixed, allowed me to gain a bunch more feed subscribers than I was getting before.
My RSS button was going straight to the feed itself. I changed that link to go to my feedburner email subscribe form. Email rss subscribers are very important to me, and to the success of my blog. If I can make it easier to get them, then I have won half the battle.
If you want to start making improvements, do a simple twice-over on your blog. I’m sure you will find something that can be changed and optimized for maximum results.
Never Leave a Man Behind
That’s the motto of our armed forces, so why can’t we seem to follow it ourselves? Sometimes following this rule means helping ourselves when we fall behind on our goals.
- If you get lazy and stop writing articles, then you have fallen behind.
- If you don’t send out newsletters on a regular schedule, you have fallen behind.
- If you fail to write guest posts, then you have fallen behind.
- If you fail to ask others to guest post on your blog, you have fallen behind.
- If you are dragging ass creating your newest ebook, you have fallen behind.
There are so many things that you can be, and should be doing. Something has smacked you off of the train tracks, and it’s a tough job getting back on there. You have to find a way though, otherwise you risk falling behind indefinitely!
While it is important to keep yourself ahead of the game, it is also important to help others stay ahead of the game. If you have networked with a blogger at some point, then you have a responsibility to say something if that blogger falls behind. If YOU notice the issue, then they will want to know that the issue was noticed. That can sometimes be a motivator for that blogger to get back on track.
Is it drafty in here?
Unfortunately, you can’t just close the windows. This is a blog after-all… But you can send your articles to draft long before you publish them.
I have spent a bunch of my blogging career publishing out of the box. This means that I write it, and hit publish. I have eased more to the draft section because it allows me to perfect my articles before I show them to the world.
There have been times where I actually have had to edit a post 5 times because each time I came across typos. It can be extra annoying if you are a perfectionist like myself.
Stubborn Attitudes Will Kill Your Blogging Career
I used to be one of those guys that despised pop-ups on websites, and I have even rallied against them and gotten into heated debates against them. That was before I got wise to the obvious. Pop-up aren’t bad. People that use them can be. It’s the same thing with guns. Guns don’t kill, husbands that come home early do. LOL!
The thing about popups are that they work. They do their job of getting subscribers, and having your ebooks downloaded. If you have read ANY of the articles on my blog for awhile, then you will know that ebooks can be monetized even when they’re free!
Popup plugins can be set to not be annoying. I had one up that only appeared once every 30 days. I switched to a different style of pop-up, and changed the frequency to 7-days. Even with a seven day leeway before it appears for the same person again, it is not annoying. What would be annoying is if it showed up on every single page, every time the page loaded. There are some blogs that actually do that. It makes their blogs impossible to read without going insane.
Even if you are against pop-ups, you can still use them without “selling out”. They can and will help you grow your blog, and your income. Leaving them off the table because you are hard-headed will get you nowhere.
Laziness Can Be Costly
When I speak of laziness here, I am speaking of not backing up your blog. Chances are, your hosting company has a backup option. If not, it isn’t hard to use an ftp program like CoreFTP to download all of your files, and you can easily export your database using phpMyAdmin.
Did you hear about the time that my website got hacked, and I lost everything? Probably not because it only happened to me once when I was a newbie to websites many years ago. Ever since, backups have been a huge part of my internet life.
I backup so much, I would make Microsoft jealous. It’s worth it too. If someone were to hack me, I would be operational again within minutes if I am around; the next day if I wasn’t around.
If you are hosting with Hostgator like I am right now, then there is an option to backup your entire website including the databases, and you will be provided with a link to download them all.
Are you missing your balls?
That might have missed the mark if you happen to be a woman… but the meaning is exactly the same. Blogging for income requires you to be ready to take action. If you are someone that procrastinates on everything, then blogging for income will be tough for you to master.
As you know, I am an advocate for offering a service on your blog. You can be consulting on some topic as soon as today if you wanted. You just have to put your plan into motion by creating a service, and offering it on a page within your blog.
Blogging in 2011-2012 will require some big balls. The competition is stiff (no perverted pun intended), but luckily Google and other traffic sources will still help you out. The problem is that you have to be a decision maker to make the process work for you.
Not only can it be tough to piece a service together, but there are other issues you have to get around such as guest posting. You may not feel that your content is top-notch quality like those you have read, but believe me when I tell you that there are major websites out there helping to promote beginner bloggers.
Guest blogging is a vital step to take if you want to establish yourself, and earn quick traffic in the process. Get over your fears, and get out there. Your name can be plastered all over the place like mine is in no time at all!
Show Your A$$!
Yes, I said ass and balls in the same article. While I await the many complaints from censors across the world, let me tell you about why it’s sometimes important to show your ass.
I remember awhile back, my friend and fellow blogger Alex Whalley was attacked on his blog by someone that simply could not comprehend something he wrote about. The woman called him sexist for no reason, because he used a nice little photo of a hot chick on his article. By the way, he didn’t say “hot chick”, that’s my nice little addition.
When the reader refused to listen to reason, and she became belligerent, he had no choice but to show his ass. There was another time when we first created our joint-blog at ScrewedByLife.com (note: we have been slacking on that blog though
), some joker started talking crap about Alex on his blog. Not Alex’ blog, but the dude’s. We had no choice but to show up on his blog and call out his stupidity. Apparently, the guy did not like the idea of affiliate marketers affiliate marketing (tongue twister, sorry).
If you are being attacked, sometimes it can be wise to go on the offensive. It feels good while it gives your readers your side of the story.
Overbearing Personalities, Lacking Content
Sometimes you come across a blog that is horribly monetized. It is one thing for there to be ads, and links to affiliate products within quality articles. It is another thing to go to a blog that is nothing but affiliate reviews.
Sites that are obviously full of spam will not help your credibility. You need to provide meat and potatoes, not a plate full of mustard.
To avoid falling into the blogger affiliate marketing trap that makes readers want to vomit, I suggest you having a review to article ratio of 1/10. Squeeze out 9 quality articles before writing yet another review to make money from. What this will do is allow you to build up rss subscribers, newsletter subscribers, and traffic which you can then monetize with the 1 review.
In addition, you will be able to get paid ads and paid reviews because your blog has been established with quality control.
Don’t be a cheapskate!
If you are always worrying about the $47 for the new ad management plugin, or some other premium feature that will make your blog stand out, then you will never spend a dime on anything to improve your blog. In the end, you are basically telling your readers that you don’t care about them.
The same goes for learning. If you want to make money now, or build up your reputation as an expert, then get yourself a consultant or coach. These are experts in their field that can save you years by teaching you what works now. Everyone needs help now and then, so don’t be afraid to ask. More importantly, don’t be too cheap to ask.
You will do well
If you follow these invaluable tips, I have no doubt that your blogging career will skyrocket into something that you can share with your grandkids.
Making changes can be easy, but you have to have an open mind. Your blog can be fully developed and raking in money in just days in some cases.
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