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How to find a profitable blogging niche?

Anything considered a "hustle" and not necessarily a CENTS-based Fastlane

BizyDad

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There are 3 factors to consider.

1 - What can I write about effectively? This is arguably the least important, as you can hire writers, but it is still a very important consideration.
2 - How will my blog make money? The answer likely is, "all kind of ways", but monetization is tricky. Adsense doesn't pay much. Sponsors don't care about you until you grow an audience. Affiliate offers can work, but come with their own set of problems. Most bloggers that end up making a livable wage have a product of their own to sell, usually a book or course of some kind.
3 - How will people find me? Social, SEO, Paid traffic, press, your own email list, or what I call "buzz" (people/other bloggers just talking about you) are the big ways.

Align these 3 factors to achieve profitability. But don't forget to weigh time commitments to all of it.

Knowing this, you have 2 options right now.

You can either spend forever trying to figure out that perfect plan to get you there when you don't know enough right now to answer the question. (you're on this path now, just by asking the question. But I could write 10000 words about all the skills you'll need to make it big and still be only scratching the surface).

Or...

You can write about what you are good at and enjoy writing about. Start yourself a hobby you like. Build a particular set of skills. Then, a year from now, armed with this new knowledge, you can ask yourself this question again.

Lastly, I'll say this for your consideration. Most bloggers don't ever make a liveable wage. The minority that do, don't ever make it big.

You're on the Fastlane Forum, and there are better vehicles for driving in the Fastlane than blogging.

Build a business, and use a blog to supplement growing that business. Don't make the blog the heart of the business. Just one man's opinion...
 

DarkWoods

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You're on the Fastlane Forum, and there are better vehicles for driving in the Fastlane than blogging.

Build a business, and use a blog to supplement growing that business. Don't make the blog the heart of the business. Just one man's opinion...
Thanks for all your tips.

And I will follow what you said about searching something else for driving in the fastlane. I have not yet read the book entirely.

Thanks again :)
 

Raoul Duke

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Kid

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There are two profitable niches and they are ever green.
Money making and personal finance.

Its bitter sweet because first is selling shovels to gold diggers
and the second is teaching people how to stay poor.
 
Last edited:

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Kasimir

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Don't worry if your blog will be profitable. Just try to do your best and take a niche where you can help people.
If you think you can help people with their gardens then do a blog about gardening.
But if you think you could help people with their mental health and do that. Helping others should be your biggest mission then the profit will come.
 
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DarkWoods

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Don't worry if your blog will be profitable. Just try to do your best and take a niche where you can help people.
If you think you can help people with their gardens then do a blog about gardening.
But if you think you could help people with their mental health and do that. Helping others should be your biggest mission then the profit will come.
I think I will start my blog as a hobby with the goal to help people like you said.
 

Zahida A. Khan

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Hi everyone.

I like to write and I'm good at it but I would like to know what are the steps I should follow if I want to build a profitable blog?

Thanks for your help!
Hey there, if you have the gift of writing, creating your own blog requires traffic and quite a bit of time to build it.

Why not bypass all that effort and jump on a blogging platform that has paid members hungry to read, to learn and improve their lives, and you get paid when peeps read your articles

Check out Medium.com

I just started using Medium for my articles, however, I've met authors earning a full-time living writing

Hope this helps?
 

BizyDad

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Hey there, if you have the gift of writing, creating your own blog requires traffic and quite a bit of time to build it.

Why not bypass all that effort and jump on a blogging platform that has paid members hungry to read, to learn and improve their lives, and you get paid when peeps read your articles

Check out Medium.com

I just started using Medium for my articles, however, I've met authors earning a full-time living writing

Hope this helps?
It's a good idea, especially if you're just starting out getting your feet wet.

But if this is a long-term endeavor, it's kind of like building your house on land that someone else owns.
 
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Zahida A. Khan

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But if this is a long-term endeavor, it's kind of like building your house on land that someone else owns.
Hey BizyDad, you are correct

While posting articles on another platform, the OP can also post on his/her blog, therefore maximizing efforts
 

DarkWoods

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Hey there, if you have the gift of writing, creating your own blog requires traffic and quite a bit of time to build it.

Why not bypass all that effort and jump on a blogging platform that has paid members hungry to read, to learn and improve their lives, and you get paid when peeps read your articles

Check out Medium.com

I just started using Medium for my articles, however, I've met authors earning a full-time living writing

Hope this helps?
Hi Zahida. Thanks for the tip. I have just created an account on Medium. My profile is completed and now I am searching for how to write my first article. Don't know yet how.
 

danwan337

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Look for topics that people like to read most and which is not covered by other blogs. A lot of blogs have the same style and information which makes the reader bored. So if you want to mint money with your writing, then look for interesting rare topics.
 
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Zahida A. Khan

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Hi Zahida. Thanks for the tip. I have just created an account on Medium. My profile is completed and now I am searching for how to write my first article. Don't know yet how.
Great to hear!!

Are you searching on "Medium how to write your 1st article" or are you "searching for topics?"

If the first, click your profile pic and select HELP

In HELP, scroll down to WRITING to get training

Make sure you join their PARTNER's program where you can put your article behind a pay wall to earn income

Best of luck!!
 

Choate

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When I think of a successful blog, I think of Seth Godin. Seth's Blog

I used to read it every day (and probably still should but only check it from time to time now) but this guy makes a post every single day. He provides real value 95% of the time, with every so often a paid offer for something he is associated with, like a course, new book, etc. It's not intruding and doesn't detract from what it is.

If you were to do something similar, let's talk about how low of a risk this could be.

1 post per day = 10 minutes to 60 minutes of your time. You improve your efficiency as time goes on.

Web hosting / domain = $100 per year or less

Building your website on Wordpress: a one-time endeavor that should take you one day to one weekend to complete

With that in mind, why not just go for it?

You don't need to focus on becoming profitable, because again, you are not investing a lot into this time or monetarily. Instead, you should focus on providing consistent value.

---

One other way to do this is to make an affiliate site. In this case, you would want to hire a team of writers from Upwork and pay between $5 to $20 per post depending on the quality, length, and turnaround that you want. In this case, you're talking about a much more considerable upfront cost both in terms of time and money. Let's say you pay on average $10 per article averaging $1,000 words. Your goal could be to get 40,000 words up on the site in the first month with an average of 10,000 words per month thereafter, or about 2-3 new posts per week. Your first month will cost you $400 with an average of $100 per month after, or about $1500 total for one year. You have to organize and assemble the team of writers, copyedit, proofread, and organize each post they write and then upload them to the site regularly. Then there's advertising, like SEO, ads, social, Reddit.

If you're interested in the second method, you should still start with the first. You should fully understand the process and be able to be consistent with it before hiring others.

---

In short, provide value.
 

ric2020

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Hi everyone.

I like to write and I'm good at it but I would like to know what are the steps I should follow if I want to build a profitable blog?

Thanks for your help!
could we connect through whatsapp hangout, etc to exchange in ideas?
 
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MJ DeMarco

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could we connect through whatsapp hangout, etc to exchange in ideas?

You need to STOP trying to offload people from this forum into your own private group.
 

Kid

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Zahida has a good point on paid communities.
Its far easier to get 100 users paying ten bucks a month than get
half a million page views and earn same amount from ads.

If you will take that route, check substack.com (its ready to use from get go).
I just started using Medium for my articles, however, I've met authors earning a full-time living writing
Zahida, can i ask you if those writers earn full time living on medium alone? I've read that Medium pays pennies so im surprised.
 

DarkWoods

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Look for topics that people like to read most and which is not covered by other blogs. A lot of blogs have the same style and information which makes the reader bored. So if you want to mint money with your writing, then look for interesting rare topics.
Thanks for the tip.

My niche is very unique. It's part of a very popular and larger niche but here where I live, I could become number one in that niche if I put in the effort.
 
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DarkWoods

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Great to hear!!

Are you searching on "Medium how to write your 1st article" or are you "searching for topics?"

If the first, click your profile pic and select HELP

In HELP, scroll down to WRITING to get training

Make sure you join their PARTNER's program where you can put your article behind a pay wall to earn income

Best of luck!!
Finally, I decided to close my Medium account. I made some research for reviews about Medium and I think it would be better to work on my own business instead of working for another company.
 

DarkWoods

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When I think of a successful blog, I think of Seth Godin. Seth's Blog

I used to read it every day (and probably still should but only check it from time to time now) but this guy makes a post every single day. He provides real value 95% of the time, with every so often a paid offer for something he is associated with, like a course, new book, etc. It's not intruding and doesn't detract from what it is.

If you were to do something similar, let's talk about how low of a risk this could be.

1 post per day = 10 minutes to 60 minutes of your time. You improve your efficiency as time goes on.

Web hosting / domain = $100 per year or less

Building your website on Wordpress: a one-time endeavor that should take you one day to one weekend to complete

With that in mind, why not just go for it?

You don't need to focus on becoming profitable, because again, you are not investing a lot into this time or monetarily. Instead, you should focus on providing consistent value.

---

One other way to do this is to make an affiliate site. In this case, you would want to hire a team of writers from Upwork and pay between $5 to $20 per post depending on the quality, length, and turnaround that you want. In this case, you're talking about a much more considerable upfront cost both in terms of time and money. Let's say you pay on average $10 per article averaging $1,000 words. Your goal could be to get 40,000 words up on the site in the first month with an average of 10,000 words per month thereafter, or about 2-3 new posts per week. Your first month will cost you $400 with an average of $100 per month after, or about $1500 total for one year. You have to organize and assemble the team of writers, copyedit, proofread, and organize each post they write and then upload them to the site regularly. Then there's advertising, like SEO, ads, social, Reddit.

If you're interested in the second method, you should still start with the first. You should fully understand the process and be able to be consistent with it before hiring others.

---

In short, provide value.
Thank you for all your help but for now the only person I know who can write about this topic is me ;)
 

DarkWoods

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You think you can create value with $10/1000 words? What world do you guys live in? I pay 10x that, and I still have trouble finding people who can create content without me effectively telling them what to write... And these are smart, capable people. Creating valuable content is actually very very hard.

I think that in today's market, your chances of making any serious money with a blog are virtually 0. Your best bet is to build your blog on the side, and go into some form of consulting as the main business. Then you can actually serve your readers and start making money that way. But going the affiliate/adsense route... will be hard.
I was thinking that creating a blog would help me increase my expertise and value to other people. Not much about money yet but eventually, if I write ebooks or create online courses my blog could be helpful.
 

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