THIS BOOK BELONGS TO The Library ofCopyright @2023 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the Publisher.| can’t tell you how grateful | am that you decided to read my book. My most heartfelt thanks that you took time out of your life to choose my work and | hope you find benefit within these pages. There are so many books available today that offer similar content so that makes it even more humbling that you decided to buying mine. Tell me what you thought! | am eager to hear your opinion and ideas on what you read as are others who are looking for a good book to buy. Leave a review on Amazon.com so others can benefit from your wisdom! With much thanks.Table of Contents Welcome Is $1,000/Day a Realistic Goal? What Success Looks Like What It Takes to Be Successful Myth vs. Reality How to Use This Book Choose a topic Plan Out Monetization Methods of Monetization Research Register a Domain Name Set Up a Hosting Plan Buy a Theme (or use a free one) Writing Great Content Build an E-mail List Creating a Lead Magnet Drive Traffic Monetizing Turn into authority business over time Next Steps 26 2 29 34 36 38 38 42 43 46 48 49 53 54 56 66 7 80SUMMARY The Blogging Revolution refers to the significant shift in the way information is created, shared, and consumed through the rise of blogs. Blogs, short for weblogs, are online platforms where individuals or groups can publish their thoughts, opinions, and experiences in a chronological format. One of the key aspects of the Blogging Revolution is the democratization of information. Prior to the advent of blogs, traditional media outlets such as newspapers, magazines, and television networks held a monopoly on the dissemination of news and opinions. However, with the rise of blogs, anyone with an internet connection and a computer can become a content creator and share their perspectives with a global audience. This democratization of information has had profound implications for society. It has allowed marginalized voices to be heard, as individuals who were previously excluded from mainstream media now have a platform to express their opinions and share their experiences. This has led to a more diverse range of voices and perspectives being represented in public discourse. Furthermore, the Blogging Revolution has also challenged the traditional gatekeepers of information. Bloggers are not bound by the sameeditorial constraints as traditional media outlets, allowing them to provide alternative viewpoints and challenge the dominant narratives. This has led to amore critical and nuanced understanding of complex issues, as bloggers often delve into topics that are overlooked or ignored by mainstream media. In addition to democratizing information, the Blogging Revolution has also transformed the way we consume news and information. Blogs provide a more interactive and participatory experience compared to traditional media. Readers can engage with bloggers through comments and discussions, creating a sense of community and fostering dialogue. This has led to a more engaged and informed citizenry, as individuals are no longer passive consumers of information but active participants in the conversation. Moreover, the Blogging Revolution has also disrupted the business models of traditional media outlets. With the rise of blogs, advertising revenue has shifted from traditional media to online platforms. This has forced traditional media outlets to adapt and find new ways to monetize their content. Additionally, bloggers themselves have also found ways to monetize their platforms through sponsored content, affiliate marketing, and partnerships with brands. However, the Blogging Revolution is not without its challenges. The ease of creating and sharing content has led to an overwhelming amount of information available online, making it difficult to discern credible sourcesfrom misinformation or fake news. This has led to concerns about the reliability and accuracy of information in the digital age. Identifying your passion and expertise is a crucial step towards finding fulfillment and success in your personal and professional life. It involves introspection, self-reflection, and a deep understanding of your interests, skills, and values. To begin the process of identifying your passion, take some time to reflect on the activities and experiences that bring you joy and fulfillment. Think about the moments when you feel most alive, engaged, and energized. These could be hobbies, projects, or even specific tasks within your current job or studies. Pay attention to the activities that you naturally gravitate towards and that you find yourself consistently drawn to. Next, consider your skills and strengths. What are you naturally good at? What do others often seek your help or advice for? Reflect on the tasks or activities that come easily to you and that you excel in. These could be technical skills, creative abilities, or even interpersonal strengths such as empathy or leadership. In addition to your interests and skills, it is important to align your passion with your values. What do you deeply care about? What causes orissues resonate with you on a personal level? Consider the impact you want to make in the world and the values that guide your decision-making. When your passion aligns with your values, you are more likely to find fulfillment and purpose in your pursuits. Once you have identified your passion and expertise, it is important to explore and develop them further. Seek out opportunities to learn and grow in your chosen field or area of interest. This could involve taking courses, attending workshops or conferences, or even finding a mentor who can guide you on your journey. Itis also important to remember that passions and expertise can evolve over time. As you gain more experience and knowledge, your interests may shift or expand. Embrace these changes and be open to exploring new avenues and opportunities. Your passion and expertise are not fixed, but rather dynamic and adaptable. In conclusion, identifying your passion and expertise is a deeply personal and introspective process. It requires self-reflection, exploration, and a willingness to embrace change. By aligning your interests, skills, and values, you can find fulfillment and success in both your personal and professional life.Setting up your blogging platform is an essential step in starting your own blog. It involves selecting the right platform, customizing its appearance, and configuring its settings to suit your needs. This process can be both exciting and overwhelming, especially if you are new to blogging. However, with the right guidance, you can easily navigate through the setup process and create a professional and user-friendly blog. The first step in setting up your blogging platform is choosing the right platform for your blog. There are several popular blogging platforms available, such as WordPress, Blogger, and Tumblr. Each platform has its own unique features and benefits, so it's important to research and compare them before making a decision. Consider factors such as ease of use, customization options, and available plugins or themes. Once you have selected a platform, the next step is to customize its appearance. This involves choosing a theme or template that reflects your blog's niche or personal style. Most blogging platforms offer a wide range of free and premium themes that you can choose from. You can also customize the colors, fonts, and layout of your blog to make it visually appealing and user-friendly. After customizing the appearance, it's time to configure the settings of your blogging platform. This includes setting up your blog's title, tagline, and URL. You should also configure the privacy settings, such as decidingwhether your blog will be public or private. Additionally, you may want to set up comment moderation to prevent spam or inappropriate comments on your blog. Another important aspect of setting up your blogging platform is optimizing it for search engines. This involves adding relevant keywords to your blog posts, optimizing your blog's meta tags, and creating a sitemap. These steps will help search engines understand the content of your blog and improve its visibility in search engine results. Furthermore, it's crucial to set up analytics and tracking tools to monitor the performance of your blog. This will provide you with valuable insights into your blog's traffic, audience demographics, and popular content. By analyzing this data, you can make informed decisions to improve your blog's performance and attract more readers. In conclusion, setting up your blogging platform requires careful consideration and attention to detail. By selecting the right platform, customizing its appearance, configuring its settings, optimizing it for search engines, and monitoring its performance, you can create a successful and engaging blog. Remember to regularly update your blog with fresh and high- quality content to keep your readers engaged and coming back for more.Advertising refers to the practice of promoting a product, service, or brand through various forms of communication in order to attract and persuade potential customers. It is a crucial component of marketing strategies and plays a significant role in driving sales and increasing brand awareness. Display ads, on the other hand, are a specific type of advertising that involves the use of visual elements such as images, videos, and graphics to convey a message to the target audience. These ads are typically displayed on websites, social media platforms, mobile apps, and other digital channels. One of the key advantages of advertising is its ability to reach a wide audience. Through various mediums such as television, radio, print, and online platforms, advertisers can target specific demographics and geographic locations to ensure their message reaches the right people. This allows businesses to effectively communicate their value proposition and differentiate themselves from competitors In addition to reaching a large audience, advertising also allows businesses to create brand recognition and establish a positive brand image. By consistently promoting their products or services, companies can build trust and credibility among consumers, making them more likely tochoose their brand over others. This is particularly important in competitive industries where consumers have numerous options to choose from. Furthermore, advertising enables businesses to generate leads and drive sales. By strategically placing ads in relevant locations and targeting specific demographics, companies can attract potential customers who are more likely to be interested in their offerings. This can result in increased website traffic, phone inquiries, and ultimately, conversions. Display ads, in particular, offer unique benefits for advertisers. With the ability to incorporate visually appealing elements, these ads can capture the attention of viewers and effectively convey the desired message. They can be designed to be interactive, engaging, and memorable, making them more likely to leave a lasting impression on the audience. Moreover, display ads can be highly targeted and personalized. Through the use of data analytics and audience segmentation, advertisers can tailor their ads to specific demographics, interests, and behaviors. This allows for more effective and efficient advertising campaigns, as businesses can focus their resources on reaching the most relevant audience. However, it is important to note that advertising and display ads also have their limitations. With the increasing prevalence of ad-blockingsoftware and the growing skepticism towards traditional advertising, it can be challenging for businesses to capture and maintain the attention of consumers. Additionally, the cost of advertising can be significant, especially for small businesses with limited budgets. Social media promotion refers to the process of using various social media platforms to advertise and promote a product, service, or brand. It involves creating and sharing content on platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube to reach a wider audience and increase brand visibility. The goal of social media promotion is to engage with existing customers and attract new ones by creating compelling and shareable content. This can include posts, images, videos, and stories that are designed to capture the attention of users and encourage them to interact with the brand. By leveraging the power of social media, businesses can connect with their target audience on a more personal level and build a loyal customer base. One of the key advantages of social media promotion is its ability to reach a large number of people quickly and cost-effectively. With billions of active users on various social media platforms, businesses can tap into a vast pool of potential customers. By strategically targeting specificdemographics and interests, businesses can ensure that their content is seen by the right people at the right time. Social media promotion also allows for real-time interaction and feedback. Users can like, comment, and share posts, providing businesses with valuable insights into their audience's preferences and opinions. This feedback can be used to refine marketing strategies and improve products or services. Furthermore, social media promotion enables businesses to build brand loyalty and trust. By consistently delivering valuable and engaging content, businesses can establish themselves as industry leaders and experts. This can lead to increased customer loyalty and advocacy, as well as positive word-of-mouth referrals. In addition to organic reach, social media promotion also offers the option to boost posts and run targeted advertisements. This allows businesses to reach an even larger audience and increase their chances of converting leads into customers. By utilizing advanced targeting options, businesses can ensure that their ads are shown to the most relevant audience, maximizing their return on investment.However, it is important to note that social media promotion requires careful planning and execution. Businesses need to develop a comprehensive strategy that aligns with their overall marketing goals and target audience. They must also regularly monitor and analyze their social media performance to identify areas for improvement and adjust their approach accordingly. In conclusion, social media promotion is a powerful too! for businesses to increase brand awareness, engage with their audience, and drive sales. By leveraging the reach and interactivity of social media platforms, businesses can connect with their target audience on a more personal level and build long-lasting relationships. Balancing blogging with other commitments can be a challenging task, but with proper planning and organization, it is definitely achievable. Blogging requires time, effort, and dedication, and when combined with other responsibilities such as work, family, and social commitments, it can become overwhelming. However, by following a few strategies, you can effectively manage your time and find a balance between your blogging endeavors and other commitments. First and foremost, it is crucial to prioritize your commitments. Take a step back and evaluate the importance and urgency of each task or responsibility. This will help you determine how much time and effort youshould allocate to each one. By setting clear priorities, you can ensure that you are not neglecting any important aspect of your life while still dedicating sufficient time to your blog. Creating a schedule or a routine can greatly assist in managing your time effectively. Set aside specific time slots for blogging and stick to them as much as possible. This will help you establish a routine and make it easier to allocate time for other commitments. Additionally, consider using productivity tools or apps to help you stay organized and manage your time efficiently. These tools can help you track your progress, set deadlines, and remind you of important tasks. Another important aspect of balancing blogging with other commitments is learning to delegate and ask for help when needed. It is not necessary to handle every aspect of your blog on your own. Consider outsourcing certain tasks, such as editing, graphic design, or social media management, to professionals or freelancers. This will not only save you time but also ensure that these tasks are handled efficiently, allowing you to focus on other commitments. Furthermore, it is essential to set realistic goals and expectations for your blog. Understand that you may not be able to publish a new blog post every day or respond to every comment immediately. Be realistic about what you can achieve within the given time frame and avoid putting unnecessarypressure on yourself. Remember that quality is more important than quantity, and your readers will appreciate well-thought-out and engaging content, even if it is not published as frequently as you would like. Lastly, do not forget to take care of yourself. Balancing multiple commitments can be mentally and physically exhausting, so it is crucial to prioritize self-care. Make sure to allocate time for relaxation, exercise, and spending quality time with loved ones. Taking breaks and rejuvenating yourself will not only improve your overall well-being but also enhance your productivity and creativity when it comes to blogging. Managing finances for growth is a crucial aspect of running a successful business. It involves carefully planning and controlling the financial resources of a company to ensure its sustainable growth and profitability. This process requires a deep understanding of the company's financial position, as well as the ability to make informed decisions regarding investments, expenses, and revenue generation. One of the key elements of managing finances for growth is creating a comprehensive financial plan. This plan outlines the company's financial goals and objectives, as well as the strategies and tactics that will be employed to achieve them. It includes a detailed analysis of the company's current financial situation, including its assets, liabilities, and cash flow. By understanding the company's financial position, management can identifyareas of improvement and develop strategies to optimize the use of financial resources. In addition to creating a financial plan, managing finances for growth also involves monitoring and controlling expenses. This includes tracking all costs associated with running the business, such as salaries, rent, utilities, and supplies. By closely monitoring expenses, management can identify areas where costs can be reduced or eliminated, freeing up financial resources for growth initiatives. This may involve negotiating better deals with suppliers, implementing cost-saving measures, or reevaluating the company's spending priorities. Another important aspect of managing finances for growth is revenue generation. This involves identifying and implementing strategies to increase sales and generate more revenue for the company. This may include developing new products or services, expanding into new markets, or improving marketing and sales efforts. By focusing on revenue generation, management can ensure that the company has the financial resources necessary to support its growth initiatives. Managing finances for growth also requires effective cash flow management. Cash flow is the lifeblood of any business, and managing it effectively is crucial for sustainable growth. This involves carefully monitoring and projecting cash inflows and outflows, ensuring that thecompany has enough cash on hand to meet its financial obligations and invest in growth opportunities. This may involve implementing cash flow forecasting tools, negotiating favorable payment terms with customers and suppliers, or securing additional financing when needed. Furthermore, managing finances for growth also involves assessing and managing financial risks. Every business faces a certain level of financial risk, whether it be market volatility, economic downturns, or unexpected expenses. By identifying and assessing these risks, management can develop strategies to mitigate them and protect the company's financial health. This may involve diversifying revenue streams, implementing risk management strategies, or purchasing insurance policies to cover potential losses. There are numerous real-life examples of successful part-time bloggers who have managed to turn their passion for writing into a profitable venture. These individuals have demonstrated that it is possible to balance a full-time job or other commitments while still building a successful blog that generates income and attracts a loyal audience. One such example is Michelle Schroeder-Gardner, the founder of the personal finance blog Making Sense of Cents. Michelle started her blog as a side project while working a full-time job, and within a few years, she was able to quit her job and focus on her blog full-time. Through her blog,Michelle shares her personal finance journey, provides valuable tips and advice, and documents her experiences of living a frugal and debt-free lifestyle. She has managed to monetize her blog through various income streams, including affiliate marketing, sponsored content, and her own digital products. Michelle's success as a part-time blogger has not only allowed her to achieve financial freedom but has also inspired countless others to take control of their finances. Another inspiring example is Pat Flynn, the creator of the blog and podcast Smart Passive Income. Pat started his blog as a way to document his journey of creating passive income streams online. He initially worked on his blog during his spare time while working a full-time job as an architect. Through his blog, Pat shares his strategies, insights, and income reports, providing valuable information to aspiring entrepreneurs and online business owners. Pat's transparency and authenticity have helped him build a loyal following, and he has successfully monetized his blog through affiliate marketing, online courses, and speaking engagements. Today, Pat is considered one of the most influential bloggers and online entrepreneurs, and his success as a part-time blogger has allowed him to leave his full-time job and focus solely on his online business ventures. Furthermore, there is the example of Lindsay Ostrom, the creator of the food blog Pinch of Yum. Lindsay started her blog as a creative outlet while working as a teacher. She initially shared her recipes and food 2photography as a hobby, but her blog quickly gained popularity and attracted a large audience. Lindsay's dedication to providing high-quality content and her ability to connect with her readers have been key factors in her success. She has monetized her blog through sponsored content, advertising, and the creation of her own cookbook. Lindsay's success as a part-time blogger has allowed her to transition from teaching to focusing on her blog and other food-related ventures full-time. Introduction: In today's digital age, blogging has become an essential tool for individuals and businesses alike to establish their online presence and connect with their target audience. Whether you are a seasoned blogger looking to diversify your content or a beginner aiming to build a strong foundation, expanding your blogging portfolio is crucial for long-term success. This comprehensive guide will provide you with valuable insights and practical tips to enhance your online presence, attract a wider audience, and ultimately boost your professional growth. 1. Identifying Your Blogging Goals: Before embarking on the journey of expanding your blogging portfolio, it is essential to identify your goals. Are you looking to monetize your blog, establish yourself as an industry expert, or simply share your passion with a wider audience? Understanding your objectives will help you tailor your content and strategies accordingly. a2. Niche Selection and Target Audience: To expand your blogging portfolio effectively, it is crucial to select a niche that aligns with your interests and expertise. By focusing on a specific topic, you can establish yourself as an authority in that area and attract a dedicated audience. Additionally, understanding your target audience's demographics, interests, and pain points will enable you to create content that resonates with them and keeps them coming back for more. 3. Diversifying Your Content: One of the key aspects of expanding your blogging portfolio is diversifying your content. While maintaining consistency in your niche, consider incorporating different formats such as written articles, videos, podcasts, infographics, or even interactive content. This not only keeps your audience engaged but also attracts new readers who prefer different mediums. 4. Collaborating with Other Bloggers and Influencers: Collaboration is a powerful tool for expanding your blogging portfolio. Partnering with other bloggers or influencers in your niche can help you tap into their audience and gain exposure to a wider network. Consider guest posting on established blogs, participating in collaborative projects, or even hosting joint webinars or podcasts. These collaborations not only expand your reach but also provide valuable networking opportunities. 25. Search Engine Optimization (SEO): To expand your blogging portfolio, it is essential to optimize your content for search engines. Conduct keyword research to identify relevant and high-ranking keywords in your niche. Incorporate these keywords strategically in your blog posts, meta descriptions, and headings to improve your visibility in search engine results. Additionally, focus on creating high- quality, informative, and engaging content Celebrating Your Milestones: A Guide to Recognizing and Commemorating Your Achievements Introduction: Achieving milestones in life is a significant accomplishment that deserves recognition and celebration. Whether it's graduating from school, landing a dream job, getting married, or reaching a personal goal, milestones mark important moments in our lives. Celebrating these milestones not only allows us to acknowledge our achievements but also provides an opportunity for reflection, gratitude, and motivation for future endeavors. In this guide, we will explore the importance of celebrating milestones and provide practical tips on how to make these celebrations meaningful and memorable. aWhy Celebrate Milestones? 1. Acknowledgment and Validation: Celebrating milestones is a way of acknowledging our hard work, dedication, and perseverance. It validates our efforts and reminds us of our capabilities, boosting our self-confidence and self-esteem. Recognizing our achievements helps us feel valued and appreciated, both by ourselves and by others. 2. Reflection and Gratitude: Milestones offer an opportunity for reflection, allowing us to look back on our journey and appreciate the progress we have made. Celebrating these moments encourages us to express gratitude for the people, resources, and opportunities that have supported us along the way. It reminds us to be thankful for the lessons learned and the growth experienced. 3. Motivation and Inspiration: Celebrating milestones can serve as a powerful motivator for future endeavors. By recognizing our achievements, we are reminded of our potential and are inspired to set new goals and pursue further success. Celebrations can fuel our ambition, providing the necessary drive and enthusiasm to continue striving for excellence. 2Tips for Meaningful Milestone Celebrations: 1. Set Clear Goals: Before celebrating a milestone, it is essential to define what it represents for you. Setting clear goals helps you understand the significance of the achievement and ensures that the celebration aligns with your values and aspirations. This clarity will make the celebration more meaningful and purposeful. 2. Personalize the Celebration: Tailor the celebration to reflect your personality and preferences. Consider what brings you joy and incorporate those elements into the festivities. Whether it's a small gathering with close friends and family or a grand event, make sure the celebration resonates with who you are and what you find meaningful. 3. Share the Joy: Invite loved ones to join in the celebration. Sharing your achievements with others not only allows them to rejoice in your success but also strengthens your support system. 2Welcome Thank you for taking the time to download this book. | realize there are hundreds of books and courses online that will supposedly teach you how to make money with a blog. Personally, | think running a blog is the perfect online business for anyone to get started with. It's one of the few businesses that can be Eastarted for under $200 yet has the potential to make you very wealthy. The difference between this book and many of the other books about making money with a blog is that this book aims to give you a complete picture of running a profitable blog. Many of the other books on the topic only cover certain aspects of the business. Few books I've seen take you from the starting point of not even knowing what you want your blog to be about all the way through generating $1,000 per day. This book will show you step by step how to progress from milestone to milestone. Here are some of the topics that |’m going to walk you through one step at a time: * Choosing a topic you love * Making sure there’s demand for that topic * Making sure it's a profitable topic * Choosing a domain name + Setting up a hosting plan «Installing Wordpress * Choosing a theme * Setting up a writing schedule + Writing magnetic headlines + Getting tons of FREE traffic * Transforming that traffic to profit As you can see, there is a lot of work to be done if you want to make serious money blogging, and it won’t happen overnight. But, if you're willing to work hard it's very much possible. After all, you can’t fail if you never give up. Is $1,000/Day a Realistic Goal? aThis is probably the first question you asked yourself when you saw the title of this book. The answer is YES. Making $1,000 per day blogging is very much possible. However, here is what is NOT realistic. * Going from $0 to $1,000 per day in a few short weeks or even months * Making $1,000 working on your blog for just a few hours a month « Using any system that claims to put your blog on “autopilot” Starting and running a successful blog is hard work and takes time to get off the ground | strongly suggest that you set both short and long-term goals for yourself and your blog. However, don't make all your goals be focused on how much money you want to make. If you have a goal of making $500 next month with your blog and only make $400, it's hard to learn from that and make adjustments. If you have a goal of publishing 8 articles in a month and writing a new lead magnet and fall short of that goal, you can look back and know that you didn’t put in the time and effort to get the work done. Similarly, if your goal is to post all of your content on social media, and spend x amount of time working your Twitter account and miss that goal, you'll know that you need to be more productive and spend more time marketing your content. Focus on doing the things that are productive and the money will come. Measure your success in how much value you add for your audience (in this case articles and new content). That change in perspective will make a world of difference. aWhat Success Looks Like You are probably wondering what running a successful blog looks like. You might even wonder how all these different aspects of a blog work together to create something that is powerful enough to make you a full time income. In this section | want to give you an overview of an example successful blog along with what the things look like behind the scenes of running that successful blog. For privacy reasons, | can’t mention the exact name or web address of this blog, but | can share with you strategies that work from behind the scenes Here are the characteristics of the successful blog: Topic The blogger who started this blog did his homework in choosing a topic. He made sure to choose one that was specific enough that people who wanted to learn about that topic could identify with the author. Also, he made sure that his research confirmed that this was a topic that people wanted new content on a regular basis and were willing to spend money on related products and services. This confirmed that the blog could be profitable before the author wrote a single article. Articles The successful blog has a combination of short articles and longer articles that add massive value. Some of these longer articles take a specific topic and explain it so well to a reader that the reader might otherwise have paid for this information. We're talking about a blog post so good it could be a short book. These are the articles that get shared by readers because of how much value they add. Readers share these with friends on socialmedia. Other blogs even post links to them. These are the kind of articles that will get you traffic for a very long time. Posting Frequency The successful blog has a new article on a scheduled day and time every week without fail. Readers know they can look forward to this new article and expect it to be there. If they started coming to the blog and not finding a new article, they would be less likely to come back in the future Content Marketing The successful blogger knows that it isn’t enough to write and create great content. You also have to market that content. That means that when you post a new article you also share it on social media to make sure that many people who might be interested will see it. These new readers can become regular weekly readers if they find value in the article. Connection Great blogs connect with people. That means finding a way to get in front of people so that they can't forget about your blog. This includes capturing their e-mail address, having readers follow you on social media sites, and replying to their questions and comments as appropriate. These efforts contribute to building a great relationship with readers, which leads to a great long-term relationship. Monetization The successful blog has integrated ways to make the blog profitable without making the readers feel as though they are constantly being asked for money. If readers feel as though your blog is nothing more than a collection of advertisements, they will not buy anything from you and they will not be coming back. 0Successful monetization means that readers rarely feel like you are selling to them. And when you do offer to sell them something, it's something you already know they want to buy. In that case, they can't wait to buy from you Consistency This is last on the list but arguably the most important. All of the things listed above have to be done on a regular basis. Doing the right thing only some of the time will not make your blog a smashing success. You need to do these things and invest the time it takes to be successful day after day, week after week. What It Takes to Be Successful Like starting any business, blogging has certain requirements you need to know about before you get started. Here is a list of some of the things you'll need to be successful. Time You'll need to dedicate time to work on your business. The title of this book implies that you can do this part time, and that is 100% true. Part time does not mean 2 hours per month of work. As a general rule, | would plan on spending 10-15 hours per week on your blog when you get started. This includes having enough time to both write and market content. That's right, you will need to invest time into making sure people find your blog in the first place. In addition there will be other things that need to be done upfront like making sure the blog looks good, finding or making products to sell, interacting with your audience and more. As time goes on and you start to see some success, you'll likely want to work on your blog more and more. If your blog someday acreates enough of an income for you to quit your day job, you'll likely find yourself investing 20-25 hours a week or more into it. The good news is that you are responsible for choosing when you work on your blog. Maybe you can write content on your lunch break at your job. Or maybe you prefer to wake up early in the morning and get work done while everyone else is still asleep. Some people prefer to work on their blog a little bit each day while others prefer to focus on it for a whole day over the weekend. The choice is yours as long as you make sure to invest the time needed to be successful. Money Like any business, starting a blog will require a financial investment. Lucky for you, the money needed to start a blog is a small fraction of the money needed for most other businesses. Domain Name: $15/year Hosting Plan: $10-$15/month E-mail Auto-responder service: $19/month WordPress Theme: $0-$100 Graphic Design Work: $0-$100 The total upfront cost should be under $200 and your recurring monthly overhead should be under $30 when you get started. There are very few businesses you can start with that low of an initial investment. Especially one with the potential of making you a very healthy full-time income. 2Some of these expenses will depend on your skill set and how fancy you want your site to be. You can spend a little more if you want to outsource the entire project of getting the website set up by a professional. Or, you can do most it yourself as you learn and save some money. Skills Starting and running a successful blog will also require a specific set of skills. Although some of these can be outsourced for a small amount of money, you should at least have an idea going in of what you plan on doing yourself vs. what you will outsource. Also keep in mind that although you might not be an expert in these areas just yet, you can make some serious progress and learn a lot by working hard and practicing. Something that you might not be good at right now could be something you're great at in 6 months or a year. Don’t ever assume you can’t acquire these skills. Technical Skills Some of the technical aspects of running a blog include using software like WordPress, web development, and many other skills you need to run a website. Don't let any of this scare you. Thanks to platforms like Wordpress, you can actually get quite a bit done while still knowing nothing about coding, web development, or anything else too technical. Take me for example. | don’t know HTML or any programming languages. That hasn't stopped me from starting over a dozen sites over the years. There are tools out there that you can use to help you get started. Also, if you do have the motivation to learn there are tons of resources to help you do that quickly and easily. If you prefer to not get involved in any of the technical stuff, you can hire someone to do most of it for much less money than you think. 2My point is simple: The technical aspect of running a blog is something that keeps a lot of people from starting a blog... and it shouldn't be! Writing Skills This should go without saying but if you want to have a great blog you are likely going to have to become a good writer (if you aren't already). Your audience will want your posts to be clear, concise, helpful, and free of errors. Much of being a good writer when it comes to blogging is finding your voice. This means that once you've spent some time writing it will start to come naturally. You'll start to notice the tone of your writing change as you find what works for best you. Remember this one rule when it comes to blogging and non-fiction writing in general: Less is more. People don't want to read long fancy sentences that include words they need to look up in a dictionary. You should practice getting your point across with writing that is easy to read and consists of shorter sentence. Sales Skills This is an area many people overlook. Regardless of what topic you pick for your blog, at some point you're going to have to convince your readers to do something. That can be something like signing up for your newsletter or buying a product you created. This requires you to have at least a basic concept of how to sell to people. Don’t think of sales as only being something you do when talking to someone in person. In this case your sales pitch will likely be in the form of a written sales pitch. There are people out there that make a great living just doing this for others. Think about that for a second. 4Writing sales copy is so valuable of a skill that people make a full time living doing it for other peoples web sites. If that sounds like something you should get good it, it’s because it is Design/Graphics Skills Nobody likes visiting a website that looks terrible. We've all been there. You click on a link and instead of focusing on the content of the site you can't help but to focus on how terrible the site looks or how hard it is to navigate. When it comes to your blog you will need to have some clean and professional graphics. This includes a nice logo for the site, covers/design for any products you sell, and an overall design that's easy to navigate. Just make sure that you focus on the site being clean and easy to navigate. If someone has to figure out what's going on because you chose to design a complicated home page, it will negatively impact your traffic. People won't come back. If you can make some simple and professional graphics on your own, go for it. Otherwise | would hire this out. You can outsource quality graphics for really cheap on sites like Fiverr. If graphic design interests you, feel free to practice and start making your own graphics. Just make sure your site looks good Resourcefulness There are dozens of questions and problems you'll run into while running your blog. They will range from how to change something on your blog's settings to how to best set up your e-mail auto-responder service. This is where resourcefulness comes in. Getting frustrated and quitting isn’t an option. You've already decided that you aren't quitting until you grow your blog to where it's making 38you $1,000 per day. Since your blog isn't yet making much (if any) money, outsourcing every last detail of your business likely won't work either. You'd go broke and never learn anything. Instead, you'll need to get good at finding resources that answer your questions, solve your problems, and help you improve your skills. | can’t tell you how much I've learned over the years from some of my favorite online resources. Here are a few: * YouTube * Online Internet Forums * Podcasts + Other blogs (See what others are doing right!) « Kindle Books There is a ton of free info out there. It's up to you to get really good at finding this information so that you can use it to grow your business. Myth vs. Reality There are a lot of people that have started a blog to make some extra money in the last decade or so. Many of these blogs fail quickly. Most of them never go on to make $1,000 total, let alone $1,000 in a day. The main reason many of these bloggers fail is they start out with unrealistic expectations about how quickly and easily they'll be able to make money. Running a successful blog takes a lot of very consistent hard work and hustling. Here are a few examples of misconceptions people have about starting and making money with a blog. Myth: Your new blog will make you rich overnight. 6Reality: Building a successful blog takes a lot of hard work and time to grow. Although you can start making SOME money right away and grow your income every month if you work hard on it, it will take a while to get to the point of making $1,000 per day with your blog. The key to success is sticking with it long term. Myth: Your blog will get tons of traffic as soon as you start writing Reality: There is a good chance that you will struggle to get traffic when you first start your blog. This is what makes most people quit. When you work your butt off for a month and only get 500 views you will likely get discouraged. Trust me, everyone goes through it. If you don't work through those early struggles to build an audience, you'll never get to the next level. Myth: Making money blogging is easy Reality: Blogging is hard work. Although a successful blog can make you a full-time income in part-time hours, it still takes a lot of effort. Depending on your skill set you'll be wearing many hats while you run your blog. This includes writing, sales, marketing, time management, networking, design, etc. Being successful also requires a certain level of creativity and thinking outside the box. Myth: | can blog whenever | feel like it and still be successful Reality: The most successful blogs are consistent. This means having new content on a regular and scheduled basis. If your blog hasn't been updated in 6 months, new visitors are never coming back. The same goes for the quality of content. You need for your content to be good and provide value every time. This is how you build an audience that can’t wait for your next post. Myth: As long as my content is good, I'll be successful Reality: This is a common misconception. You can have great content and have no readers if you don't do a good job marketing your blog and connecting with others. Likewise, having traffic won't do you any good if you can’t monetize it properly. a7How to Use This Book This book is structured to walk you through the most important steps of setting up a blog, driving traffic to your blog, and then monetizing your blog. Along the way | have include specific info on how to do all of this. Plus | am including some tips on how to best market your blog. There are parts of this book that may not make sense at first, but will make plenty of sense as you continue to read. My advice is to grab a notepad and make yourself some notes as you read through the book. Keep a running list of ideas, questions, and to-do items for yourself. | strongly suggest you wait until you’re done reading through the entire book before going back and following the steps while you actually do them. If you already have a great idea for the blog you want to start, that’s great! Just hold off until you've read through the entire book for strategy before you actually start the blog. This will allow you to have a great big picture view of your blog before you get started and prevent you from having to go back and re-do things because of a mistake you made. Trust me, |’ve been there. Do your research, read this book, and then put together a great plan before you get started. Choose a topic Now that you've decided you want to start a successful blog, the first step is to choose what the blog will be about. This will be referred to as your blogs topic or niche. Throughout the rest of this chapter we will look at things you'll want to research before you decide on a topic and actually get started on the blog. 8At this point you'll need to identify a list of potential topics you're interested in and want to further research. You'll have to remove topics that through your research you find out aren’t the best idea for your blog. Likewise, you'll need to add ideas for great topics as they come to you. My advice is to grab some paper to keep a list of ideas on. Write down notes as you go. Be creative and don't be afraid to make changes. Ideas for topics For some people even thinking of an idea for a topic might be challenging.Here is one method you can use to start brainstorming ideas for your blog. Brainstorming Session In order to get started brainstorming you're going to need some way to keep track of your ideas. This can be a paper and a pen or if you prefer the high tech version you can use word processing software like Microsoft Word. Do whatever works for you, just make sure you have a way to keep record your ideas moving forward. Start by making a list of 10 or more topics you are passionate about and would not get bored of quickly. This will be a topic you write about and research on a regular basis for a long time to come, so make sure you love them. These 10 topics can be hobbies, interests, or anything else you really feel drawn to. Some of these might turn out to be bad ideas for a blog and that's fine. The idea here is to cast a wide net and eliminate as needed. Here is a list of examples | could think of right off the top of my head: * Business + Sports * Politics+ Fishing + Home Remodeling ° Fitness * Cooking * Travel * Graphic Design * Crafts + Ete Now that you have a list of at least 10 things that you are interested in and/or passionate about, let's add 10 more. This time, add 10 things that you think most people need or want help learning about. This could be improving on skills they already have or learning new skills to solve problems in their life. Here are some examples | quickly thought of: * Budgeting * Credit Repair « Losing Weight * Saving money on * Skills for a new job (technical skills) + Web Development + Improving speed at a distance run (5K, marathon, etc) + Ete As you can see, some of them can be similar to the categories in the first group of ideas you came up with. You'll start to see that certain things appear more often on your list due to them being things you naturally gravitate towards. If both lists you make have at least one topic from a similar category, you should really consider digging into these categories more. In the next section of this book | walk you through how you can research if the category you choose can be profitable. This is 40important and | would never tell you to start a blog on an unprofitable topic if your goal is to make money. A blog you start as a hobby is a different story. In this case we are trying to make this blog profitable so doing this research is important. That being said, you have to make sure you choose something you are passionate about. Otherwise, you'll never really be good at connecting with the readers that really are passionate about it. Get Specific Now that you hopefully have a list of at least 20 ideas for the topic of your blog, we are going to get much more specific. One of the biggest mistakes you can make in starting a new blog is choosing a topic that is not focused. There is a common misconception that you need to pick a topic that appeals to as many people as possible. In reality, you want to choose a topic that will resonate really well with a specific group of people. If your blog tries to appeal to everyone, it will end up appealing to no one. To do this, take each item from the list above and try to add at least 3-5 (or hopefully more) specific topics within that topic that could make for a good blog topic. Allow me to walk you through a few examples to show you what | mean. If one of the possible topics you chose was fitness, think of specific groups of people or types of fitness that you would like to cover. Fitness is a really broad category. A better and more specific option might be “Fitness for men who want to work out at home”. That takes the broad category of Fitness and makes it exclusive to males who want to be fit without having to go to agym. aAnother option might be narrowing down fitness to “Fitness info for women over 50”. In that example you've take the broad category of fitness and made it appeal to the specific group of women over 50. Each of the specific topics above would be very different blogs. Imagine a 60-year old woman stumbling into a blog for men who want to be power lifters. She would never come back. That is exactly why you want to make your blog home to a very specific group of people that can really identify with what you're trying to do. Now that you have gone through your original list and identified some specific categories that you might be interested in choosing as your topic, you're going to have to start eliminating options that you don't think realistically will work. One good way to do this is to eliminate every options that: * You can't identify a specific audience for + You identify a specific audience that is too small « Is something that you do not think you can stay interested in for the long term The above should reduce the number of options quite a bit. Once you have a smaller and more manageable list, it’s time to see which ones have more opportunity when it comes to monetization. Plan Out Monetization While you are choosing a topic to start your blog about, you'll also want to think ahead to how you will monetize that audience in the future. First of all, you need to make sure that the topic you're choosing can be monetized. There are definitely topics out there that even if you have a ton of traffic it is really hard to make money from. Other topics on the other hand lend themselves really well to you finding ways to make money. 2There is an entire chapter in this book coming up that walks you through some of the basics of monetizing your blog along with the best and worst ways to do it. In this chapter our goal is to make sure that the topic you’re picking has at least a decent chance of making money. There are a few methods of research you can do to find this out. Methods of Monetization Research Google Keywords One way to check and see if there is a large market for a potential blog topic is to use Google’s keyword research tool to see just how popular a search term is. For example, if you want to start a blog about underwater basket weaving, you might see that very few people are searching for that term. As a general rule you want to make sure there are at least 5,000- 10,000 people searching for terms related to the topic you want to blog about. Another thing to keep in mind, is making sure that you aren't picking too general of a topic. If the term you are searching for get millions of searches, there is a good chance that it will be too difficult for you to get noticed and compete with that many sites. If you think you are being too specific and are choosing too small of a market, go back to the keyword search tool mentioned earlier to make sure there is a big enough market for your topic. Kindle Store Another great way to see if your topic has an audience willing to pay for information is to check the Kindle store on Amazon.com. ryGo through the Kindle marketplace and look for books that offer to solve problems for your target market and check to see if they are selling well. Every book has a sales rank listed for it that you can use to calculate how well it sells. Although this number changes very often (literally every hour in some cases) it is a great indication of how well a book is doing. In this case you want to look at several books in your category and see if they generally do well So how can you interpret these Sales Rank numbers? Here are some general guidelines. Sales Rank of 100,000 = about 1 copy sold per day Sales Rank of 40,000 = about 5 copies sold per day Sales Rank of 10,000 = about 10 copies sold per day Sales rank of 5,000 = about 20 copies sold per day Notice that the smaller the number the more copies the book is doing. What you want to make sure of is that the top books in the category you want to blog about have at least a rank of 40,000. That means that a good book that adds value and is properly marketed in that category has the potential of 150 copies per month. Assuming a sales price of $2.99, you'll get to keep about $300 per month from that book since Amazon pays a 70% royalty as long as you join their KDP Select program. Let's walk through an example for this process. You want to start a blog for fishing. You go to the Kindle Store and see there are a more than a few Kindle Books about various aspects of fishing. Within the fishing category let's say there are 3 books with a ranking better than 10,000 and over a dozen with a sales rank better than 40,000. That means you've found a good category. 44On the other hand, if the best selling book in the fishing category had a ranking of 80,000, you'd have to wonder why. Odds are that the market for this book is too small Affiliate Programs for similar services The topic you want to start your blog about should have at least a few opportunities for you to market other companies’ products to your audience. This means that just by reviewing and recommending products and services that your audience buys, you'll get a cut. Before you get started, go online and do some research to see what affiliate programs are out there for your audience and how much they pay. Here are a few examples of affiliate programs for specific audiences that pay well: If you had a blog about online dating, you could easily discuss and promote affiliate programs for paid dating sites like Match.com and eHarmoney.com. If someone clicks on your affiliate link on your blog and signs up for one of these services, you can make as much as $100 from a single sale. Another example is domain name and hosting plans. If you have a site that helps people set up websites and blogs, you can promote companies like GoDaddy and BlueHost. If someone signs up for service due to your referral you can easily make $50-$75. What about your site? What products and services are out there that you can promote to your audience down the road? If you can track down at least a few products and services that pay you at least $25 per sale, you are in a good place. One last thing on finding potential affiliate programs - Keep in mind that if there are physical products you can promote, you can refer your audience to Amazon and get a percentage of all their sales to Amazon that come from your referral. 48My advice would be to spend some time doing some research and make sure you have a list of at least 5 different products and services you can promote. Udemy Courses If you aren't familiar with Udemy yet, you will be soon. Udemy is a marketplace where anyone can teach an online course. There are amazing instructors teaching everything online including web design, programming, online marketing, and even martial arts Take a moment to head over to Udemy.com and see if there are people teaching courses that would be of value to your audience If there are a at least a few courses that offer a benefit to your target market, you have the opportunity to make some extra money referring your audience to take that course. One thing to keep in mind is that as you continue to grow your audience you might realize that there are some great topics your audience would love to take courses on but those courses don't exist. This would be a great opportunity for you to make that course and sell it to your audience directly. (More on this in the monetization chapter of this book) In the meantime, head over to Udemy.com and make a list of courses you could promote based on the topic you want to create your blog about. Register a Domain Name Once you've decided on a topic, you'll need to pick a domain name. This is a very important part of your business so you should take your time to find the right one The domain name you choose now will be a big part of your brand for as long as you run this blog so make sure it really fits your topic 46and will resonate with readers. There are tons of places you can register a domain name. This will cost you in the range of $12-$15 for the first year, although there are often deals out there to get your first year included for free if you also sign up for a hosting plan (which you'll need anyway). Now that you know how important a good domain name is and where to get one, here are some helpful hints to help you choose one: Keep it Simple When it comes to choosing a domain name, you want to make sure that you keep it simple and easy to remember for your readers. Good simple domain names can he hard to come by since many of them are already taken. You might have to be a little creative in choosing a domain name that includes your topic and niche along with another word or two that describe it For example, let's go back to that imaginary blog that aims to make you better at fishing. The odds of being able to register fishing.com are pretty slim. In fact, | just checked and someone beat us to it. But, if you were starting a blog about how improving at fly fishing, you might be able to register something like betterflyfishing.com or weekendflyfishing.com might be available. The goal is to have a word or phrase that's easy to remember and describes your content. Personally, | always go for the .com extension versus the others (.net, etc) because | think it's universally considered to be the “best” by many people. Depending on your topic, this might not be the case. a7What to avoid Make sure you don't make the mistake of naming your site after a purposely-misspelled word. If you have a site about shoes, you do NOT want to register shooz.com. | know that’s an example that’s been beaten to death, but it needs to be said. Choosing a word like that will make it hard for people to remember your address. If they misspell it in the future and can't find your site, they are never coming back. Another thing to avoid is a needlessly long domain name. Even if you think it's descriptive, a domain name that looks to be the length of a sentence is going to confuse people. Go with a 2 or 3 word phrase instead. Set Up a Hosting Plan Once you've chosen your domain name and registered your website, you'll have to sign up for a hosting plan. This is the service that actually let's people see your website. | use Bluehost myself but there are a ton of great providers. If you end up not using Bluehost like | do, just make sure that the hosting provider you choose has an easy option to install Wordpress. Wordpress is a content management system for blogs (and other types of websites too) that works really well for what you are trying to do. You'll want to install Wordpress right away and get busy making your new blog look like the great destination it's going to be. This isn't a book on graphic design, so | won't get too far into the technical and design aspects of using Wordpress. The important thing to note is that you'll be able to log in and start making changes 4and adjustments right away. It’s a very user friendly system that does not require you to know how to code. | have several websites running on Wordpress and | do not know how to code. If you are new to Wordpress and don't like the idea of just fiddling around with it as you figure it out, | would suggest watching some YouTube tutorials on it. They are free and the skill of using Wordpress is going to be very valuable to you as you build your blog This is time well invested. Buy a Theme (or use a free one) One thing you'll likely want to do is get a new theme for your blog. This is a small downloaded piece of software that sets the style of your blog. There are many, many themes out there. The right one to choose really depends on the type of blog you start. There are specific themes for blogs that plan to have more videos, specific themes for magazine type blogs, etc. Choose one you want to try and give it a chance. If you decide to switch it later on, it won't be a problem Switching your blog theme takes just a few minutes on Wordpress and changes the styling of your entire blog with a few clicks. You'll also notice that there are both free and paid themes. The paid themes can cost as little as a few dollars or as much as $100. My advice would be to choose a free one to start with. This will let you test things out and see what you do and don't like. Once you have an idea of what you want to have on a long-term basis you can choose one to buy. That way you can avoid spending hard earned money on a theme you don’t want to use.Writing Great Content Now that you have a working blog, it's time to start creating some amazing content that your readers will love. Writing great content will be the difference between a blog nobody cares to read and one that makes you more money than you've ever made before. Here are a few of the most important things to keep in mind as you start creating content for your blog. Write Content that Adds Value If you’ve read my other books on making money with your own business you know |’m huge on the concept of adding value. This really holds true when it comes to your blog posts. People will be coming to your blog specifically to learn and read about the topic of your blog. Here are some of the most important things to keep in mind as you start to fill your blog with great content. Schedule You should plan on having a specific schedule of new content on your blog. There isn't a specific rule you need to stick to other than sticking to something that works for you and making sure your readers see you as being consistent. If you plan on having one new post per week, then you need to do that every week. Also, publish it on the same day of the week. Your readers should be able to rely on you being consistent. If they are used to a new post being published every Saturday, then you need to stick to that. It's common for new bloggers to come out of the gate and have a ton of content when they get started. Over time they realize they can’t 50possible keep up with that pace and slow down to a crawl. From the perspective of a reader, this looks like the blog is slowly dying. Selecting Blog post ideas Regardless of the topic you chose for your blog, you are going to have a ton of ideas for specific blog posts. How do you chooses which one to write about next? A great method | use is to keep a running list of ideas in a file | can go back to. This prevents me from ever having the problem of not knowing what to write about. Then, | take those ideas one at a time and do some research to see if that is a topic that people in my niche are talking about. Doing 15 or 30 minutes of research to make sure what you are about to write about is a good topic is a good use of your time. To do this research | would use some of the same tactics you used to test the market on how easy it is to monetize your niche. Check Google to see how often people are searching for certain combinations of keywords. Check Amazon for books that cover that topic. Also, check what others on social media are saying about your topic. To illustrate this idea, let's go back to that theoretical blog about fishing. You want to write a new post for your fishing blog but aren't sure what it should be about. Should you write about how to choose anew rod? How about an article of the pros and cons of certain types of bait? These might all be topics that you'll get to at some point, but which one should you start with? To answer this question, you would go to Google and see how often people are doing searches. You would then go to some of the more popular Internet forums on fishing and see what the hot discussion are these days. stThis will give you a great idea for how much interest there is ina certain topic within your niche. Write Great Headlines As you are getting ready to publish your newly written content, ask yourself if the title of the article would make readers instantly want to read it. You need to get your hooks in people so that they feel compelled to click on and read the article. A great way to do that is with a compelling headline they can't help but to click on There are two specific strategies | use to achieve this. Here they are: Benefit Statements: | try to make the title of my articles show how the reader will benefit from the article. Let's go back to that fishing example for a moment. Which of the following titles do you think would make people more likely to click on and read the article: “Ideas to Choose Bait” or “Save Money and Catch More Fish with These types of Bait” | think you can see why the second options would do a lot better. It immediately makes it clear what you as a reader have to gain by reading the article. Lists Another way to make people feel compelled to read an article is to include a list in the title. There is just something about lists that people love. Looks at sites like Buzzfeed, they have literally made a business of it. 2Going back to the example of the fishing blog, let's look at these 2 headlines: “Great Bait to Use” Or “The 9 Best Baits to Catch Fish While Saving Money” It's probably pretty obvious which one of these headlines will get more attention, more readers, and be shared most often. Before you publish any article, you should look at the headline/title and think about how compelling it is to someone who might run across it. If you aren't sure, e-mail a few friends and ask them based on the title alone, which article sounds more interesting. You might be surprised what you hear. Build an E-mail List In my 10 years of being involved in online businesses | have tried to read as many books and interviews from successful entrepreneurs as possible. There are a ton of examples of these experienced and successful entrepreneurs being asked for their ONE piece of advice for people just getting started. The answer | have seen the most (by far) is to set up an e-mail list. This is the one thing almost all successful online entrepreneurs agree on. It’s so important that they are also saying it’s the ONE thing they wish they would have done sooner themselves. | can’t impress upon you how important | think it is to start gathering email addresses of your readers as soon as possible. Where to Start The first thing you should do when you decide to start building an e- mail list is to sign up for an auto-responder. saAn auto-responder service is the software you are going to use to manage your subscriber list and send them messages. It allows for you to send out automatic messages, manually send out messages, let readers subscribe and unsubscribe, and more. The one | use is located at Aweber.com but there are several other good ones out there too. The cost of one of these services is typically in the range of $20 per month to start although some of them often have promotions to let you try them for much less. Signing up for one of these services is easy and they will even walk you through how to add a sign up form on your website or blog. Once you have this added to your blog, readers can opt to subscribe to your e-mail list. This lets them get updates from you so they never miss out on special content and offers you send out. It helps you because now you have a way to connect with your readers without them having to remember to do anything. As you grow your readership, you can use this core group of readers to do everything from ask questions on content to offer to sell them your products and services. Getting people to sign up isn’t always as easy as you think, and sometimes people need some incentive to do so. Which leads up to.. Creating a Lead Magnet As much as you want people to join your email list, they typically won't do it just to be nice. Like anything else in life, people will take action when they feel there is something in it for them. One of the best ways to get people to join your e-mail list is to offer what's referred to as a lead magnet. A lead magnet is a free gift or piece of information you offer someone in exchange for trusting you enough to join your e-mail list. 5This is often times a short informational product in the form of a pdf or audio file that adds value to your target audience. The best way to think of something to turn into a lead magnet is to make a list of questions and problems that your ideal reader might run into. Then, research and write a short guide to solving those problems. For example: If you have a blog about Online Dating, write a short guide about the secrets to writing an attractive profile. Then offer guide as a free gift to anyone that joins your newsletter. Dangling that carrot in front of people works really well since they get something of value in exchange. The key to this working is you choosing to make something to give away that adds massive value to your targeted audience. Don't fall into the trap of thinking that you shouldn't make this free gift too good. Many people think that since they will be giving it away for free it's ok to make it of questionable quality. That is not the case. If someone does sign up for your newsletter in exchange for your lead magnet, the content of that lead magnet will be his or her first impression of you. Make a great impression. Us this as your opportunity to earn their trust so that in the future they not only visit your blog but that open your e-mails and take action. Here are some more examples of things you could use as lead magnets: * Audio or Video info on how to do something (How to...) * List of resources for a specific topic (70+ Places to...) + How you did something great (How | improved my marathon time by...) « Ete Think outside the box, be creative, and challenge yourself to find new ways to provide people with something of immense value. 58Drive Traffic Now that you've set up your blog and some of the other necessary elements to be successful (E-mail list, lead magnet) it’s time to go out and build an audience. You are going to want to find as many people as possible that are already interested in your topic to connect with. Getting traffic is something that anyone who has a blog (or any website for that matter) struggles with. The key is to not only get people to your site, but to get the right people to your site. You want to build a long-term passionate audience that will not only enjoy your content but will share it with other like-minded people. This chapter is to help strategize on how to get traffic to your site. Before | share with you what | think are the top ways to get traffic and build an audience, | want to cover 3 things | think you should specifically not do. Don’t Rely On Google It's tempting to focus your writing/blogging on things like keyword research so that you can rank high in search engines like Google. There are a lot of problems that come with this strategy however. One of those problems is that Google and the other major search engines are constantly changing the algorithm they use to determine your ranking. So, you can end up spending a lot of time jumping through hoops only to lose your ranking (and traffic) overnight. This has happened to a lot of people in the past. Another problem is that you end up writing your content for the search engines instead of your readers. You want your readers to love your content and share it with others who have similar interests. 56Deciding what to write by focusing on getting search engine traffic isn’t a good long-term strategy. Instead, just focus on writing great content. If people like it, you will still end up ranking high for the topic and search terms that apply to your blog. NOTE: | mention using Google Keyword tools elsewhere in this and other books I've written. | want to make sure | don’t sound like I'm giving you contradicting advice. | am all for using keyword tools to do research from a big picture standpoint. | just don't think you should try to use that as your primary source of traffic by writing content catering to those keyword results. Don’t Spend Money on Ads Although some gurus out there preach that you should go out and start paying for traffic by running ads, | really think that you should focus on free organic traffic from sources that match your target demographic. This is especially true when you are first getting started. It can get very expensive trying to get people to your site by paying for ads or competing for keywords. People are tempted to do this since it requires less work and can literally get you traffic overnight. Don't looks for the easy way out. The reason this could be a problem is that unless you have a long track record with your blog and have already successfully grown your user base, monetized, and taken care of all the other aspects of your blog, paying for ads will likely not help you much Put in the time and work upfront to build an organic user base before you ever consider paying for ads. Don’t Do Anything Morally Questionable There are a lot of strategies and tactics out there that are very questionable if not flat out unethical. There are even so called 7“gurus” out there that sell you on crazy ways to grow your blog. These can include anything from ways to trick the search engines, spam people, or other hair brained schemes | haven't even thought of yet. People looking for a quick way to make a buck usually lose in the long-term. If you do anything against the rules with one of the search engines, you'll regret it. The same goes for any monetization strategy. If you try and scam people, you'll regret it. Instead, focus on the effective and honest ways to grow your business and make your blog be so valuable to people that making money is never an issue in the future. Great Sources Of Traffic Now that you have all the basics down and are ready to get some readers, lets take a closer look at places you can get additional traffic. Social Media One of the best sources of traffic for a new blog is social media. This includes Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and more. For the purposes of this book, | am going to be focusing on the big one, Twitter. Facebook, and Pinterest should also be able to provide you with a ton of great focused traffic if you use them similarly to how you will use Twitter. Twitter Here is a great way you can get awesome traffic from Twitter with just a few minutes of work each day. First, go ahead and create an account on Twitter. Before you get started trying to get traffic from Twitter, make sure your profile looks good. Don't leave the default graphics on your profile, for example. seChange your profile picture and background to match your website. This will make it clear that your Twitter account is an extension of your blog. This will help you build trust on Twitter and make you look like a professional. Also, make sure your bio is clear about the value you intend to bring along with a link to your blog. Next, go on Twitter and find people that are very popular in the topic you have chosen to start a blog about. For example, if you are blogging about fitness, find the Twitter account of an already popular authority figure that has an audience similar to the audience you want to build. If your blog is about fitness for men, find someone already popular in that space. Then go through and start following people that are following that authority figure. After all, if they are following that authority figure they obviously have enough interested in the topic to seek out and follow that person. Once you start following people, you'll notice that some will start to follow you back. These people are prime candidates to be exposed to your brand so that they can someday become members of your audience. Once you start getting more and more followers, you can even double back and unfollow those that didn’t decide to start following you in return. If you don’t want to waste the time on it, there are even paid services you can use for a few bucks a month to unfollow people who don't follow you within a certain amount of time. If you do this on a consistent basis you should end up with an account that has thousands of people following you that are interested in your niche. That's when you focus on converting them to members of your audience. How do you do that? In order to take Twitter followers and make then engaged members of your audience you need to do two things. They are:Engage them Take the time to show that you are human by having conversations with people. If they ask a question, answer it. Comment on things they post. Be all around helpful and treat them like you would one of your friends. As you start to build relationships with people on Twitter you'll notice a few things starting to happen. One of those things is that people will look to you for info on certain topics. You will slowly start to be seen as an authority, which is exactly what you want. Another thing that will happen is other people who don’t currently follow you will start seeing your tweets and then they can start to follow you. The reach you have on Twitter will grow faster and faster as you continue to build relationships with people. Post Links to Great Content The other tactic you need to take advantage of on Twitter is to post links to your blog when you have helpful information to share. For example, you just wrote and posted a 4,000-word article to your blog about how to do something that you think your audience would find useful. That is a perfect time to send a tweet letting everyone know about your article. It also helps to give your article a title that is very catchy or describes the value that the reader will get from it so that people feel inclined to click on it. Since there is a lot of “noise” on Twitter, you'll likely have to send this tweet several times over the course of a couple days to make sure people see it. You can also do this with older articles from your blog as long as the content is still timely. For example, if you wrote a great article on your fitness blog about losing weight after the holidays last year that you feel nobody saw Cysince you had so little traffic at that point, feel free to share it again this year after the holidays. This isn’t a sales pitch and all your doing is linking to a helpful article. People will actually appreciate this, which leads to you getting a new reader. Make sure that your article makes it easy for people to subscribe to your e-mail list, too. | always include a link at the bottom of the article so someone visiting for the first time gets a chance to subscribe. What NOT to do It may be tempting to use your Twitter account as some kind of spamming machine, but that is a terrible idea. If you start trying to sell/market products as a new user on twitter you will end up annoying and alienating people. It may not be a bad idea to let your readers know you just launched a new book/product once you have a large and engaged audience, but that is many months if not years away. In the meantime, focus on getting people over to your site in the first place and hopefully getting them to give you their e-mail address. Forums One of my favorite places to promote a website is on Internet forums. There is at least one (if not several) out there for most topics that already passed the test of being a marketable topic. | would strongly suggest doing a search on Google for your blog topic along with the word “forum” after it so you can locate them. Once you find one of these forums, create an account and try to become a member of the community. Much like Twitter or any other form of social media, you don’t want to come across as you are spamming the forum. Instead, be a genuine helpful member of their community. Answer questions, provide value, and start building relationships with people. otAs time goes on and people get to know you, you can start promoting your brand in a very subtle yet immensely effective way. Here are a few ways to build an audience from an Internet forum. * Make sure to link to your blog in your signature line, if the forum allows it * Refer back to an article you wrote on a topic when it's relevant to someone's request for info * Create a new “thread” with a helpful guide to a specific issue people face and answer questions The key to being successful is to always make it your priority to help others while on the forum. Over time, this can not only lead to traffic, but the traffic you do get will be very engaged. Keep in mind that a post you make on a forum is read by a lot more than the people who comment on that post. | used to be a moderator for a large forum in a particular niche and can tell you first hand that most of the people reading the forum comments don’t even have accounts. They are what is referred to as a “lurker” and are only there to read what others post. These people still are interested in the same things as the others posting, but just aren’t as vocal. If you post to a forum and come across as friendly and helpful, you can get a ton of traffic from these lurkers. Guest Posts & Articles Another way to raise awareness of your blog and get new readers to join your audience is by writing guest posts for other blogs in your niche. Regardless of the niche your chose to focus on, there are many larger and more successful blogs and sites out there. There is a good chance that at least some of them struggle to come up with great content on a regular basis. In order to help your blog (and theirs) you should reach out to other bloggers and websites to see if they would be post an article you wrote for them on their site. eaThis happens a lot more than you might think in the blogging world and benefits both the guest writer and website. So how do you go about finding one of these opportunities? It's not complicated but it's going to take some good old-fashioned hard work. Make a list of websites and blogs that have articles that cater to a similar audience as your new blog. Then, find their contact info on the site and send them a message. Introduce yourself as someone who owns a similar site and let them know you'd love to contribute a great article that their readers would love in exchange for a link back to your site at the end of the article. Be completely upfront and let them know why you think this will benefit you both. Expect for many people to turn down your offer. Just like any time you are out there trying to make connections, a lot of people are going to say no. No problem. Just keep working hard and keep that opportunity in back of your mind for down the road in case they change their mind. YouTube YouTube is a great way to get traffic to your site for a few reasons. One of them is that people are constantly searching YouTube for new content. So, if you create a video and post it on YouTube about a specific question or topic, you have the opportunity to get new traffic from that video for years. Also, since you are taking the time to talk to and inform people with your videos, your credibility goes through the roof. You have the opportunity to build trust very quickly and it doesn’t require someone to spend time reading a long article. Let's be honest, people are busy and there is a lot of content online. Giving them the opportunity to discover your brand by watching a video increases you chances of adding them to your audience. oThe YouTube Videos You Should Make If you aren't sure what to make a YouTube video about, here are some suggestions to get you started: + Answer common questions people interested in your topic have * Short instructional videos explaining a process + Product reviews As you can see there is a lot of opportunity for someone willing to spend some time making a few short videos that help teach or even entertain a specific audience. “| don’t want to be on the screen!” One of the biggest reasons people don’t want to do videos for YouTube is because they don’t want their face plastered all over the internet. This is very understandable for many reasons. Some people want to protect their privacy, while others just find it awkward. Another reason could be that you don’t want your “normal” life and your blogging activities to mix. That is also very understandable. To combat this, | suggest buying a decent microphone and screen capture software so you can record your screen as you talk into the microphone. This allows you to record your voice over the background of whatever is on your screen. There are more than a few different things you can have on your screen as video while you talk. This includes Powerpoint slides, other websites, graphics, etc. You can basically put on presentations for everyone in your niche to watch and never have to be on screen. If you are interested in picking up the necessary equipment to start a YouTube channel, go to my blog here where | recommend some 0