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How To Find Your Blogging Niche

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How To Find Your Blogging Niche

If you have not created a blog yet, this blog post is especially for you. If you have a blog, and have not identified your blogging niche yet, you must identify that niche before you write another blog post. Every successful blogger knows what their blogging niche is, and by learning what your blogging niche is, you will know what you need to write about so you can become a successful blogger. Knowing your blogging niche is important for the following reasons:

 

#1: You get to know who your target audience is.

Just because someone visits your blog does not mean that person is a part of your target audience. Your target audience consists of people who were interested in your niche before visiting your blog. That means when these people visit your blog, they already have a strong interest in what you are providing.

Knowing your target audience also allows you to know who you need to interact with on social media. Not every social media user is created equal. If you are a digital marketing expert, you do not want to build a following around karaoke. You want to build your audience around people who want to learn more about digital marketing.

 

#2: You get to specialize your writing.

Believe it or not, it is easier to specialize your writing than it is to constantly write about anything. Although that statement may be difficult to believe in, writing about anything brings forth an infinite amount of choices. Being given that many options makes it difficult to make one decision. It is easier to make a decision you have faith in if there are only 10 options on the menu than if there are 1,000 options on the menu.

You can write about an experience, a motivational quote, a music song, an animal, your trip to the zoo, a long rant that you read from a blogger named Marc Guberti, or anything else. When you choose to write content for a specific niche, you will always have a general idea for what your next blog post should discuss.

 

#3: You know what to build your presence around.

In order to build your presence, you need to build that presence around one niche. When we think of Steve Jobs, we almost always think about Apple and nothing else. Some people also think of Pixar, but ultimately, when we think of Steve Jobs, we also think of Apple. You want to make sure people can easily associate you with a niche when they think of you.

Now that you know what to build your presence around, there are fewer obstacles holding you back. The main obstacle in the beginning is before you choose what you want to build your presence around, you tinker around with numerous niches. I wrote blog posts about the Red Sox, Yugioh Cards, and Legos before I started this blog. All of that time taught me about blogging, but now that I have chosen digital marketing as my niche, I waste less time.

 

#4: You know which niche is going to be your money maker.

In order to make money on the web, you need to create products and offer services such as eBooks, training courses, and consultation sessions. Once you identify your blogging niche, you are also identifying the niche you use to create products and offer services. When your blogging niche and your products match up, some of the people who visit your blog end up becoming customers.

By focusing your efforts on one niche, you will focus more of your time strengthening a few areas of your money making strategy instead of spending a little time implementing different methods to bring in a small income (i.e. taking surveys, clicking ads, tweeting ads to a small audience, etc).

 

How To Identify It

Identifying your blogging niche will allow you to save valuable time and grow the right audience. When I refer to a blogging niche, I am referring to a niche that you can stick with for many years to come. Ask yourself these three questions so you can identify the right blogging niche for you:

  1. What topics do I enjoy writing about? The only way you are going to make it as a blogger is by enjoying what you do. That way, when the journey gets challenging, you embrace the challenge when most people would give up. Besides, you are doing what you love to do. Create a list of all of the topics that you enjoy.
  2. Which of these topics do I know a lot about? Now that you have the list of all of the topics that you enjoy, identify the ones that you know about the most. If you make it big as a blogger, it is entirely possible that you will be writing about this topic for many years (or even decades) to come.
  3. Which of these topics do I enjoy learning more about? You must strive to constantly learn about the niche you choose so you are able to write more blog posts. If I stopped learning about digital marketing last year, I would not have been able to share the thousands of methods that I have learned within a year to grow your presence on the web.

You need to choose a niche that applies to all three of those questions. The niche must be something you enjoy writing about, are an expert in, and enjoy learning about. There is no in-between answer. Do not choose to write about a topic just because it is popular or your best friend likes that topic. If you can find a topic that satisfies all three of those needs, then you have successfully identified your blogging niche. With your blogging niche identified, you can now put content in front of the world that is related to your blogging niche instead of any blog post idea that comes up at the spur of the moment.

What is your blogging niche?

10 SEO Mistakes That Will Hurt Your Blog’s Search Ranking

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10 SEO Mistakes That Will Hurt Your Blog’s Search Ranking

Millions of blog posts are being written every day for various blogs across the web. One of the obvious facts that new bloggers learn quickly is that not all blogs and blog posts get equal attention. On a particular blog, some blog posts get more attention than others. There are some blog posts on this blog that always get more traffic than others. There are also some blogs that get more traffic than other ones. Out of all of the blogs I have, this one is by far the most successful.

The amount of traffic your blog gets is dependent on social media and SEO. Social media covers the sharing aspect and growing an audience on the networks you use. However, SEO is a much deeper concept that a select few understand. To everyone else, it looks like the extensive math problem that takes up the entire chalkboard.

Understanding SEO is important because it is a big avenue for traffic. Some people get thousands of daily visitors from SEO which means it is valuable. Although SEO is not exactly the do or die stage of a blog, it is important, and here are 11 mistakes you need to avoid so your blog can have better SEO.

 

#1: Not submitting your blog’s sitemap to Google.

One of the reasons why blog posts do not get SEO traffic is because they are not even indexed by Google. A sitemap presents all of the contents of your blog in a way that makes it easier for Google to read them. Submitting your blog’s sitemap to Google will allow them to properly index your blog posts. Indexing your blog posts on Google makes it possible for anyone to find any one of your blog posts with a particular search phrase.

There are many options for creating your own sitemap, but out of all of the options, the Google XML Sitemaps WP plugin is the easiest to use. This plugin makes it easy to create an XML sitemap to submit to Google so all of your blog posts can be properly indexed. Once you get your sitemap, head over to Google Webmaster Tools and submit your sitemap.

 

#2: Not knowing the difference between http and https

Actually, there is no difference, and that’s the problem. Search engines see http://www.example.com and https://www.example.com as two different websites with identical content. This is duplicate content that search engines associate with plagiarism. As a result, your SEO ranking will go down for both the http and https versions of your website.

In order for you to identify whether your blog has this problem or not, simply enter http:// before your blog’s URL. Then, do the same thing but with https:// in the front. When you do this, check your URL for spelling because you do not want a misspelled URL to give you the wrong webpage.

Your SEO is doing just fine if one of the two options worked. If both options work, then your blog’s SEO is getting hurt. For a WordPress blog, you can change your blog’s URL by going into settings–>general. Then, you can change your blog’s URL to your preference so people can either use http or https to access your blog. Visitors should not be able to use both http and https to access your blog.

 

#3: Not having meta tags for your blog posts

Search engines have a big responsibility in organizing billions of blog posts based on popularity, keywords, and value. Although search engines have this big responsibility, they struggle to understand a majority of blog posts. The reason why some valuable blog posts are not getting any search engine traffic is because they do not have meta tags.

I got introduced to meta tags more than a year and a half after I created this blog. I had to go through every blog post I ever wrote and add meta tags to them all. It was painstaking work that took several months of my time, but it was all worth it. My search engine traffic jumped up significantly after making the change. Any of my blog posts that were already doing good traffic from the search engines got a big jump in traffic.

I use the Add Meta Tags WP Plugin to add meta tags to all of my blog posts. I include keywords in these meta tags so search engines can pick up on them and promote my content. Meta tags, especially the meta tags with the right keywords, make it easier for the search engines to understand what your content is.

 

#4: Not understanding how Google sees your blog

Google sees your blog completely differently from you. It does not see the colors and pictures that may be on your blog posts. In order to make it easier for Google to see the way your blog looks, use the data highlighter in Google’s webmaster tools. Once you verify your blog, the data highlighter will allow you to let Google know how your blog looks (pictures, text, author name, etc). Using the data highlighter only takes 10-15 minutes, and it can have a big impact on your search engine traffic.

 

#5: Not improving your blog’s bounce rate

Your blog’s bounce rate allows search engines to identify how interesting your blog is. If your bounce rate is 100%, that means people are visiting your blog and then leaving without reading another article. A high bounce rate is bad for SEO and results in fewer conversions.

In order to see where your bounce rate is at, verify your blog with Alexa and then see their stats. Your blog’s bounce rate should be under 70%. A bounce rate under 70% means that at least 30% of your visitors are reading multiple articles on your blog. The lower you can get that bounce rate, the better your SEO and conversions will be.

You can lower your bounce rate through a variety of ways. Here are some of them:

  1. Include links to your older blog posts in your new ones
  2. Use Hello Bar to promote one of your articles, or better yet, a landing page
  3. Show related articles at the bottom of every blog post
  4. Show popular articles on your sidebar
  5. Redirect people to another page on your blog after they subscribe. This page should contain links to the best content on your blog.
  6. Show summaries of blog posts so people have to click (lowering bounce rate) to read the entire blog post

Most people do not see a sudden drop in their bounce rates. It takes a few weeks before seeing a significant drop in your bounce rate, and when I say significant drop, that usually means a 5-10% drop. Getting your bounce rate under 60% means you are moving in the right direction.

 

#6: Stuffing keywords

For a long time, keywords were the focal point of SEO. If your blog post had a lot of keywords, it would be on Page 1. If I decided to write the word “SEO” 100 times in all of my blog posts about SEO, those articles would have been #1 on Google. However, many people abused this rule, and Google sent their panda after those people. Many blogs suffered under the wrath of the panda, even the blogs that were getting millions of daily visitors.

If you try to stuff your blog post with keywords, then the search engines will make it more difficult for people to find your content. The worst part about keyword stuffing is that there are many offenders, but few people know that they are breaking the rule. My rule of thumb is to never use the same keyword twice in the same sentence. Synonyms are also very useful. If your keyword is “giraffe,” you can refer to the giraffe as an animal in one of your sentences instead of referring to it as a giraffe in every sentence of your blog post. Using synonyms to replace keywords will boost your blog’s SEO.

 

#7: Having too much anchor text

Anchor text is any clickable text in your blog post that leads to any webpage. In this sentence, “10 Easy Ways To Enhance Your Blog’s SEO” is anchor text. It is a clickable link that leads to another webpage. Anchor text is great for SEO and bounce rate, but having too much anchor text in one blog post can also be harmful.

The search engines won’t like it if you have dozens of anchor text links in the same blog post. However, there are worse consequences of having too much anchor text. The success of a blog all depends on how many visitors it gets and what those visitors do when they get on your blog.

If you have dozens of anchor text links in your blog post, it will be more difficult to read. I make my blog posts as easy to read as possible by writing short paragraphs and only having some anchor text. Imagine how different the reading experience of this blog post would be if every other sentence was anchor text. For the average person, it would be too much to bear, especially when there are other blogs on the web without that much anchor text.

 

#8: Letting spam comments infect your blog

Most of the comments you will get for your blog will be from spammers who are promoting their links without even bothering to read your content. New bloggers who want to boost their social proof often make the mistake of approving these comments. These bloggers reason that, based on the numbers, it is better to have 1,000 spammy comments than 10 real comments.

Having 1,000 comments indicates a popular blog, but the search engines know better. Not only are the links from most spammy comments bad (i.e. Get 5000 Twitter Followers For Just $3), but when engaged readers think of commenting on your blog, they get to see all of the spammy ones first. Would you want to comment on a forum group where all of the members were saying things like, “This is the magic pill that will make you lose 100 pounds in 10 days,” or, “Get a six-pack in six weeks”? You will lose the type of interaction that matters–the one between you and someone in your targeted audience.

 

#9: Not taking social media seriously

Social media is anything but a fad. It has completely transformed businesses and allowed blogs to suddenly become popular. The main reason this blog is popular is because of my Twitter presence. My SEO traffic has really been kicking in lately, but that is because I also get traffic from Twitter. Every day, I am getting hundreds of daily visitors from both Twitter and the search engines.

In addition to boosting your SEO traffic, social media allows you to interact with your targeted audience. I have made many wonderful connections on Twitter. Some of these people share my blog posts and buy my products. Social media is one of the most valuable traffic generating assets known to mankind.

 

#10: Not taking backlinks seriously

Backlinks are one of the most intriguing parts of SEO. When people think of backlinks, they think of the old and worn out practice of buying backlinks in bulk. Google caught on, and now the mighty search engine measures backlinks by quality instead of quantity.

When Google caught up to backlinks and declared quality over quantity, many people assumed that backlinks were simply dead. For a very long time, I assumed backlinks were dead just like many people who read contradicting advice on the web.

If you still believe backlinks are dead, take a look at the Alexa ranks for the most popular blogs on the web. Then, scroll down to see how many backlinks they have. Most of the popular blogs that are getting thousands of daily visitors also have thousands of backlinks. If you want to get more backlinks for your blog, implement these tips.

 

In Conclusion

SEO is a powerful way to get more traffic from your blog. Many of the mistakes people make are based on misconceptions and contradictory advice. I have tested various methods to boost SEO, and these are the good ones. However, SEO chances rapidly, and the methods to boost SEO are always subject to change.

You want to implement the methods that work now before Google changes the rules again with another panda attack. Implementing the methods now will allow you to get more visitors and allow more people to remember you. That way, if Google levels the SEO rules again, you’ll still get a lot of traffic from the people who remember you.

7 Reasons Why You Need To Schedule More Blog Posts

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7 Reasons Why You Need To Schedule More Blog Posts

To some, the idea of scheduling blog posts may sound unnecessary, but in reality, scheduling your blog posts in advance is a utopia. Is that a bit of a stretch? Maybe, but scheduling those blog posts in advance does come in handy. Here are seven reasons why you should start scheduling more blog posts.

 

#1: You get more comfortable as a writer

The key to producing valuable content is to be comfortable as a writer. If I had to rush this blog post and have it done by the end of the day, it would be tough to read. Being forced to write a 1,000 word blog post (which could sometimes turn into a 2,000 worder) with a time limit removes the comfort of writing.

However, I always have a month’s worth of blog posts scheduled in advance so I can comfortably write my blog posts. I can go in depth and provide more examples.

 

#2: You get to write longer blog posts

When you schedule numerous blog posts in advance, you are giving yourself extra time to add more meat to your blog posts. The reason why longer blog posts are better is because your readers stick around for a longer period of time. I could have listed these seven tips in just 50 words, but then my readers wouldn’t stay on my blog for a long period of time.

In addition to making your readers stay on your blog for a longer period of time, longer blog posts allow you to bring the main points home. I could have just mentioned that you have to get more comfortable as a writer and then went into this method. However, going more in depth allows more people to understand that something is important.

You must go into detail about why something is important instead of just stating that it is important. Being able to write longer blog posts allows you to develop a stronger why for your readers.

 

#3: You have the option to focus on more important goals when necessary

If you have months of scheduled blog post, you can take a month off of blogging and consistently publish new blog posts at the same time. In essence, your blog will temporary be systematized. Now you have the option to temporary focus all of your attention on more important goals.

When I have three month’s worth of blog posts scheduled, there is no reason for me to write blog posts at the same pace. Rules and concepts occasionally change in my niche which means if I continued at my pace and had 6-12 month’s worth of scheduled blog posts, some of them would be outdated by the time they got published.

Instead of writing more blog posts, I put more content into my books. Instead of writing 2,000 words for one of my book and a blog post each day, I am writing 4,000 words for one of my books and nothing for my blog for an entire month. That’s an extra 60,000 words for the book. The best part is that I continue to publish content on my blog at the same rate as I was before without writing a single blog post in an entire month.

 

#4: You have more control over your schedule

One of the biggest things I feared as a new blogger was getting home from an event at midnight and having to write the blog post at midnight so I could publish it at 9 am Eastern–the same time that I always publish blog posts on this blog. Luckily, that has never happened, and that’s only because I write blog posts in advance.

Scheduling blog posts gives me the ability to take a day off. I never have to write a blog post or send an email on major holidays because they are all scheduled. I get to spend time with my family instead, which is more important to me. Scheduling blog posts in advance makes sure that you never sacrifice family time so you can write the blog post that you need to publish tomorrow.

 

#5: You can do more research

Providing research in a blog post makes that blog post more interesting. If your research is related to your blog post, your readers will enjoy learning about the useful facts. For example, there are over 1 billion Facebook users. This is an interesting fact that I stick into many of my blog posts about Facebook.

Doing more research will also allow you to learn new things about your niche. The prime purpose for some of the research I conduct is to obtain new knowledge about my niche that serves as inspiration for my future blog posts. Knowledge is power, especially when it is on your side.

 

#6: Your content will grow in value

Since you are writing more comfortably, and you are able to write longer blog posts, your content will grow in value. When I first started this blog, I understood the advantage of having scheduled blog posts. As a result, I went on a complete working frenzy to schedule as many blog posts as possible.

When I rushed my blog posts, I was not doing a good job. Some were filled with basic typos that a spell check would have caught, and there were a few that confused me when I looked at them a few months later. I started to get comfortable with writing when I had numerous blog posts scheduled in advance. Then, I wrote better blog posts that, since being published, have been shared thousands of times across the web.

 

#7: You will be more a committed blogger

The more of your time and work you put into a project, the more committed you become. The typical college athlete is more committed to a sport than the typical athlete in elementary school.

The same concept applies for blogging. If you have numerous blog posts scheduled, you have more commitment because you know at this point that you have written thousands of words for your blog. I am committed to blogging because its fun, but another factor is that over 400,000 words are on this blog. It would be very difficult to simply walk away from all of that hard work.

Scheduling blog posts in advance will allow you to see the work you have accomplished. Seeing this work may make you think of your future in blogging, and that thinking process may boost your commitment.

 

In Conclusion

Scheduling blog posts in advance presents bloggers with many benefits. The main benefit of scheduling blog posts is that you become a better writer in a variety of areas. You may learn how to write more content in a shorter amount of time, write higher value content, and become a more committed blogger. I attribute the value of my blog’s content to the fact that I was able to schedule blog posts in advance, and therefore I could write comfortably knowing that I have months of blog posts scheduled in advance.

How many blog posts do you schedule in advance?

7 Reasons Why You Should Not Depend On Social Media For Blog Traffic

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7 Reasons Why You Should Not Depend On Social Media For Blog Traffic

Social media has been established as a powerful way to get more traffic and build an authority on the web. Many people have used social media to become the leaders of their niches and ultimately dominate their industries. Social media brings over 10,000 people to this blog every month.

Although social media is powerful, it is not something that we should rely on for blog traffic. There are several people who get all of their traffic from social media, or worse, one social network in particular.

The risk with relying on social media, or even worse, a single social network to bring in the bulk of your blog’s traffic is that you are putting all of your eggs in one basket. Although the basket may look nice and stable now, the basket can suddenly break, and then all of your eggs are splattered on the floor. Do you want that to happen to you? Chances are you don’t, and just in case that was not convincing enough, here are the seven reasons why you should depend on social media for blog traffic.

 

#1: Social networks change

One of the main reasons why I wrote this blog post was because I recently read an article about Twitter experimenting with an algorithm similar to Facebook. These algorithms enforce a pay to play system where growing a presence is no longer enough.

Facebook posts now only get seen by about 3% of your audience which means to have a big impact on Facebook, you need to have a ginormous audience. There was a time when Facebook did not have these algorithms and everyone was happy. With Facebook’s change, many people say a noticeable decline in Facebook engagement and traffic. Would you be happy if you had a Facebook Page with 300 fans, but only nine of those fans could see the posts on their home feed?

Does Twitter follow this exact path and create a pay to play system? Only time will tell, but Twitter talking about an algorithm suggests how little power we have in the decisions that popular social networks make. If Twitter decides to enforce the same policy as Facebook, then too bad. We will complain, but every social network has the final say in what happens.

 

#2: There are other options available

With the thought of a Twitter algorithm causing dissent amongst many users and a pay to play system being enforced, blogging has become more important than ever. Just because social media is powerful does not mean it is the only option.

With a blog, you still have the power to publish content and share it with the world. Blogging also gives you numerous advantages such as growing an email list and bringing in more sales. These advantages allow you to control the communication that you have with the people who stop by. On the other hand, social media has direct control over all of the interactions you have on it. If a social network decides to suspend your account, all conversations come to an end whether you want them to or not.

 

#3: All social networks get hacked

Many people look at Burger King’s success on the day it got hacked and aspire to be hacked themselves. Some accounts have even faked being hacked just to gain popularity. However, the latest hacks have not gone as well for the hacked accounts.

An example of this was when Uber Facts lost over 10,000 followers on the day it was hacked. Ouch! The worst part about hackings is that in most cases, they are not under your control. Some information leaks out of social networks. Remember Heartbleed?

Changing your password reduces the chances of your account getting hacked. However, anything on the web to get hacked nowadays, but if your social network gets hacked, and you have no other way of communicating with your audience, that spells trouble. Not only are you barred from your audience, but the hacker may use your account to insult your audience or post inappropriate content–all under your name.

 

#4: All social networks have bugs

There are some social networks that encounter strange bugs that make them perform differently. There are some Twitter users who get their accounts compromised every single day for no reason whatsoever. When these accounts get compromised, no tweets can be sent out. That means all of those tweets that got scheduled on HootSuite cannot be sent out because of a flaw out of your control.

No one is hacking into the account, and many of these Twitter users have resorted to 30 character passwords which still does not solve the compromise problem. If a bug affects your ability to post content on your social network, then you are losing blog traffic, interactions, and possibly sales.

 

#5: Not everyone will see your posts

No matter how much hard work you put into growing your social media audience, most of that audience will not see the social media posts that you publish. If every single one of my Twitter followers saw one of my tweets and clicked on the link, I would be getting hundreds of thousands of visitors every day (at that point, move over Huffington Post).

Too bad that is not the case. Unfortunately, no matter which platform you choose, not everyone will see your posts. However, social media happens to be a place where few people click on your posts and engage with you. I get over 10,000 visitors every month from Twitter alone. Assuming there are no repeat visitors (which is not the case), that would mean less than 10% of my followers see at least one of my tweets every month. The typical email list leads to more engagement than the typical social media account.

 

#6: Social media is addictive

Although social media is a great way to bring in more blog traffic, it is also extremely addictive. Some people spend hours on social media every week, and the amount of time people spend on social media takes time away from the big projects. Social media eats up more time than most people realize. Many people are spending three hours every day on social media while others are on social media for a longer amount of time.

When someone finally logs out after spending three hours on social media, that person may remember the blog post that needed to get published or the video that should have been uploaded to YouTube. If you are unproductively using social media for three hours every day, think about how much time you are spending unproductively on social media within a given week, month, or year. It adds up.

 

#7: Social media is not a direct way to make money on the web

When people think of making money online, they want to make money as directly as possible. Many people have tried turning social media into a direct revenue stream, but that’s not how social media works.

The function of social media is to build an awareness for your blog, get more traffic, and then have your blog optimized so it is able to bring in revenue. Since social media is addictive, it is entirely possible that the time you invest in social media does not necessarily result in more revenue.

 

In Conclusion

Just like the millions of other people who use them, I love social media. I am able to interact with my followers, build connections, and get more blog traffic. However, with the popularity of social networks, many people have become dependent on social media traffic for their blogs.

Regardless of how many visitors a social network is bringing in, you need to avoid having all of your eggs in one basket. If that basket gets dropped (whether it’s your fault or not), your blog traffic will suffer.

Utilizing social media while utilizing other avenues of traffic will allow you to become a successful blogger who is not dependent on one thing. Be sure to branch out by getting more traffic with different methods whenever you can.

5 Steps To Make Your Blog Go From Hobby To Business

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5 Steps To Make Your Blog Go From Hobby To Business

Some blogs on the web are money making machines that allow bloggers to bring in six figure incomes. Before getting to this stage, many bloggers initially take it as a hobby. I considered blogging as a hobby for a very long time. Just to be exact, it took me about a year to go from hobby to business, and I wasn’t making much money when I started (that’s true about any blogger).

You may be on the fence right now still taking blogging as a hobby. It is great to start off treating it as a hobby because you need to enjoy blogging in order to be successful. There are tips to get more traffic and make money online, but if you don’t enjoy writing content, it is not going to work out. After you can consider blogging as a hobby, and you are eager to make the transition from hobby to business (that you still enjoy), here are the five steps you need to take.

 

Step #1: Write a bunch of blogs until you find your niche

When you first start out as a blogger, it is important to avoid settling with one blog right away. Although there are some people who know what they want to write blog posts about since day one, there are other people who make big changes. I wrote blogs and blog posts about the Red Sox, Yugioh Cards, and Legos before I started this one.

If I settled with the Red Sox blog, you would not be reading this blog post right now. I refused to settle with one idea until I created this blog. It is okay to have dozens of blogs before finding the best niche for you. When you identify your main blog, you have the option of using your other blogs to test out particular plugins, themes, or code before applying them to your main blog.

 

Step #2: Focus on the main blog

Once you identify your main blog, you need to solely focus your time on that individual blog. When I first started this blog, I was still updating my Yugioh Philosophy Blog because I had no idea how far this one would go. As a result, I was writing one blog post every day for the Yugioh Philosophy Blog and one blog post every day for this one. It was only when this blog started to get more traffic than the Yugioh Philosophy Blog that I paid my undivided attention to it. As a result, I did not write another blog post on the Yugioh Philosophy Blog, and I was able to write two blog posts every day for this one (I have stopped since then because when I say two blog posts per day, I am referring to 250-500 word blog posts).

The strategies I use to promote this blog change, but the blog I promote is always the same. Don’t try to juggle responsibilities for multiple blogs because you put all of that time into one blog, and provide more value to your readers. If you insist on having multiple blogs, my recommendation is to still focus on one of them until it brings a full-time revenue. Then, create another blog and have contributors for it. Neil Patel does this very well with his Quick Sprout, KISSMetrics, and Crazy Egg blogs.

 

Step #3: Look at the leaders of your niche

The reference to Neil Patel earlier is the proper segway for looking at the leaders of your niche. I examined the leaders of my niche so I could learn new information, what works, and what does not work. Neil Patel has multiple blogs that get over 100,000 visitors every month, and I read through many of the Quick Sprout blog posts.

In addition to Neil Patel, I also read what Jeff Bullas, Kim Garst, and others put on their blogs. Seeing how the leaders of your niche are writing blog posts will give you ideas for your own content. The best way we learn is by example, and by looking at enough successful bloggers in your niche, you will be able to learn from the best examples available.

 

Step #4: Write high value content often

One of the main reasons why most people get stuck at the hobby stage is because they are not writing valuable content often. Some bloggers write inconsistently. On one month, these bloggers are able to write 10 blog posts, but the next month, these bloggers only write two blog posts. This inconsistency indicates that blogging is still a hobby.

In addition, the content you post needs to be valuable. I could have ended this blog post a long time ago if I chose, but then it wouldn’t be as valuable. I could have simply mentioned the first three steps and then scheduled the blog post. However, extending the blog post to include other steps and examples increases its value.

Instead of writing a blog post just to say that you wrote one, write a blog post that you know your targeted readers will enjoy.

 

Step #5: Create products that match your niche

Most of the blogs that are bringing in the six figure incomes are doing so with products. There is the rare exception in which ads are bringing in a bulk of the revenue, but ads are the exception, not the rule. Most people cannot make a full-time income with advertisements just because a blog would need to be getting over 100,000 visitors every month to have a good shot at it.

Instead of relying on advertisements, you need to create your own products. The web has made it incredibly easy for us to write books, launch training courses, and create membership sites. All three of these products have the power to bring in six-figure incomes. Some of the people have used these products to make millions of dollars, and that is not an exaggeration.

Creating your own blog is a great way to get more traffic and spread awareness for the products that will bring in the revenue.

 

In Conclusion

Blogging is a fun experience that can also turn in big profits. Some people make six figure incomes just from their blogs, and in order for you to start making revenue with your blog, you need to go from hobby to business. You can still enjoy writing blog posts when you make this transition, and this love for blogging is critical towards your success in the area.

Blogging success is never an overnight success. For most bloggers, it takes several years before they get the type of traffic associated with a full-time income. However, blogging success is possible, and it has transformed some people’s lives.

12 WordPress Plugins That You Need To Have

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12 WordPress Plugins That You Need To Have

One of the biggest advantages WordPress.org has on the free version is that you gain access to various plugins that can be used to enhance your blog. These plugins perform a variety of functions such as get more subscribers, boost SEO traffic, and improve the way your blog looks.

Not every WordPress plugin is created equally, and after using hundreds of plugins for this blog, I have been able to identify the most effective WordPress plugins that your blog should be utilizing. Here’s the list.

 

#1: Optin Forms

Compared to other free plugins that perform similar functions, the Optin Forms plugins does a great job at getting more subscribers. This plugin connects with a variety of emailing options such as iContact and Aweber, and it allows you to include an optin box at the end of every blog post. After you read this blog post, you will be able to see the Optin Form plugin in action asking for your email address (you get free goodies).

The optin box that you see at the end of my blog post was also very easy to create. The Optin Forms plugin gives you five pre-made themes to choose from, and you can change any of the colors and text in your optin box. You can even change the button’s color to match your blog’s color. If you want to grow your email list, the Optin Form is the next WordPress plugin that you need to install.

 

#2: Quick Page/Post Redirect

The Quick Page/Post Redirect Plugin allows you effectively redirect people to different pages on your blog or any webpage on the web. You can set up a Page in your menu that, when clicked on, can redirect your visitors to a product page, even if that product page is not a part of your blog.

When you go to this blog’s menu and click, “My Books,” you are immediately brought to my Amazon Author Page which consists of all of my books. This is a more direct approach than you clicking that page, staying on my blog, and having to click a link that leads to my Amazon Author Page first.

In addition, the URLs for your blog posts have an impact on SEO. For a blog post like “5 Blogging Tips For Success,” the usual URL would be www.yoursite.com/5-blogging-tips-for-success. However, a good SEO practice is to use fewer words in the title, and only focus on the keywords. The ideal URL would be www.yoursite.com/blogging-tips-success.

Many people realize this difference late in the process and are left with blog post URLs that are not SEO optimized. Changing the link to www.yoursite.com/blogging-tips-success would result in all of the people who go to www.yoursite.com/5-blogging-tips-for-success being led to a 404 error page. You can use the Quick Page/Post Redirect Plugin to fix this issue by having www.yoursite.com/5-blogging-tips-for-success redirect to www.yoursite.com/blogging-tips-success.

 

#3: Comment Redirect

As long as your blog posts are valuable and do not have grammatical errors, most of the people who muster up the courage to leave a comment on someone else’s blog enjoy the value that your blog provides. As a result, these people will be more likely to subscribe to your blog, but some people may not subscribe to your blog just because they do not know where the optin box is.

Even when people see my optin box made by Codeleon at the end of my blog posts, not all of them will subscribe at that moment. That’s even true for the people who comment on my blog. Some of the people who comment on my blog are not on my email list, but the Comment Redirect plugin allows me to change that.

All this plugin does is redirects someone to a different page on your blog immediately after that person submits a comment. The Comment Redirect plugin only gets applied when a visitor leaves his first comment on your blog. On this Comment Redirect Plugin, you can lead people over to a landing page, promote your most popular blog posts, or if you choose to do so, promote your products. Personally, I recommend promoting a landing page, and the last thing you want to do with the Comment Redirect is promote one of your products.

 

#4: Optimize Press

Speaking of landing pages, Optimize Press is a great plugin for creating great landing pages. I used Optimize Press to create my landing pages for my free eBook 27 Ways To Get More Retweets On Twitter. I was able to create the page in just 10 minutes, and it works. If you enter your email address on that page, you will properly get added to my list. You can create multiple landing pages for specific giveaways or reasons such as a good URL for the Comment Redirect plugin.

In addition to creating great landing pages, Optimize Press also allows you to create training courses and membership sites. Although Optimize Press is not a free plugin, it is worth every penny, and if you are confused with anything about the plugin, Optimize Press comes with great videos and support so you can get your questions answered.

 

#5: Hello Bar

Hello Bar allows me to display the message that appears on the top of my blog. The actual message up there has varied over time, but you can always promote a link (preferably a landing page or product), or you can use it as an optin form that collects email addresses.

Hello Bar has a variety of functions to choose from, and creating the actual bar is extremely easy. Hello Bar has a simple approach that allows you to easily add text, identify where you want to direct visitors who click on the link, and change any of the colors that you see. Hello Bar also has email integration for numerous mailing services such as iContact and Aweber.

One of the advantages of the Hello Bar plugin is that the message on the top can scroll down. Each time you scroll down while reading this blog post, the Hello Bar follows you. In addition, it is tempting to click on because it offers something valuable and the color combination was chosen to match the color psychology of consumers.

 

#6: Add Meta Tags

#6 is an SEO tip and a plugin’s name at the same time. Adding meta tags makes it easier for Google to understand what your blog post is about because you get to provide keywords, a short description for your content, and the title.

Keywords allows Google to identify what search terms should be used to lead people to your blog. With this knowledge, many people assume a great strategy would be to stuff their meta tags with keywords, but this is a mistake. My recommendation is to only have 5-7 keywords per blog post because if you add too many, they will lose their effectiveness on Google.

When you choose the keywords, be sure to use long-tail keywords (the ones that consist of multiple keywords). I could have chosen the keyword “WordPress plugins” for this blog post, but instead, I chose, “WordPress plugins that all blogs need to have.” Which one paints the better picture for what your blog post is about?

 

#7: Google XML Sitemaps

Not having a sitemap is a big mistake for your SEO. Google uses your blog’s sitemap to index your blog posts and make sure they get seen on their search engine. That means if you want more SEO traffic as well as a reliable way to track results, then you need a sitemap.

Normally, a sitemap is very difficult to properly create, but this is when the Google XML Sitemaps plugin steps in. This plugin makes it super easy to create your own sitemap. Then, you can submit that sitemap to Google with the webmaster tools. What may take just 15 minutes of your time may result in hundreds of extra visitors later.

 

#8: Limit Login Attempts

We must embrace the fact that the internet is not secure, and hackers are everywhere. The Twitter accounts of Burger King, Donald Trump, and Uber Facts are three of the many accounts to have been hacked. There are also hackers who are hacking into blogs and putting up bad content.

Regardless of how popular you are on the web, chances are there is a hacker who is trying to obtain your password. Some of these hackers use a computer system that logs in and enters as many password combinations as it possibly can (which means thousands per day). This is one of the reasons why many websites including WordPress encourage you use to long passwords. However, that is not enough protection.

If you gave them the opportunity, some hackers would spend days trying to log into your account until they identified your password. The Limit Login Attempts plugin is the fix to that problem. This plugin limits the number of times that you (or any hacker) can log into your blog. If any IP Address exceeds the limit, that IP Address gets locked out for the time you specify. I choose to lock people out of my blog for 12 hours just in case I am the one who enters the wrong password (or someone tries to guess my password just for fun).

I get an email each time this plugin catches someone, and I have been amazed with the results. Initially, I thought this plugin was a joke because no one would ever hack my blog. Since installing this plugin, I have learned about thousands of attempts for logging into my blog.

Another great perk of this plugin is that it gives you the IP Address that was used for the login attempts. If you Google search an IP Address, you can find the location of the computer, and better yet, you have the option to prevent that IP Address from visiting your blog. I only recommend to use this as a last resort (if the same IP Address is a repeated violator), but with limits in place, your blog is very unlikely to get hacked. In a four number password, there are 10,000 possible combinations. That means someone would have to enter 10,000 passwords before they identified whether your password has four numbers or not. This does not even include letters, special characters, or if you wisely decide to use a longer password. My password exceeds 10 characters and is filled with special symbols, numbers, and letters. With the Limit Login Attempts plugin in place, I don’t have to worry about a robot guessing until it identifies the right password.

 

#9: Pinterest Pin It Button For Images

Pinterest is a social network that does not get as much credit as it deserves. While some people are thriving on social networks such as Twitter and Facebook, there are not nearly as many people making it big on Pinterest. If you are not on Pinterest, then you are missing out.

Regardless of whether you use Pinterest or not, plenty of your visitors will have Pinterest accounts. Over 70 million people use Pinterest, and many of these people love to share pictures. If you make it easy for people to pin your blog posts, you will be able to get more traffic from Pinterest. Even if you do not have a large presence on Pinterest, some of the people who visit your blog may have large audiences on Pinterest.

The Pinterest Pin It Button For Images plugin is a plugin that adds a “Pin It” button to all of your pictures. This button only shows up when you drag your mouse on the image, but by clicking on the image, a new window that allows you to send the pin opens up to the side.

The more people share your content, the better, and Pinterest is a great source for more blog traffic.

 

#10: WWSGD

The abbreviation for this plugin stands for “What Would Seth Godin Do.” Although I wish this plugin allowed us to get business advice from the famous marketer himself, WWSGD allows you to put a message on your blog welcoming new and returning visitors alike.

You may have seen a message on the top of this blog post welcoming you back or welcoming you for the first time. These types of messages build a strong connection between you and the reader. You can customize what the messages say, and with some basic knowledge in HTML combined with Google searches, you can also modify how the box surrounding the text looks. This plugin is critical towards making your visitors feel like they belong on your blog. Making them feel like they belong will encounter those people to visit your blog numerous times. The more someone visits your blog, the more likely that person will be to buy your products and subscribe.

 

#11: WordPress Editorial Calendar

As you schedule more blog posts, it will be more confusing to remember when you scheduled blog posts. When I was writing two blog posts every day, I would accidentally send out three blog posts on some days because I scheduled two blog posts to get published at the same time. That did not help out towards keeping people on my email list.

That problem happens less often because now I only write one blog post every other day. In addition, I use the WordPress Editorial Calendar plugin. This plugin allows you to  stay organized by displaying all of your sent and scheduled blog posts on a calendar. If you do not know whether you properly scheduled a blog post three weeks in advance, you no longer have to scroll through your blog posts and look at the dates to see if that blog post was scheduled at the right time. The WordPress Editorial Calendar allows you to see the exact date and time you are scheduling certain blog posts.

 

#12: Widget Context

Isn’t it annoying when you put widgets on your blog only to realize that they should not appear on certain pages of your blog. You may not want a certain widget to be on your homepage, and you may want another widget to only show up on your homepage.

The Widget Context allows you to choose where widgets appear on your blog. If you want a widget to be displayed everywhere on your blog, then you don’t have to do anything else. The Widget Context is set to that default. However, if you only want to show your widget on certain blog posts and pages, the Widget Context plugin can be used to specify where you want the widget to show up.

The Widget Context is especially great for testing a widget. Some widgets that get put up for the first time do not work as intended just because we are not used to them. You can use the Widget Context to test out the widget on one of your blog’s pages that does not get a lot of attention. You can keep testing the widget until it works, and then you can display the widget everywhere on your blog knowing that it works.

 

In Conclusion

There are numerous WordPress plugins to choose from. However, not all of them are created equal. These 12 WordPress plugins have been the most beneficial for my blogger journey, and they have enhanced my blog in one way or the other. Plugins are essential to a blog’s success because they provide a blog with enhancements that a blog cannot provide for itself.

What are your thoughts on the 12 plugins? Do you have a favorite plugin? Please share your thoughts and plugins below.