Plan For Your Blog To Succeed

Over six years ago, I started blogging from my passion to help others in the publishing community. My idea was simple: to give my insight about the writing and publishing world. I’m using those words in the broadest possible way so I write about the magazine and book worlds. I highlight new products that I’ve created and what I learn from others. While I never dreamed it would get this big, my blog has over 1,000 searchable entries in it. This place alone has a wealth of material about writing.

Millions of people start a blog with no plan. They have a passion for their topic and begin pouring words into their blog and posting them on a regular basis. I applaud that passion but one of the keys for your blog to succeed is that you have a plan for how your blog will earn money.

I’ve heard of people who turn their blogs into a six-figure income center yet I’ve also watched others start a blog, work hard at it and then eventually abandon it because it didn’t make them a dime.

I’m sure you’d like to be in the former category rather than the latter.

You can increase your chances of doing so but following these three easy steps for making money as a blogger…

Step 1: Create quality content in a hot niche.

People aren’t interested in reading ads or “spun” articles that are nothing more than gibberish. They want solutions to their problems. And that means they need quality content. In other words, they want useful information that solves their problems.

Here’s the key, though: While the information you provide should be useful, it should also be incomplete.

That is, it shouldn’t completely solve your prospects’ problems. After all, if you completely solve your prospects’ problems, then they really have no need to buy what you’re selling.

One way to provide useful but incomplete solutions is by sharing articles that tell people what to do, but don’t go into detail about how to do it.

Example: A marketing blog might have the instruction “buy a good domain name at NameCheap.com,” but it doesn’t get into the details of what it means to buy a “good” domain name. Then the blogger can point to a short report that tells people how to build a website (which includes how to choose a good domain name).

Step 2: Monetize your blog.

You’re already providing useful content. Soon you’ll have plenty of readers eyeballing this content. So before you bring in the traffic, you need to find ways to monetize the traffic. Here are three ways:

* Promote products and services. These could be your own products or affiliate products. If you don’t know or understand the word affiliate, I encourage you to get my free Ebook on this billion dollar industry (click the link in this sentence). Read my Ebook and sign up to become one of my affiliates.

* Sell advertising space.

Example: You can sell a rotating banner ad on the home page of your blog. You can even sell plain text links.

* Get people on your list. Instead of focusing on getting people to buy products or click on ads, you can focus on getting them on your list. Then you can build a relationship with them, which makes it easier for you to sell products on the backend.

Step 3: Drive traffic to your blog.

Your blog is ready to make some money – now you just need traffic! Here are three ways to get traffic:

* Start a Facebook Fan Page. I used a simple tool Facebook Fan Page Engine to build my own Facebook Fan page. You can see my Facebook Fan page at this link. Please click the “like” button and get my free Ebook.

* Get JV (joint venture partners). Then co-promote each other on your blogs, such as by guest blogging.

* Submit articles to article directories such as EzineArticles.com.

There’s not enough room in this article to share with you all the tips you need to know to make a killing with your blog. That’s why you need The 31-Day Guide to Blogging for Bucks. Get your copy here now: http://bucksforblog.com.