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Find A Niche For Your Blog: Step-by-Step Guide

Blogging has become extremely popular today, but not all blogs are successful. When trying to find a niche for your blog, you want to choose one that will get traffic but also has the potential to make money.

Many people are unsuccessful because they don’t choose the right niche for their blog. They may not be passionate enough about the topic, not know enough about it or not really know how to make money from it. If you want to be a successful blogger, choosing the right niche is crucial.

Key considerations when picking a niche are your interests, the level of competition, monthly searches, money-making potential and long-term potential.

1. List Your Interests And Experience

The first step when trying to find a niche for your blog a list of all your interests. To make this list, think about your hobbies, how you enjoy spending your free time, the books you read and the TV programs you enjoy watching. An interesting exercise is to look at some of the recent Google searches you have made.

If you have little interest in a topic, you will not be able to sustain the effort required day after day to make it successful, especially when you seem to be putting in a lot of effort and you don’t see the results straight away.

Gina Michaels, who blogs for a top-rated assignment writing service company has this advice, “Don’t worry if you think you don’t know enough about a topic – you can learn as you go along and your audience will enjoy the journey with you.”

When you’re passionate about your topic, it is easier to connect with an audience. You’re less likely to run out of ideas or abandon your blog. You will be able to continue writing day after day without losing interest and keep learning and developing your skill sets within your niche.

You may be able to utilize your experience and skills to teach others. Do you embroider? Are you a carpenter? Are you skilled at DIY? Perhaps you have learned some valuable life lessons as a parent. If there are people who can benefit from your experience and skills, you have a potential audience.

2. Examine The Competition

If you’re a passionate gardener, and gardening tops your list of interests, should you go ahead and start a gardening blog? Google gardening, and you’ll be completely scared off by the number of other gardening blogs, some of which are majorly successful.

If you really want to have a gardening blog, you will have to drill right down into the topic to find a niche within that broader niche. For example, container gardening would be better than gardening but even that niche may be saturated, and you have explored all the nooks and crannies of that niche to come up with the idea that could be profitable.

3. Strike The Right Balance

Perhaps you have an interest on your list that is not so common, like making wallets from leather offcuts. You google that and find that there’s hardly any competition. You get excited, only to realize that you need to consider the demand. How many people want to find out how to make wallets from leather scraps every month?

If your blog’s niche is just too small, growth will be limited, and you may struggle to increase your traffic and even to continue to find blog topics to write about. Looking at a keyword research tool, such as Google Keyword Planner (free), can give you a good idea of how many people are searching for specific keywords.

Looking at books that have been published within a niche is also helpful. If a book has been published by one of the big publishers, such as Penguin, you will know that there’s a decent audience for the topic.

What you need to do is find a topic that strikes a balance between your interests, the level of competition and current trends. The topic can’t be too broad or too small. Too broad and you have too much competition, too small and you don’t have a big enough audience. It can be quite difficult to strike this balance.

4. Think About The Profit Potential

You may come up with a niche for your blog that you’re really passionate about, but if you can’t think of any products or services you can sell, you will not make any money. It may help to go to Amazon and have a look through the products available in a niche you’re considering to become an Amazon affiliate blogger. This may just give you the inspiration, especially if you see a particular product you can visualize selling on your website.

You can use Google Trends to find out whether an interest in a particular product is increasing or decreasing. For instance, selfie sticks were popular at one point, but interest has declined. You may have been on to a good thing selling a certain popular product for a while, but as interest declines, so your niche falls flat.

5. Think About Long-Term Possibilities

You need to consider whether the topic you have chosen can last the distance. If you choose to start a blog about a current trend, there’s no guarantee that it will last. It may be successful in the short term, but you won’t be able to count on ongoing monetary success. An evergreen topic will always be relevant and continue to bring in money year after year.

6. Think About Your Ideal Audience

Ask yourself who would benefit most from your service or product. Who are the people you most closely empathize with and understand? You have to be able to identify strongly with your audience and have insight into the challenges they face and their desires.

It helps to understand how they dress, what they eat, what they do for entertainment and much more. Unless you understand them, you’re unlikely to be able to provide them with the solutions they want. A good tip is to give your customer a name and describe him or her in great detail.

7. Create A Mind Map

Once you have narrowed down your options, it helps to create a mind map. This can even trigger ideas you may not have considered. You can write down each topic and then add applicable words such as passion, expertise, and profit.

If you can mark off all three of these factors, you will probably narrow your list right down to one or two ideas. Free Mind is open source mind mapping software you can use.

8. What Can You Bring To A Niche?

This may be the deciding factor in choosing your niche. If you believe you have something new and fresh to offer, this is an advantage. That said, don’t worry because you can be successful anyway – as long as you do what you do better than your competitors.

Finding the right niche may not be as easy as you imagined but if you go through a logical, thoughtful process, you’re more likely to find one that strikes the right balance. Many people do not get it right the first time but go on to become successful by applying what they learned in their first attempts.

Don’t be held back by your fears and spend so much time trying to find a niche that you never begin. Go through the process suggested above, take the bull by the horns and choose a name for your blog.

Remember that niche marketing does not limit you. It means that don’t have to spread yourself too thin, you have a small pool of potential clients, and it’s easier to become well known in your niche. Stay flexible, listen to feedback from your followers and you will discover more about what they want and what you can offer them. This will help you to fine-tune your niche as you go along.

Author Bio

Mary Whitman is a freelance writer and blogger based in Adelaide, South Australia. She is a Master of Arts. In her spare time, she enjoys talking about Sustainable Development and writing essays.

Long-Form Blog Posts or Bite-Sized Reads? Reel in Leads With Both Strategies

Content is the future. Research shows that compared to paid search and advertising, content marketing drives 3X more value for brands. While organizations around the world concur on the importance of content, there still remains one unanswered question – are long-form blog posts better for marketing or does short-form content win?

The battle of the word counts

Most marketers struggle with the question of word counts when creating content. While it’s true that long-form blog posts generate 9X more leads than bite-sized reads, it’s also true that an average reader’s attention span is only 37 seconds and short content is better placed to leverage this attention. So, what should marketers choose?

Experienced blog writing service providers and content marketing agencies are capable of generating both long form and short form content. However, it’s marketers who need to commission content and they can do so wisely once they understand the benefits each type of content offers.

Write Great Blog Content

 

Advantages of long-form blog posts

Long form content refers to anything above the standard 1000 words copy. Long-form content is great because:

  • It is rich with statistics and data
  • It offers writers great flexibility to be creative
  • It generates more social shares
  • It  can increase conversions by 37%
  • It generates more organic traffic
  • It is great for SEO

When to use:

  • Your brand is new to the market and you wish to give a detailed introduction of your product or service
  • The topic is highly technical or talks of a task that requires great investment from the readers
  • You are a B2B company and you are publishing important product/process information
  • You wish to create great SEO value and improve page ranking

Advantages of short-form blog posts

Bite-sized content can be anything from small 200 word blurbs to 500-600 word articles. They can extend up to 1000 words. Short form content is perfect because:

  • It is extremely mobile-friendly and perfect for readers who scan articles
  • It helps retain reader attention
  • It gives a precise and focused explanation of the topic
  • It is highly data-backed and replete with important facts and figures
  • It can act as teasers and intros to long-form content
  • It allows content writers to focus on visuals

When to use:

  • Your brand/product/service is well-known by readers and you merely wish to bring it to the audiences’ attention
  • You’re targeting readers who belong to a niche market and they respond well to jargons and concise writing
  • You’re writing for social media or a platform that requires less word count
  • You wish to use more visual content than words

How To Start A Blog: Become A Successful Blogger

Getting the best out of your long form and short form content

Research by Demand Metric shows that content marketing generates 3X more leads for brands while costing 62% lesser than other forms of marketing. Both long-form blog posts and bite-sized reads play a vital role in the success of content marketing. Let’s take a look at some of the best ways to generate more leads from both types of content:

Long form blog posts

  • Capture reader attention with case studies

Studies show that more than 78% of B2B customers use case studies when making a purchase decision. This makes long case studies the perfect marketing tool in the B2B industry.

Case studies cover vital theoretical points with examples of real-life situations and practical operations. They help buyers evaluate whether a product, technology or process will truly be helpful to their organization or not.

One of the best places to publish case studies is LinkedIn, where senior management can have the most access to it. Take a look at this study on the Canadian city of Mississauga.

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  • Publish your findings in an eBook

Some of the most popular and most engaging pieces of long content are eBooks. They cover various topics from science to art and religion to commerce. A lot of researchers and Ph.D. graduates are choosing to publish their findings not as papers, but as eBooks.

They are extremely easy-to-read, contain data-backed information, and cover an extensive range of sub-topics. Often, eBooks are also excellent as marketing materials which can be used to supplement a service such as medicine or architecture, explaining the industry, topic and the firm’s offerings.

Flywheel uses a fresh template backed by color psychology to promote their eBook. It’s attractive, descriptive, and engaging.

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  • Data-packed whitepapers rock

Whitepapers make for very compelling marketing material and approximately 76% of marketers and B2B buyers refer to whitepapers when making purchase decisions. Whitepapers are excellent tools to promote new products and services. It is a long form content that is used to provide an actionable solution to a problem commonly experienced by readers.

If you’re interested in promoting your product as the solution for a particular problem, writing a whitepaper with information about how to use your product and the benefits it will offer users in light of the problem is a great way to market your brand.

Take a look at this whitepaper (visit source) by Qompass Blockchain on cryptocurrency. It’s really interesting. 

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  • Update old posts

Have a short content that you’d love to share again? Why not update it and republish it as a new post? Research shows that Google ranks blog posts that are above 2400 words very high on its list, as longer posts give greater scope for more, high-quality backlinks.

If you have evergreen content that your readers will really benefit from, pack it in with more relevant data, updated statistics, and colorful stories and share. Social media influencer Neil Patel recommends that writers re-structure their updated posts to give it a fresh look and new feel.

Entrepreneur Timothy Skyes often updates and publishes superior-quality content on his website.

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Bite-sized reads

  • Make lists and how-to posts

Research shows that 36% of readers prefer short list-based posts compared to traditional long blog posts. Create odd-numbered listicles (this will increase post popularity by 20%) and publish it for your readers.

How-to posts are also excellent ways to provide easy-to-follow instructions in a concise format. Both of these articles will be appreciated by your readers. This listicle entitled ‘Race Day Tips: 10 Ways To Manage Race Day Panic’ is a great example.

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  • Memes are your means towards glory

One of the most viral pieces of bite-sized content is the meme. Memes have revolutionized the world of content marketing, with brands choosing to go the meme-way in their marketing efforts.

When creating memes, remember to never take yourself too seriously and always piggyback on the latest social media trends. If a famous celebrity has been in the news for a hilarious reason, use them as the background to get your point across.

Memes are short, spunky, savage, and super-effective. Just like this one by Mexican beer manufacturer Dos Equis.

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  • Go short with social

Short form content and social media posts are synonymous with each other. With average attention spans reducing and people’s desires for bite-sized content increasing, short social media posts are highly-lucrative for brands and writers alike.

A lot of research has been conducted to know what the ideal post length is on social media. Based on collective evidence by various parties, here are the results for average word count on social media platforms:

  • Facebook – 80-120 words
  • Instagram – 30-40 characters
  • Pinterest – 150-300 words
  • Twitter – 70-100 characters

Take this Twitter post by the Tata Group for example. It’s short, simple, and makes use of really nice hashtags to get noticed by leads.

Walmart’s Facebook post is another great example of how brands can create amazing bite-sized content with a combination of words and visuals.

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  • Create beautiful infographics

Studies show that colored visuals increase a person’s desire to read by 80%. Infographics with their bold colors, funky designs, and engaging symbols have all the elements necessary to make short content quirky and exciting.

It’s also been observed that while 70% readers understand labels and texts, a whopping 95% understand the focus of a post by its images. This makes infographics extremely useful and highly-impactful. This infographic by USC Marshall is a great example of a brilliant infographic. Follow the source for the complete infographic. 

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If you’re planning to write about a topic that’s dull and dry, choose to create a colorful infographic in place of a wordy content. This will draw leads in like fish to water.

Author Bio:

Nisha Prakash is a blogger specializing in social media marketing and content management. She is an avid runner and a bibliophile.

3 Critical Questions To Answer BEFORE You Start A Blog

You’ve probably heard the phrase “look before you leap” or one similar. This could not be truer than when you’re thinking of starting a blog. Here are 3 critical questions that you should answer before you start a blog to save yourself tons of heartache and frustration.

1. Before You Start A Blog… Ask Yourself Why You Want To Start A Blog?

Why Blog?

Don’t skip this question… Before you start a blog, you need to know why you’re doing it.

Your why is what’s going to keep you going when you get frustrated and want to give up. Knowing why you want to start a blog BEFORE you start blogging is critical to your success. You don’t need to know all of the “how to” details up front, but you must understand WHY you’re doing it.

Here are the 4 most common reasons for starting a blog:

  1. Start a blog to educate, teach, or show someone how to do something.
  2. Start a blog to share your personal story and experiences.
  3. Start a blog to grow your business or build your personal brand.
  4. Start a blog to sell something and make money online.

Educational BloggingStart A Blog To Educate, Teach, Or Show Someone How To Do Something

This is the most popular kind of blog. Blogging to teach, train, or educate is a way to change the world, help others, and just give back.

When you start an education blog, your thought process is around problems and solutions. Your readers have a problem, and you have an answer. The solution that you provide can be casual like an advice blog or more formal like an online course.

People who start these types of blogs love to learn and share knowledge. They enjoy helping others and watching them succeed.

This is me. I LOVE to help other people succeed, and my superpower is the ability to absorb tons of knowledge and break it down so that others can understand it.

Before starting an educational blog, ask yourself these questions and how you can provide value.

  • What are you truly good at and I mean better than everyone else you know?
  • What is the one topic that you continuously love to research and learn about?
  • What is the one thing that you can talk about for hours and hours and never get bored?
  • What skills have you acquired in your life through work or hobbies?

Educational blogs come in every shape and size. Most blogs will fall into this category.

Here are just a few examples:

  • How to create a beautiful garden
  • Home improvement instructional videos
  • Makeup instructions
  • Online cooking course
  • Teach Yoga
  • How to Master Google Docs

Start A Blog To Share Your Personal Story And Experiences

An experience-based blog is less about teaching and more about sharing. Regardless of your history, you have something to share. This type of blog tends to be less structured and more creative and flowy.

Are you one of those people who has lived a crazy, weird, or enjoyable life? Have you survived a tragedy, illness, or escaped from an abusive relationship? Are you a huge success in your industry? Or maybe, your life has been a total failure, and you can tell people what NOT to do…

Here are a few examples of blogging about life:

  • Travel blog
  • A blog about living with diabetes (though this could also be an educational blog depending on your personal style)
  • Surviving divorce / or stories about marriage or kids
  • What not to do at work
  • Your journey to health and fitness

Start A Blog To Grow Your Business Or BrandStart A Blog To Grow Your Business Or Build Your Personal Brand

Do you have an online or offline business or maybe you provide a service to others? My joy is helping small business owners, so I usually think of shop and restaurant owners, personal trainers, dentists, and new affiliate marketers.

People starting a blog for business or to build their brand need to start with a plan. You need to know what your goals are. Do you want to generate more leads, sell your services online, build a social media presence, and just get more eyes on your website?

Blogging for your business means that your topics are going to be tightly related to that business and the questions your potential customers have.

Here are a few examples of what I mean:

  • Personal Trainer. Your topics are going to be about health, fitness, and diet. The goal should be to teach and show your readers how you can help them achieve their goals.
  • Plumber. An excellent idea for a plumbing blog would be to make videos for how to solve simple plumbing issues. It shows your readers what you know, builds trust and respect, and also keeps you from getting calls where you address their problems for free over the phone.
  • Online store. Product reviews and coupons are excellent blogging topics for an online store. Again, you’re building trust and respect so that when they are ready to buy, they will want to buy from you.

Start A Blog To Make MoneyStart A Blog To Make Money

I would say that around 30% of the bloggers I’ve worked with want to at least make a little money from their blog, even if it’s just enough to cover expenses. And, another 5% of those want to quit their day job to make money online while working from home!

Making money online is very doable. It all depends on how hard you’re willing to work and learn. It’s ‘SIMPLE’ but not always ‘EASY.’ Blogging to make money is NOT a get-rich-quick type of thing as many skilled internet marketers will have you believe. There is no magic 30-day plan, no secret strategy, and there are no guarantees. But yes, it is possible to earn 6 figures from blogging – I do.

So this is where I have to provide a disclosure statement to make the “powers at be” happy…

EARNINGS DISCLAIMER

I cannot make any guarantees about how much money you will make as a blogger or if you will even be successful. Any examples provided on this site are just that, examples. Your earning potential from blogging is 100% dependent on you and your efforts.

There, now that that’s done…

I do make a 6 figure income from blogging and personally know bloggers that make 7 figures! It took me almost 3 years of consistent blogging, promoting, and learning new skills to get there. And while there are many gurus out there who will promise 6 figures in just a few months, trust me… they just want your money. The training programs are probably excellent (I’ll even recommend several on this website), but that timeframe is just not doable for a brand new blogger – there’s WAY too much to learn.

I cannot tell you how long it will take you to grow into a successful blogger, but if you’re willing to learn and work hard, and NEVER ever quit, then it is possible for you.

How To Make Money Blogging

Making money from your blog is definitely possible and can be hugely profitable. Seriously, there’s next to no overhead costs. Again, it all depends on you and how hard you’re willing to work for it.

Here are the most common ways to make money with your blog.

Direct Advertisers

These are individuals, bloggers, or larger companies that will pay you money to place advertisements or write paid reviews on your blog featuring their product or service. This can be very lucrative, and once you start getting traffic in the 10k visitors per month range, these people will find you. There’s no need to solicit them.

Affiliate Marketing

Companies like Amazon, ShareASale, ClickBank, and JVZoo have extensive networks of products and services that you can promote on your blog for a commission.

Ad Networks

The most recognizable ad network is Google Adsense. They connect advertisers with content publishers (bloggers) to place ads on your blog. Unlike traditional affiliate networks, they control what ads to run on your site. This is an excellent option to set it up once and forget it. Talk about passive income!

Create And Sell Your Own Product Or Service

This is where the real money is made. Create your own product or service to sell to your readers. It will convert better because they already know and trust you. It will make you more money because you get to keep it all – duh! So start thinking about a product or service that you can offer in the future.

2.Before You Start A Blog… What Will Your Blog Be About?

You don’t have to know everything up front, but before you start a blog, you should give some thought to what you will blog about and how you will present yourself to the world.

How To Choose Your Blogging Topic Passions Vs Money MakersPick A Blogging Topic – Passions Vs. Money Makers

Sometimes you’ll hear this referred to as your niche. It’s your primary focus, what you will blog about the most. Your niche/topic will drive everything you write about and share on your blog.

There are two schools of thought on picking the right blogging niche.

Blog About Your Passions

Some people say that you should choose something you are passionate about because that’s what gets you out of bed every morning and motivates you to write high-quality content. While that is a great thought, if your passion is underwater basket weaving, you are unlikely to make an excellent income blogging about it. One often overlooked component in blogging is that you need to be able to find related products to promote to your customer base to make money.

While I agree entirely with that concept, if your passion is painting thimbles, you are unlikely to make an excellent income blogging about it – though I’m sure there is a group of people who are very passionate about their thimbles! One often overlooked component in blogging is that you need to be able to find related products to promote to your customer base to make money.

One often overlooked component in blogging is that you need to be able to create a product or easily find related products to promote to your readers to make money blogging.

Blog For Money

There are those who say you should ONLY pick topics that are known money makers whether you are passionate about them or not. That will only work if your real passion is making money! Otherwise, you’re going to find yourself bored and uninspired – that’s no way to live…

I personally believe that it should be BOTH. You want to be sure that thousands (if not millions) of other people share your enthusiasm and interest in the topic and will pay money for products and/or services that you have to offer in the niche from time to time. Even if you’re not interested in making money from your blog, I am assuming that you at least want other people to read it, yes? Then the same rules apply.

Write down your top 3 ideas that you are passionate about and think you want to blog about. And then, do at least some research up front to make sure there are at least 1000’s (hopefully millions) of other people interested in your topic and are willing to pay money for products and services. If no one else is searching for your subject, cross that one off the list. (We’ll get into how to do this research in another article.)

What Kind Of Blog Do You Want To Create?

Not only do you need to consider your topic before you start a blog, but you’ll also want to think about the type of blog you want to have. Each of these types of blogs has a different layout, personality, and publishing requirements.

  • News Blog
  • Fashion Blog
  • Advice Blog
  • Recipe Blog
  • Travel Blog
  • Story Blog
  • Review Blog
  • eCommerce Blog

Knowing how and what you want to blog before you start blogging will make you a far more successful blogger!

Blogging Persona Reporter

What Kind Of Blogger Do You Want To Be?

When you first start thinking of starting a blog, you may not completely understand your “online persona,” but once again, you’ll at least want to give it some thought.

Your “Blogging Persona”

Your “blogging persona” can impact everything about your blog and the way you present yourself to the world. The style in which you write your blog posts, how often you publish those posts, where to share them on social media, and even how long (how many words) to make your blog posts will all be affected by your “blogging persona.”

Here are a few possible “blogging personas” to help get you started…

“Expert”

You are the ultimate source of knowledge on your particular topic, and you want to be acknowledged for your expertise. Your blog posts will be very focused, very detailed, and often quite long. These days an expert post can easily exceed 3000 – 5000 words and that’s perfectly OK. Gone are the days of 300-word “linkbait” articles.

“Storyteller”

You have a story to tell! What you’re writing is creative and flowy, and your blog posts may cover many different topics from your wedding day to your adventures remodeling your home. Wherever your inspiration leads you, that’s what you write about.

“Helper”

The helper personas are the Reviewers, DIY’ers, and how to bloggers (I tend to fall in this category). You want to help other people solve their problems in whatever way possible.

“Marketer”

You want to become a blogger for a straightforward reason – promote your business and make money. You’re not in it for the passion. You’re in it for the money.

“Reporter”

Whether it’s beauty, fashion, technology, politics, or natural foods, if it’s news and it’s happening now, you know about it want to write about it. You tend to post shorter posts more frequently with lots and lots of pictures to help tell your story.

There are much more “blogging personas” so take the time upfront to understand who you are before you start blogging. Look at other bloggers in your niche to see how they write and format their posts and website as a whole. It will save you and your readers a lot of frustration and confusion later down the road. Seriously, can you imagine going to a technical product review site where the “reviewer” proceeds to tell you about the incredible fashion show she went to last night?

Social Media Time Management3. Before You Start A Blog… How Much Time Can You Realistically Commit When You Start Blogging?

This is the single most significant points of failure for new bloggers! They commit to 5 hours per day thinking they will be successful in 2 weeks… When in reality, they’ll be lucky to get in 5 hours per week – and becoming a successful blogger takes months, maybe even years for some.

Don’t be that guy! Before you start a blog, take a serious look at your schedule – work, family, exercise, all of it. How much time do you really have to dedicate to your blog?

Set Reasonable Expectations For Yourself And Your Blog

If it’s only 1-2 hours per week, that’s great, but it’s unreasonable to expect that you’ll publish 3 posts per week in that one single hour. I recommend giving yourself 2-3 hours per blog post, at least in the beginning. You’ll also need time to get your site looking the way you want and time to learn new skills. Don’t expect to know it all right out of the gates – that’s a recipe for frustration and disaster!

If it’s only 1-2 hours per week, that’s great, but it’s unreasonable to expect that you’ll publish 3 posts per week in that one single hour. I recommend giving yourself 2-3 hours per blog post, at least in the beginning. You’ll also need time to get your site looking the way you want and time to learn new skills. Don’t expect to know it all right out of the gates – that’s a recipe for frustration and disaster!

It’s critical when you start blogging to create habits and be consistent with your posting schedule, so don’t overschedule yourself. That’s just going to stress you out. Time management and consistency are your new best friends!

My Recommendations

  1. Set the goal of writing one high-quality post per week and if you find that’s too easy, then try for 2 posts per week. Depending on your topic and your “blogging persona,” that may be more than enough. If you’re like me, you can also batch write your posts. I love to sit down on a Sunday morning and just write until my brain hurts, then I’m done for the week.
  2. Limit yourself to no more than 3 hours to get your site looking the way you want. It’s far too easy to spend hours, days, weeks, even months tweaking the way your blog looks, and honestly, as long as your blog is well-organized with a clean design, that’s all you need. Focus on those 3 hours on defining your categories and setting up your menus. Those are the keys to your success.
  3. Dedicate at least 1 hour per week learning a new skill related to blogging. SEO is my first choice, but Social Media, working with images, and learning how to become a fantastic writer is also essential.

Don’t Miss The Hottest Blogging Trends Of 2018

A number of active blogs numbers over 100 million, so how do you make your blog a standout?  Whether you are starting a blog for the first time, or you are looking to get more traffic to your blog, there are always trends to follow to make your blog shine.  Follow these blogging trends to get your site the following it deserves.

Include Engaging Media

Blogs are no longer just made up of blocks of text and a few images scattered here and there.  In today’s blogging environment, a variety of content is key.  This means not only making sure your images are high quality, but varying your use of different types of media. Fun and creative videos are the latest and most popular trend in blogging. Do not hesitate to create videos and encourage followers to follow your social media accounts. 

You can create videos using GoPros, amazing new drones, and even your iPhone! There’s no excuse not to use video today.

BlogPress Images and Video
Taking your own photos and video is a great way to get really creative with your blog.

The crème de la crème of blogging at the moment, however, has to be live streaming.  Live streaming is at this time the most immersive experience for viewers because it puts them right there with you.  Followers have the ability to interact with you, ask questions, and comment while you are streaming.  More and more people want to buy into a totally immersive experience in which they are engaging with the content as it happens in real-time.  In many cases, it goes farther than what many blog videos and images cannot do.  Depending on the brand of your blog, you can conduct interviews with special guests or even immortalize your travel adventures.

Go for Quality Over Quantity

BlogPress: Blogging, Training, and Incredible Personal SupportToday, there is simply too much content on the web to sift through.  The sheer amount of blogs that may surround your topic can be overwhelming, so the answer to this is simple: less is more.  Readers and viewers today want quality work.  Their time is precious and they want to find something worth looking at.  If they cannot find it in your content, they will quickly move on to something else.  The cure to this is to elevate the quality of your content.  Feel free to go in-depth about your specific entry, or divide the topic into a series whether it be politics, lifestyle, or media.  Sometimes this means writing more, and sometimes this means writing less.  If you are not the best editor, perhaps have a trusted friend or family member who has the skills to elevate your work for you.

Keep in Touch With Your Followers

A great deal of criticism has surfaced about the cold and impersonal nature of social media.  While these critiques do have their merits, they don’t have to hold true for you.  You can influence your followers by becoming more personable.  This means that when a follower reaches out to you, you should make an effort to reach out to them.  Often, a popular blogger or YouTuber will have followers that look up to them, so making yourself accessible via a bio, a question and answer session, or a live stream will help your followers connect to you.  It may be impossible to answer everyone’s questions, but you do have the ability to reach out when it’s appropriate.

Try Guest Posting

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Guest Posting is a great way to get your blog in front of a new audience.

Instead of competing with your fellow bloggers, try contacting them for a guest post on something you enjoy.  It need not be a direct competitor, but you can write for a variety of blogs that cover a vast network of topics.  Form relationships with your fellow bloggers and you may be surprised at the following you will gain.

Blogging should be a fun and engaging experience for both you and the audience.  If you want to continue to have a successful blog in the future, follow these tips add a nice polish to your blog.

Education Blogs: How To Stand Out From The Crowd

Did you know that almost 16 million of Americans participate in education and training programs? It means that if you decide to start an education blog, your audience will be huge.  Educational blogging is a good way to share your experience with people who need it and to become more popular in your industry. Moreover, there is a great opportunity to earn some money and to travel around the world, as you will be able to work online.

Teachers, students, and parents need time and effort to adapt to the changes. They need to get instructions and fresh information. That’s what educational blogging is all about.

Education blogs are usually maintained by teachers, tutors, or even parents. They cover anything from new teaching methods to homeschooling plans. Some bloggers provide full online courses, as well as technology tips and news about the current state of education. They are making huge contributions towards the growth of the industry.

The majority of educational bloggers use their blogs for class blogs, student blogs, and class blogs with individual student blogs. However, personal blogs are also very popular in the education niche.

Education Blogs: How To Stand Out From The Crowd

What Are Education Blogs And Why Do We Need Them?

  • Every blog makes important contributions to the online base of knowledge. Whenever we have questions or problems, we find solutions in high-quality blog posts.
  • They are great for communication between teachers. An educator can use the blog to share their experience with other teachers and ask for their feedback.             
  • Teachers can also use the blog to share news, assignments, reminders, and tips with students and their parents.   
  • Thanks to blogging, teachers, students, and parents can encourage debates on important issues related to education.
  • The students can share their studying methods, as well as the progress they make on different projects. Blogging is a nice way for them to share thoughts and opinions.
  • When a student starts blogging from an early age, they are developing valuable writing skills. Consider it this way: you’re training the next generation of successful bloggers, who will make the Internet better.

It’s clear: any teacher or student can benefit from a blog. There is a huge challenge to overcome, though: there are thousands of blogs that already cover topics similar to the ones you have in mind. Uniqueness and value are the most important principles of blogging. How do you make your project different?

Education Blogs: How To Stand Out From The Crowd

Educational Blogging Tips: How To Stand Out From The Crowd

How do you define the concept uniqueness in blogging? It’s not about thinking of a topic that has never been covered in the history of blogging. Get real: can you think of such topic? Maybe you have an idea, but you can’t maintain a blog based on that premise. Uniqueness is all about tackling trending and evergreen topics in a different way. It’s about finding your voice and conveying it through captivating posts that the audience loves reading. We’ll share some tips that will help you get there.

1. If You’re Tackling Politics, Make Strong Arguments

Every educator and parent have their point of view regarding education. Every blogger, in general, has opinions about society. Whether we like it or not, that point is often related to politics. Criticism is highly necessary for this niche since that’s what drives the education system forward.

However, you have to keep in mind that people don’t like reading blogs exclusively focused on politics and pedagogy. If you really want to bring light to some issues, you need to do it occasionally. Most of all, you have to expose unique arguments and support them with facts. Keep in mind that you’re just another blogger in this niche. You’ll come across different points of view and you’ll have to handle criticism if you cover these topics.

Share Unique Experiences

Storytelling is an effective method for writing blog posts. People are not after strict guidelines and lecturing attitude when they read blogs. They want tips and opinions supported by actual experience.

If you’re an educator, tutor, or homeschooling parent, you should personalize the process of teaching according to the needs of your students. Each student has unique interests and a different capacity to process information. You experiment with different methods so you can share them with the online audience. Think out of the box and provide something valuable for your readers. For example, Julie Petersen, an educational blogger, provides scholarships at her essay writing companies review blog, to help students take the most of their studies.

2. Listen to Your Readers

You already wrote about the ed-tech products you use, you shared your teaching methods, and you covered some personal experiences. Now what? When you’re on a consistent blogging schedule, you’ll inevitably come to a point when you’re blocked. Every blogger faces such blockade. All topics will seem boring. That’s when you need your readers more than ever.

Ask your readers for their opinions at the end of each post you write. They will use that opportunity to give you credit for the good ideas and criticize you for something they don’t agree with. However, they will also ask questions that reveal new topics for you to work on. When you’re listening to your audience, you write more relevant posts.

3. Make Case Studies

HubSpot is one of the most successful marketing blogs on the Internet. Do you know why? First of all, it’s a high-quality blog with huge value for marketers. Many of the articles are supported with case studies, which make the readers aware of the way theory works in practice.

Let’s say you started using a new note-taking app in the classroom. You invited your students to use their tablets instead of the usual notebooks for taking notes. How did that work? How did their productivity, engagement, and efficiency change after this? You can measure their speed in taking notes and note if they are listening more when they don’t have to write in a notebook. Notice what results they will have on the test at the end of the lecture and turn that experience into a case study.

You can turn various classroom experiences into unique case studies.

There is no magic formula that leads you to successful blogging. Focus, persistence, and uniqueness – that’s the clear recipe for success. You’ll discover your own ways to attract the audience, and that’s what makes you a unique blogger.

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