Blogging is a hobby, yet it can also be a business idea. When done correctly, blogging can earn staggering amounts of money and replace your main job. While it’s true that hardly any bloggers make a decent amount of cash, there’s an obvious reason for this: They don’t treat their blogs like a business.
Act like blogging is a hobby and it will always stay as such. Do you make money from other hobbies? No, so you won’t earn income from blogging. With a bit of extra dedication, you can treat your blog like a small business enterprise and see it grow bigger and better. The money starts piling up and you’re considered a full-on digital entrepreneur.
We know what’s on your mind - how do you treat your blog like a business? Read on to find the most effective ways of doing this and the benefits they provide.
Blogging Is Great For Business
Companies who have blogs produce 67% more leads monthly (average) than companies that don't blog.
- DemandMetricDevelop A Marketing Strategy
All businesses depend on marketing strategies to get off the ground. When you operate a restaurant business, you need to promote your establishment so people choose it over all the others in the area.
It’s the same concept for a blog - only much, much, worse. Estimates suggest over 600 million blogs exist online, so you’ll have lots of competition. Of course, you’ll only compete with blogs similar to yours, but you still need to implement a marketing strategy. We’ll help you get started by mentioning a few key things to consider when creating your strategy:
- Search engine optimization
- Paid advertising
- Social media marketing
- Link building
- Keyword research
All of these things are topics themselves and we urge you to read about them in your own time. Understand how to market your blog and it will start drawing in more web traffic. Traffic is the key to your success; a blog with plenty of visitors will earn more money than one without.
Make Smart Investments In Your Blog
What happens when you start a small business? Things don’t appear out of nowhere - you spend money to get everything off the ground. Blogging differs in that anyone can set up a blog and start writing without spending a penny. You’ll find plenty of free blogging platforms out there if you like doing this for fun with no intention of making money.
Free platforms let you do the basics, but they won’t help you grow a successful blog. You won’t have access to any useful features that help you market your website or accept adverts. You’ll also be stuck with preset themes that make your blog look like many others out there.
Treat your blog like a business and start making investments. These investments change as your blog expands and becomes more successful. In the beginning, you should purchase the following:
- Premium subscriptions to blogging platforms
- Web design services
- Paid advertising services to promote your blog
More things come to mind, though you get the idea; smart investments improve your blog and move it one step closer to being a money-making machine. Stop thinking about how much something costs and start looking at what you’ll gain from it. Get into the habit of looking at the potential return on investment - spending $300 now sounds like a big deal, but what if it helps your blog earn hundreds of dollars per month?
The bigger your blog gets, the more you might think about other investments, such as hiring employees or assistants to help manage your blog. Again, it’s just like a business; investing in help could push your blog to the next level.
Attend Networking Events For Bloggers
Business owners will regularly be encouraged to attend business events and conferences. Why? Because they present networking opportunities. A business conference brings hundreds, maybe thousands, of like-minded businesspeople together. It’s the prime spot for an entrepreneur to gain new contacts or strike partnerships with other companies.
The same is true for bloggers and their blogs. Blogging feels like an individual thing, but it’s always better when more people are involved. Attend blogging conferences to spend time with other bloggers. Talk to people and get their contact details. From here, you could arrange for guest posts to be put on their site, tapping into their audience. Collaborations help foster more success and drive new traffic to your blog.
There’s more! Conferences are typically sponsored by brands - or sometimes brands will attend to engage with bloggers and discover new partners. It’s the perfect opportunity to network and sew the seeds for a potential brand deal.
Track Your Performance To Spot Trends
When you run a business, you’re unlikely to let things lie as they are. Nobody sets up an online store and then goes “Okay, let’s see if people buy the products!”. It’s so underproductive and leads to an astounding waste of money.
Instead, business owners will constantly track their performance. They look at metrics like sales, revenue, conversions, etc, to see how they’re doing. It lets them spot trends and make adjustments to improve performance in the future.
Do the same with your blog! Use web analytics software to track every aspect of your site. See where your traffic comes from, monitor how they behave on your pages, and understand what can be done to make your blog a better place.
Dedicate Time To Your Blog Every Day
Business owners are constantly tending to their companies. They’re always working on new things and treating business ownership like a job. It’s only when you’re truly successful that you have enough money to delegate these tasks to others.
From a blogging perspective, you need a similar approach. Dedicate time to your blog every day. The more hours you put into it, the more you’ll get out. If you’re spending an hour a day writing one blog post, then you won’t see many benefits. If you’re spending 6 or 7 hours properly going through your blog, working on marketing, and so on, then you’ll see the true gains.
At the end of the day, you must treat your blog like a business if you want it to provide the same rewards as a small business! It will require lots of dedication, but you get out what you put in. Make your blog grow bigger and better by adopting the thoughts and ideas presented above.
