Are you skilled in grammar and enjoy writing? How about earning money by creating content and sharing your interests with the world? Blogging is the best way to do that.
With a blog, you can offer various services and make money. Some of the services you can offer include
- Subscription memberships
- Sponsorships
- Drop shipping
- Affiliate marketing
- Selling physical and digital products
What`s better, you don`t need technical expertise to start a website, and this article will guide you through how to start a blog that earns you money.
Choose a Specialty
If you want to succeed in blogging, don`t be a generalist. That`s because people don`t get online searching for anything. They search for specific answers to their queries, and if you want to be seen as an authority, focus on a particular topic.
Targeting a specific niche will enable you to attract people with a high purchasing potential.
Niching builds trust with the audience and sets you as an authority, which makes people refer to your website for relevant information.
To find a niche, you can target your professional skills or talents and interests.
For instance, if you are an automotive engineer, you can create a website and cover content related to cars. If you have no formal profession but are interested in say RnB music, you can create content targeting that particular audience.
Niching on topics you are experienced in and interested in enables you to be innovative and create helpful content that sets you as an authority. When your content is helpful it`s easy to convince people to read and perform your calls to action.
Here is more about how to choose the perfect niche for your blog.
Create a Website
You can`t be a blogger without a website. This is where you will showcase your expertise.
The good thing is that you don`t need any technical knowledge to create a website. Plus, you can create one even for free and still monetize it.
There are many blogging platforms to choose from, such as
These platforms provide paid and unpaid plans you can choose from according to your needs and financial stability.
For the free plans, blogger is the best option because it`s easy to create and you don`t need to upgrade to monetize it. You only need a Gmail and you are okay to start.
To create a website on Blogger, search for www.blogger.com, open it, and sign in with your Gmail account.
On the right side of the page, select “create a new blog” and name your website, and that`s all; your website will be created.
Then choose your theme. A theme is an appearance that identifies your brand.
There are themes according to your blog's niche, be it travel, entertainment, food blogs, etc.
However, people don`t trust free blogs. To make your website trustworthy, buy a custom domain. A free domain includes the web development company`s name, which looks unprofessional. For instance, if your website name is Instant Cash, people will trust and easily remember it if the domain name is instantcash.com than if it`s instantcash.blogspot.com.
You can purchase a custom from Namecheap at only $15 per year.
Check out how Namecheap can help you start and run a successful business.
Then connect your domain with your website to look professional and attract more people.
Create Content
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| Image by Shantanu Kumar: Pexels |
On the internet, content creation is the main way to reach your target audience.
For your content to convince people to read and take your desired action, you must solve their challenges. To do that, you need to research what they type when searching for products related to yours and solve those search queries.
Here are the steps you should take:
Do Keyword Research
When people are searching for shoes, for instance, they may type “women`s wedding shoes”. The phrase “women`s wedding shoes” is what is called a keyword—the words people use when making searches online.
So, based on your niche, think of what people type when searching for products relevant to yours.
If you want to write about durable office wear shoes, that`s what you should research and see the terms used.
So, you will type the phrase in the search engines and search. Then move down the search engine page and see the related searches.
.png "Keyword research")
These are recent searches related to your keyword. Choose the more relevant ones and list them.
Besides, you can do keyword autosuggest, which refers to typing a keyword in the search engines and checking the displayed suggestions.
In the case of the office wear shoe keyword, type the keyword in the search bar, put a space, and then write another later and suggestions will be displayed. These also result from recent searches.
You can choose the relevant ones and list them.
.png "Keyword autosuggest")
Then check if the keywords have a probability of drawing readers if you use them. That is by checking their volume, competitiveness, and trends.
Keyword volume refers to how many searches a keyword gets monthly, while competitiveness is how difficult it can be to rank for a certain keyword. Meanwhile, trend refers to how popular a keyword is and whether the popularity decreases or increases.
To get this data, you need to use keyword research tools, which also have free and paid plans.
With the paid plans, you will see many more details, but if you have no big budget, you can start with the free plans.
Some of the best keyword research tools include
To use them, paste your keyword in the tool and search. It will reveal the keyword volume and difficulty.
With some tools, you can check the results only if you sign up, while others don`t require signing up, e.g., Ubbersuggest.
Here is what you can get if you use it to search for the keyword “office wear shoes”:
.png "Using Ubbersuggest to do keyword research")
Keywords with 100 to 1000 searches per month have a potential of ranking, so ensure to aim for those. For keyword difficulty, go for keywords with a 30–50 difficult score.
Keywords with less volume get few searches, and using them won`t give you traffic and rank your site. Meanwhile, if you use a difficult keyword, you won`t appear on the relevant searches easily.
However, most high-volume keywords have a high difficulty. If you want to use them, you should make them more targeted.
If you want to create content about wedding shoes, for example, and the keyword wedding shoes is competitive, you can make it targeted like this:
The Trending Stylist Wedding Shoes for a Kenyan Traditional Wedding
That will help you stand out and rank for keywords that target a specific audience with the potential to read your content and perform your calls to action.
For keyword trends, you can use Google Trends, which is free to use as long as you have a Gmail account.
All you need is to paste your keyword in the tool and search. It will reveal the percentage for which the keyword trends and whether there is an increase or decrease.
What`s better, you can search by cities, countries, or worldwide to know the perfect keywords to target for particular places. You can also target your searches according to platforms, duration, and the types of categories (whether arts, fashion, fitness, etc.). With Google Trends, you are guaranteed fast and accurate results.
After doing this, you will get an insight into the keywords to use and have a high chance of ranking.
Check out this resource for more on how to do keyword research.
Create Scannable, Helpful Content
You will attract readers and convince them to perform your desired action if your content solves their search intent. For instance, if your content is about how to do affiliate marketing, it should explain
- How to choose the affiliate niche
- Where to find the affiliate products
- How to market the products
- How to manage sales
That enables people to get value from your content and makes you a source of information on that topic, which builds trust.
However, no matter how valuable your content may be, if readers have to strain to read, you will lose traffic.
In fact, Nielsen Norman Group`s research states that people don`t read online, they scan.
Therefore, to compete for readership, ensure readers can easily consume your content, and that can be possible by using a readable font.
Use medium font size and a clear font type so that one doesn`t have to squirt to see the letters. A good font to use is Arial, font number 13. However, all blogs' default font is usually legible. So, to avoid complications, use the default one.
Besides, use simple language—don’t use too formal language. People will have a hard time understanding, which will lead you to lose readers.
Also, don`t use too informal (slang) or vulgar (curse) language; you will alienate others. Don`t say, “Homie, you gonna learn how to get dough ” Instead, say “Friend, you are going to learn how to make money”.
Moreover, break down your content into small sections and make your content navigable. This involves
Creating Headings and Subheadings
Headings are guidelines for your content`s focus. Without them, your content looks like an unreadable wall of text, which puts off readers.
Therefore, always ensure to create headings that are relevant to your content and beneficial to your readers.
For instance, if your content is about the best sneakers, the heading must show why the audience should consider the sneakers best. That could be something like
The Best Sneakers to Rock Your Party and Win Your Favourite Girl
So, people will click to know how the sneakers will help them rock the party and win girls.
Apart from that, make your headings short so people can quickly understand what the content is about and decide whether to read on or not.
The best heading length is 60 to 65 characters. Such length doesn`t bore readers.
Furthermore, all the subheadings should be connected to the main heading logically.
If the main heading is The Best Shoes to Rock Your Party and Win Your Favourite Girl, your subheadings can be
- Men`s Sneakers
- Loafer Shoes
- Chelsea Boots
- Ankle Boots
But if one of your headings is “How to make money with men`s party shoes”, you are out of topic and risk losing your readers.
Breaking content into subheadings enables readers to easily move and read their favorite sections.
Read this content on how to create intriguing titles and learn more about how you can create client-focused headings.
Using Short Paragraphs and Sentences
Content is easy to understand if it`s written in short paragraphs. This provides a white space which helps people to move between sentences.
Too long paragraphs are tiresome and confusing. People might find themselves repeating sentences because there is no white space to guide them.
The maximum number of sentences in a paragraph should be three, but even a single sentence can make a paragraph, provided that it carries a single idea.
A single-sentence paragraph can be, “I love Chelsea boots”. It completes the idea of what the speaker loves.
If you want to add other sentences to that paragraph, ensure, they support the idea of why you love those shoe types, e.g.,
I love Chelsea shoes. They are stylish and durable. That`s why I use them for almost every party.
Every sentence supports the same idea. If instead of that, you write, “ I love Chelsea boots. I will go to France this summer.
You will be out of topic because going to France has nothing to do with Chelsea boots.
Additionally, make your sentences short as well. That will help you to avoid making grammar mistakes.
Long sentences are easy to make mistakes and hard to read, so aim at creating sentences that are 25 words or less.
Also, highlight the important parts of your sentences with bold and italics. However, don`t use both for the same purpose. Use bold for words that need much emphasis and italics for words that don`t need much emphasis.
Here is an example of how you can use bold in a sentence:
If you want to succeed in business, be consistent. The word consistent is bolded because it is the focus of the sentence and important for the reader to consider to succeed.
You can use italics in quotes, titles, conversations, and words with less emphasis.
Here is how you can use italics:
“If you want to get beautiful girls, wear the latest fashions.”
The phrase is italicized because though girls might be attracted by how you wear, you don`t have to wear the latest fashions to get one.
Using Lists
Items are easily readable if arranged vertically, especially when they are more than three. So, whenever you have a list, list it vertically.
However, don`t group too many items in one list; seven should be the maximum and five the optimum.
Every item in the list should be related to each other and align with the subheading. Moreover, make every list parallel to the other.
For example, if you are talking about how to make money online, your lists could be
- Do freelance writing
- Sell printables
- Sell video editing
- Do social media management
These items focus on a single idea—how to make money online. They also start with the same part of speech: a verb, which makes them parallel.
However, if you create lists based on the same idea, how to make money online, like this:
- Do freelance writing
- Sell printables
- Doing social media management
- How to edit
The point “How to edit” isn`t related to the subject that introduces the lists, and “Doing social media management, starts with a participle, making it unparalleled to the other items.
Utilizing Keywords
Search engines understand and rank content to the relevant searches based on the keywords you use. Therefore, incorporate your keywords throughout your content. Incorporate it in the main heading, thrice or twice in the subheadings, and six to ten times in the content body.
However, make the keywords flow naturally. Too much repetition makes the content look awful, which bores and makes readers ignore the content. Besides, keyword stuffing is a crime that can make your content rank lower, and lose traffic.
Here is an example of keyword-stuffed content:
Cameras are essential if you want to do photography. So if you are looking for cameras, our cameras are the best. Visit us at our website and buy a cheap camera for your social media business.
This paragraph repeats the word camera to trick the search engines and rank, but it doesn`t benefit the reader.
To improve it, you can make it “To succeed in social media marketing, you need a perfect camera. On our website, we have the best ones suiting your budget. Visit us today and buy yours.
Such content uses the keywords naturally and provides value to the readers, making it easy to convince them to buy.
Adding Images
Apart from making content attractive, images help people understand the topic discussed.
If your content is about the best shoes to rock a nightclub party and you don`t include images, people won`t be interested in your content. You never know who does or doesn`t know about the products you are talking about, so make sure to show people the relevant products.
Also, ensure to attribute your images if you find them from an online source to avoid being sued for copyright infringement (ignore the attribute if you use original images).
Here is an example of how you should attribute your images:
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| This is the attribute: Image by Christina Morillo: Pexels |
Also, write image ALT descriptions that include your content focus keyword. ALT descriptions are words that describe the image. This enables search to engines understand your images and relate them to relevant searches.
Adding Links to Your Content
Both people and search engines find content online through links. So, linking your content to other sources makes it more navigable.
Therefore, add external and internal links to your content.
External links are links from other content from third-party websites. These links back up your content and enable readers to find it through other websites.
However, link your website to authoritative and relevant websites to your niche and your content topic. Plus, hyperlink a relevant anchor text.
Here is an example of a well-external linked text:
If you want your website to rank high on the search engines, you should use SEO optimization.
In this case, you should link the keyword SEO optimization to content relevant to SEO.
Conversely, internal linking involves linking your content to other content on the same website.
That enables you to direct readers from one content to the other and increase their stay on the site, which increases traffic and indexability.
Ensure to interlink related pages as well. You can send people from content about how to create a poem to a page about types of poems, but not to a page on SEO tips to rank a poetry website.
Marketing Your Blog
There are various ways to market your online business. Apart from using SEO optimization, which involves using the appropriate keywords, you can use methods like
Social Media Marketing
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There are clients for any kind of business on social media. To be successful you have to find the relevant audience for your business.
To succeed in social media marketing, start with a few platforms, and learn how they work before adding more. That`s because every social media platform requires a different marketing strategy.
Other platforms allow long-form content, e.g., LinkedIn, while others require short form, such as Twitter.
When starting, you can choose platforms like Pinterest, Facebook, and Instagram. These platforms don`t require creating long-form content; therefore, they won`t overwhelm you if you start promoting your blog on them.
So, create accounts and join several groups aligning with your niche. Then post content to create awareness and draw people to your website. Post helpful content so people know how they will benefit from your blog.
For example, if you sell poetry books, your posts could be
Do you know you can make $100 daily creating poems? Look at how these books can help you make a living from your poetry talent.
That will intrigue people to want to know how the books can help them, hence following your links and increasing traffic to your blog.
However, ensure the content on your blog aligns with the social media posts.
Additionally, don`t always post promotional content on your social media platforms—mix some entertaining content as well. You can make a ratio of two fun posts and three promotional ones.
If you are stuck about how to create social media posts, you can use tools like Canva. This tool will help you to create a social media post for any social media platform easily.
It has a free and paid membership, but for starters, the templates provided in the free plan are sufficient.
To use it, you only need to create an account and click on the social media option you want to create content for and you will find various templates to edit.
When creating social media content, ensure they relate to your website theme and voice to maintain a brand identity.
Email Marketing
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| Image by Karolina Grabowska: Pexels |
This is when you market your blog through an email list.
If you have an email list, algorithm changes or SEO practices can`t be an obstacle in your marketing. Whenever you create content, you already have an audience you can promote to.
To build an email list, choose an email provider and create a professional business email.
Some of the best email providers are
Building a professional email enables people to easily identify and relate your email to your business, which builds trust.
A professional email includes a business name as a suffix. If your website name is kibakingonyo.com, the email address can be kaneema@kibakingonyo.com.
People doubt generic emails, and using any can make you lose subscribers. A generic email has a suffix unrelated to the business e.g., Kaneema@gmail.com.
After creating your email address, create landing pages on your website to entice people to sign up.
To intrigue them, you can offer an incentive like a free e-book. So people will sign up for the free e-book to help them learn how to earn money blogging. In exchange, you will collect emails.
You can also market your landing pages on your social media platforms.
Moreover, you can create offers or contests on social media in which one must submit their emails to participate.
For example, you can ask people to answer a question about Maya Angelou`s citizenship and promise to give the first ten people access to a free blogging course. For someone to participate in the contest, they`ll have to submit their email, which you can use later to promote your business.
However, give simple questions relevant to your niche.
After collecting the email addresses, send people an email promoting your business and convince them to purchase your products or services.
Here is more about how to effectively do email marketing and make money online.
Guest Blogging
One of the ways to increase brand awareness is to collaborate with people who have the same business as yours. And in online business, one of the ways to do that is through guest blogging.
Guest blogging refers to creating content for third-party websites and linking to yours.
To do that, you have to find relevant businesses and reach out to them asking for guest blogging opportunities.
However, ensure to contact established websites in your industry. They should be websites that have good traffic.
To find such websites, you can type your niche followed by guest blogging on the search engines and search. If you are in the fashion niche, for instance, you can type
- Fashion blogs accepting guest blogging
- Fashion blogs to guest post
- Guest blogging fashion blogs
You can use as many variations as you want and you will find many guest blogging opportunities to pitch.
Then list the websites, and create emails asking for guest blogging opportunities. In your emails, tell them how they can benefit from your blogging ideas, and if they feel you are a good fit, they will accept you.
When you create the post, they will link back to you and also include your profile on their site so people can know who you are and follow you.
Therefore, if you get that opportunity, ensure to create high-quality content to showcase authority and you`ll drive traffic to your blog.
Check out how to create a perfect copy that converts here.
Monetizing Your Blog
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| Image by Karolina Grabowska: Pexels |
Your knowledge will be profitable if it can enable you to earn money. That`s what monetizing means.
There are various ways to monetize your blog, including
Affiliate Marketing
This is when you promote links that direct people to buy products or services then you earn a commission.
Some affiliate programs allow you to earn for generating leads to their services while in others, you can only get a commission when you make a sale.
To do affiliate marketing, you need to find companies offering affiliate programs.
You can find such companies through affiliate networks or find a stand-alone company that has an affiliate program.
Some of the best affiliate networks are
You need to create an account in these programs and, when accepted, choose the products or services you want to promote and send a request. When approved, you can start promoting.
To find stand-alone affiliate networks, search for the products you want to market and see if they have affiliate marketing programs.
You can for example type and search, “Getresponse affiliate program”. When you find that it has affiliate programs, you can apply to promote it. When you get accepted, you can start promoting and earn money whenever people purchase it.
Here is more about how to do affiliate marketing.
Selling E-books and E-courses
If you gain more knowledge about your industry, you can also create e-books and e-courses and sell them to your audience.
For example, if you start earning from your poetry blog, you can create a course or book teaching people how to start a poetry blog that makes money.
To create courses or ebooks, you can use platforms like
Through these platforms, you can sell your courses as well. So, you will use both your blogs and these platforms to market your e-books and courses.
You can also market them through social media and convince people to buy them.
Offer Freelance Writing Services
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| Image by Yan Krukau: Pexels |
Anyone can start a blog, but not everybody is good at creating content that attracts readers. Moreover, though others are good writers, they don`t have time to create content. That`s when freelance writing helps.
You can offer freelance writing services to other people and make money.
Since you already have content on your blog, you can use that as your sample when applying for jobs.
To find jobs, you can find websites related to your niche and pitch your services.
Besides, you can create profiles on freelance writing websites and offer your services. Some of these websites include
Also, you can join freelance writing social media groups, and then whenever someone posts jobs, you can apply for them. When hired, you create the content and make money.
This article explains more about how to be a freelance writer and earn money.
Final Say
Though it won`t make you rich quickly, if you are consistent and patient, you can earn a living through blogging.
What matters is to follow the required steps, which are niching and creating a blog where you offer helpful content.
Then market the content on various platforms consistently.
Later, start doing affiliate marketing or selling products and services, and you will build a business to rely on for years.
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