subject: How Bloggers Can Make Money With A Popular Blog [print this page] You may have heard tales of how bloggers are making a killing online with popular blogs, and chances are much of this is true. A popular blog can get you a boatload of traffic, and properly monetized, this traffic can bring in a full-time income and more. Let's not put the cart before the horse however: what is needed first is a popular blog. Without that, there's no one around to shovel cash your way, no matter how pretty or significant your weblog is. Let's look at how you make a blog everyone wants to visit, and then how you can take advantage of that popularity.
The best way to come up with a blog that goes viral and garners a large readership is to first of all get involved with your blog. This means taking ownership, writing vibrant, well-thought out and meaningful content, as well as doing your best to get your blog in front of as many eyeballs as possible. There are some things you can do along those lines to help yourself.
Whatever your blog's subject, make sure you have the most current, vital, and useful information you can give people. You want to be the place people go when they need to gain insight on your niche. Create another ho-hum blog, and you'll be lumped with all the rest of those, lost in the bottom of the search results.
Promote your blog wherever and however you can. Make use of all the SEO you can, utilize your blog's RSS feeds, and guest blog on other blogs in your market to get more visibility. Use linkbait. Get controversial (in a good way). Use the art of headlines to your advantage. Get backlinks, allow trackbacks, monitor and be present in your blog's comments. Be a regular poster; don't let days or weeks go by without posting and expect to create a following.
Utilize Web 2.0 sites and microblogs such as Twitter and Facebook to help popularize your blog. Get involved with other bloggers.
Plan how you're going to make money with your blog before it happens. Are you simply going to have ads on your site, like Google AdSense? Will you market affiliate products? Your own products? Don't overlook the possibility if your blog becomes highly trafficked that the blog itself becomes valuable virtual real estate, and you can sell ad space directly on your blog for a lot more money than the other monetizing methods. It's something to think about.
Lastly, while making money with a blog sounds like a cool way to come up with some extra cash, be aware that the best of these blogs are first and foremost works of passion, endowed by their owners with loads of great info for their visitors. Most didn't start with the idea of making a living with their blog, but to create a marvelously useful site that others in their niche could look up to. Something else to think about!
