Blogging is serious business and can even retire you from your full time 9-5 job grind. Find out more below with our 11 Exact Steps How I Made it to Full Time Blogger as a career making real money. Do you want to know everything it takes to become a full-time blogger and be able to work in your pajamas? Then you are in luck today bold blogger!
Here are 11 steps I took with my blogs to fire my bosses forever:
1. Consider Using Your Name As A Blog Brand
I created a blog in my name first, before branching out with other more niche blogs. When you use your name you are not limited to what you want to write about. This is just my preference. If you have a great name for your website, then go for it, but if your site is called Kites B y Mary, you are restricting yourself just to “kites” in many cases or related topics and products. Using your name means that you are branding “YOU” and as you evolve through writing, so will your blog and personal brand.
2. Identify Your Niche
The riches are in the niches as they say! The best way to find your niche is to align your passion with making money. What is your knowledge around this passion and how can you help or teach others? I found the best way to write is teach as you learn. This way you are present with your audience and it feels like you are revealing fresh secrets. Talk to your audience in a conversational tone and engage them by asking questions throughout your posts.
3. Get A Self-Hosted Blog
Most people won’t even read a blog that is on a free blogging site, like WordPress.com or Blogger.com. You want your own blog, not something that ends with .wordpress.com. It is easy to set up a blog. I use Bluehost and I have never had any problems with them and their sites run fast. Also, you have full control with your own blog. I had a pretty popular site on WordPress.com a long time ago and they terminated me without any notice. All my writing was gone because I simply linked out to another website in one of my posts.
4. WordPress Platform Blogs Benefit From Plugins
Ideally you installed WordPress for your blog. This is the operating system, not the wordpress.com blog. WordPress has the ability to add “plugins” that do wonderful things to your blog, like make it faster and more SEO friendly for the search engines.
Here are my top 10 plugins:
- Akismet: Removes Spam.
- Wordfence: Awesome security and Firewall.
- Yoast: Calculates SEO on each post you write.
- Image Optimizer: Does what it says.
- Smushit: Compresses images further.
- Gzip Compressor: Compresses files for speed.
- AddtoAny: Light social share buttons.
- W3 Cache: Super fast Cache that speeds up your site.
- Add Footers and Headers: For adding Google Webmaster code.
- WP Optimize: Cleans up revisions, old drafts, and spam
5. Begin Writing
I have experimented with different size posts so much that I believe it comes down to getting your message to a size that feels right to you and is powerful. If you feel you are rambling because you want to reach a certain word count, people will sense this and get bored. So, bottom line is if you are bored writing it, your readers are bored as well! I used to write long posts, like 2,400 words, but I realized my most passionate, and least bounced posts by visiting readers are 750 words, like how professional journalists write.
6. Experiment
You won’t be a master blogger when you first start out. I had about a year of lousy posts before I started to grasp good content creation. It is okay. I love this quote: “Once a disaster, now a master.” Even if you don’t like your writing, keep going. The bottom line is you will begin to understand what works and what doesn’t by the amount of engagement your posts get by your readers.
Titles are very important. Posts with odd numbers in the beginning work well and also using powerful adjectives, like “13 Bizarre Tricks for Capturing Leads with Twitter.” Here are 64 more “power words” to get your titles popping. 64 powerful adjectives for blog posts
7. Lots of Notes
It is wise to keep a notepad or notebook handy nearby for any ideas for content that might pop up. I am constantly thinking of blog titles. I like to have at least 20 titles ahead of my writing, because if you have to think about your title before writing, it will most likely slow down your writing process. I just want to write in the morning and not have to even think about titles. Notebooks are a blogger’s best friend.
8. Blog During Your Job
Blogs take time to take off. You will probably still have a job during the first two years of blogging. It is important to set aside at least an hour a day for writing in your blog. Eventually, with the proper monetization of your blog, your blog will start to pay you more than your job. This is what it is all about as a future full time blogger.
9. Get Traffic To Your Blog
The search engines won’t really give you a lot of free, organic traffic in the beginning, so it is important to utilize your social media for getting your posts seen. Half of my blog traffic comes from X or other social networks. You can set up an automated poster CRM to post your blog posts for you such as Buffer, Dlv.it, HubSpot, or HootSuite. I set Buffer to post for me while I am sleeping and part of the morning. You can also build up subscribers on your blog and send them new posts.
10. Blog Starts Earning More Than Your Job
The day will come, with consistency and persistence, that your blog earns more than your job. I just quit my part time job last month because this blog is doing well enough that I can come home full time. This is the miracle that all aspiring bloggers want to attain. Now, I have all day to blog and come up with new concepts.
11. Transition Fully To A Full-time Blogger
Time management is the most important aspect of blogging. It is very easy to get distracted with kids, Facebook, TV, friends, etc. Set a specific time that you write and stick to it. A good rule of thumb is to work the same hours blogging as you did at your job. Imagine the output if you put all your energy that you once did at a job into your blog. It would be amazing and your blog would get more traffic which equals more income!
Big Business Blogging Bottom Line
Building a blog business from scratch is no easy undertaking. Keep these smart steps in mind to become a full-time blog business owner and ditch the 9-5 grind.
