For many people who are pushing their side income hustles online, a blog seems like an essential tool. It is a means of getting your product out there and establishing credibility in you as an expert in your field.
Back in 2017, analysts predicted that there will be 31.7 million bloggers in the USA by 2020, that’s about 10% of the population and means that you could probably expect between 6 and 7 million bloggers in the UK. More than that, worldwide, there are an estimated 4 million blog posts every day, and 77% of internet users regularly read some type of blog.
So, if you want to make an online income you should be blogging, and you need to use your time productively to make sure that your blogs are found, read, and boost your side income.
It turns out that 2020 may be the perfect time to launch your blog.
Choose your Niche well
You know what it’s like when you go onto a website and see that their last post was 2 years ago. Very quickly you question whether the site is still current and you probably immediately go and search for more recent content.
That’s an important consideration for you, because, when you get into blogging you need to have a subject that you will be prepared to write about every week for years to come.
If your subject is too big, such as “Sports” then you will probably be lost in the masses and your blog will remain unseen. If it is too small, “Studs on football boots”, then you may struggle to find enough to retain interest, so choose a niche you can define and go after that “The English Football Championship”.
When you choose your niche, seek to define your ideal target audience. Who do you want to read your blog. Be specific and write down their Avatar – new mothers, based in London with a disposable income of … . Then ask yourself, do they read blogs and how will you capture their interest.
Blogs reach out to a massive market
Make blogging a habit
Nearly half of all bloggers state that they publish new blog content between three and six times a month. Companies or websites with multiple bloggers that publish 16 or more blog posts every month generate 4.5x more leads than those who publish four or less times.
So you need to find and produce compelling, engaging content on a weekly basis to get your idea or product out there.
The good news for you if you intend to post once a week, a less regular, longer more comprehensive content is better for returns than daily junk.
Part of the blogging habit needs to be brainstorming ideas for content. If you are at your creative best during a run, before bed, or when commuting, you need to have some means to capture your ideas. Use your smartphone, a notebook or anything else and remember brainstorming is about collecting a quantity of ideas. Quality comes when refining those ideas and writing the post.
Don’t make it too short
Blogs are not Facebook posts and their length is only constrained by your desire to write quality product.
Over half of all bloggers write less than 1,000 words per post while at the other end 20% produce posts which are more than 1500 words.
Research from a few years ago showed that longer posts tend to enjoy a greater Return on Investment, ROI. As it happens the optimal length for any post is between 2,250 and 2,500 words.
That might sound counter intuitive since readers spend an average time of only 37 seconds reading any post, or in real terms just a few hundred words.
The key, therefore, is to make whatever content you produce skimmable. Imagine as you write it that your Avatar is scrolling through the article effectively skimming for key paragraphs and sentences which give them the information they need.
So, as well as thinking about the length of your article make it readable. Avoid long paragraphs and present your points in clear easily digestible chunks.
If you break those chunks up with images and films then you’ll be on the right path. Posts which include an image or film every 100 words or so get twice as many shares as those who miss out on imagery.
Think like a buyer
You’re doing this blog to help your side income, so make it as easy as possible for your potential clients, think like a buyer, your Avatar.
Blogging is no longer just part of getting the attention of a buyer. If you are selling B2B then you might like to know that 71% of B2B buyers check out blog content during their buying process. Your content can help them by answering critical questions, demonstrating credibility and laying out in detail the full scope of your ability.
You can seek to monetise the content of your blogs by linking to affiliate programmes, providing sponsored content and selling online services, ie your intended Side Income. This can be very successful, in fact up to three times more effective than selling your services through paid search. The reason is simple. If people are reading your blog it’s because they are interested and slowly they will be building a level of trust with you and so, any of your proposed products is already going to a warmed up market.
Make it easy for Google
Google has a 92.04% search engine market share and so you may as well stack your blogs to help them.
In length terms, their top ranking content has an average of 1,140-1285 words, and has been steadily going up.
Google will look at your blog but, will rank it more highly if, it is part of a website. Some data shows that having both together can improve ranking by more than four fold.
Getting ranked on Google is very important if you want people to find you. When doing a search, 95% of people never go past the first page; 80% ignore sponsored adverts and approximately 50% will only ever look at the first three hits..
Spend time on your Headline
Your headline is the welcome mat to your post. If it’s interesting people will click on it and read what you have to say. If it bores them then they will probably never click on your post, and whatever you have to say will be lost.
Predictive headlines are out-performing more normal ‘evergreen’ headlines. Phrases like the future of, and The top 3 ways to do something, catch the eye.
If you are going to number something try to use odd numbers, they chime better than even ones.
Avoid the one word rush to label your post like a Madonna record. A heading which is between 6 and 13 words make the greatest impact, and will help to reinforce to Google what your blog is about, helping ranking.
Finally, your subject may appear dry but your heading doesn’t need to. Channel emotions. A headline which appeals to somebody’s emotions is more likely to be shared than one without.
and finally …
If this post has been of interest to you please subscribe to our posts and have a look at our advice on how to start a blog at https://sideincomeplanet.com/generators/write-a-blog/
