Make Money Blogging: A New Guide For Beginners

Today I am going to walk you through How To Make Money Blogging For Beginners in 2023

In this guide, you will know everything from start to end with practical examples.

I have explained the misconception of niche, what are the important terms in blogging, and the ways to monetize and grow your blog to the next level.

Let’s dip right in

Choose A Profitable Niche 

Considering the niche is the first thing when it comes to making money blogging. 

This niche would be the topic you would blog about such as finance, food, relationship, and technology.

But, the given niches are themselves huge markets. There are already millions of blogs out there in each niche. So if you make a blog directly on any one of these niches you would not succeed.

You need to take a different approach.

First thing first, you need to understand where is your interest, where is your experience and where is your knowledge.

find niche for money blogging
Diagram to find your niche

When you combine these three areas, you will make a compelling and useful blog post among your competitors.

Let’s say you have some knowledge about money and have some experience and are interested in it. Then your blog niche is going to be around money.

But there’s a catch

There are more than 10 to 20-year-old blogs already ranking in Google. If you start your blog directly on the money niche, it probably will take 10 to 20 years to make a penny from your blog.

So how can you fix that?

In every niche, there are three categories: main niche, sub-niche and micro niche.

 

Find micro niche for money blogging
Find micro niche for your blog

As long as you go deep in every niche, you’ll reduce your competition and increase the probability of success.

Unfortunately, only a handful of bloggers make a penny because the majority submerge into the main niche.

That’s why I don’t want you to repeat this mistake. You just need to pick a main niche, and go deep from sub niche to micro niche.

Pick any one micro niche in your desired interest and make money blogging around that topic.

How To Find A Micro Niche 

As I have explained in an example of money, if you have different interests you can find a micro niche on whatever topic you want to work on.

Here’s how

Firstly, head over to Google and search for your main niche.

Let’s say gadgets (Main Niche)

search your main niche on Google
search your main niche on Google

Head to Image Section

find sub niche on Google's image
find sub niche on Google’s image

These are the sub-niches under the gadgets category.

Again, pick any one of the above you want, search on Google, and head to Google Image.

search on Google again for micro niche
search on Google again for micro niche

micro niche for money blogging
Micro niches

Now these are your micro-niches, it has far low competition.

After that, here’s what happens

When you make your blog on a specific topic, you are the only one (maybe a few more) on that micro niche. Therefore Google has only one reliable source of the topic (you).

As a result, you’ll beat highly competitive sites, even sometimes official sites that have been for decades in blogging.

Another plus side is, when you blog on a specific topic, you will get a specific audience that can be easily monetized through various sources that I will discuss later.

How To Setup Your Blog

After deciding on the niche of your blog 

Let’s craft it

According to SEO experts, your blog structure is the thing people judge first more than the content and other stuff.

Not so fascinating and Dazzling but a well-structured blog with simple theme color can grab people’s attention.

Let’s set up

Where Would You Rent A Room

Renting a room means Hosting your blog on someone else’s platform. These hosting platforms provide Web Hosting services where you can establish A blog with a domain name and store all of your data (blog posts) on their server.

If you don’t have a budget to buy this plan, there are platforms such as Wix, Medium, LinkedIn, and Blogger, where you can establish a blog without paying for a hosting plan.

But the downside is

They have limited access to various features, so you have to struggle if you want to have a professional-looking blog, also there are no plugins for additional functionalities.

On the other hand, for a fast and smooth experience use a web hosting plan.

I don’t recommend any hosting plan. you could Search And Find according to your blog types and content format.

At this moment I assume, you have got your hosting where you establish a blog 

So let’s name it now

Choose Your Blog Name

A shop or business can only be remembered by its name and products.

Similarly, your blog name should be your niche related, you could also include your name or surname with it. Such as if your name is Alex Buffet and your blog is on baking products review, then your blog name will be BuffettBaker or BuffetBakings which shows some uniqueness with your niche.

And your domain name must be the same as your blog name, for instance, BuffettBaker.com or BuffetBakings.com.

If you would not get .com (TLD) you can choose .org or .net etc.

When you select your hosting plan, you’ll alternatively select your domain name. 

In case not, there are many platforms on which you can buy your domain name externally.

Decorate Your Blog With a Free Theme

After getting hosting and domain names, let’s pick a theme to give it a logical look and user-friendly interface.

I recommend getting free themes because they provide about the same features as paid themes.

When opting for themes, make sure it is mobile friendly and aligns with your desired blog structure, because there might be some themes with useless features so you need to avoid them.

Before you stick to one theme forever, think of experimenting with different kinds of themes and their settings. Once you are satisfied with that, commit to one theme forever.

It’s become a fashion I see many beginner bloggers, try one theme and then second, third, and next month another they tend to waste months by months just by testing their themes.

There is no direct ranking signal with themes, You only need to make sure it is mobile and user-friendly and gives a better experience to your audience, that’s it.

Do you recommend some themes?

Well, I think Generatepress, Astra, Ocean WP, and Oneplus will be the best choice for you.

How To Create High-Quality Blog Posts

So, From here you are equipped with setup and all discussions required about your blog’s architecture.

Now it’s time to decorate some elements on it, 

Blog posts or content is the main product that you serve to your audience in this business. If you fail to create high-quality content all the above I said will be pointless.

A decade ago, the quantity of content was required. But today in 2023, you have to make high-quality content that’s directly recommended by Google.

When I talked about the niche, you need to have an idea of how to find keywords (The topic you’ll write a blog post about)

keywords on blog post
keywords on blog post

How To Do Keyword Research

The keywords you are going to find should be around your chosen niche.

I’ll disclose free and paid ways to find the blog post topic or keywords.

Free Way

Head to Ahref Free Keyword Generator and select which country your audience belongs to or you want to target.

Put your micro niche’s seed keyword ( Kitchenware )

search keywords for money blogging on Ahref
search keywords on Ahref

Press Find Keywords and wait

Here is the list of queries people are searching, with Volume  (Search per month), KD (It stands for keyword difficulty, how difficult this keyword is to rank on Google)

keywords list for money blogging

Hence, pick one keyword out of what you would get and write a blog post about it.

Click Here 👇

[su_tooltip title=”Tip” text=”For unknown KD and Volume ” background=”#00EBFF” text_align=”center” shadow=”yes” behavior=”click”]Search this keyword again on Ahref, you will know everything about that
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Paid Way

If you want to analyze and find keywords deeply, Ahref has a paid plan you can get if you have a budget.

Its whole process goes the same, but as this is a paid plan you will get access to premium features.

Once you get your keywords it’s time to plan your content around 

How To Write A Blog Post

To get a glance at how your blog post would look like, search your chosen keyword on Google and analyze the top 10 results.

If you get some interesting and useful content that you believe is helping someone, take a look at how they are written.

After getting a look, structure your blog post.

Here is the content format that is common on every blog post and you exactly need to follow it.

blog post format for money blogging
blog post format

Let’s break down each element

Intro

This is the first place that would decide whether people read on or skip. So make your intro as short and attention-grabbing as possible. 

Because short intros get higher engagement than longer ones as people tend to get answers to their queries without any fluff.

Main Content

This should be your main focus and work. Try to include additional and if possible, some fascinating subheadings.

When you look at the top 10 results on Google you would see somewhere, something is missing. Hence make your content by including all points that will satisfy you, your audience, and Google.

Pros – Cons / Related Question

Here you can write Pros – Cons or/and Related Question, depending on your keywords.

To find related questions, simply head to Google, search your keyword, and here are the related questions 

Find related questions for blog post
Find related questions for blog post

Include these questions after your main content

Conclusion

This is the spot where you let your audience use provided information on blog posts to take action and leave some suggestions in the comment section. So you will know if your content is written well.

With creating content, you must need to optimize it so that Google will able to understand it better and give you ranking at the best place

How To Optimize For SEO

(SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization)  Which is the main practice after creating content. 

Google has its algorithm rules that are used to prioritize blog posts in order to give people useful content out of rest.

So you need to optimize your content to make Google understand better.

To do that, there are three parts of SEO to be implemented on your blog post, On Pages, Off Pages and Technical SEO

Let’s see what are they

On-Page SEO

This is the practice that is closely related to your blog post.

It means sprinkling keywords at your Title Tag, Alt text, all of your Sub Heading, and the body of your content.

But make sure to place it naturally, your on page optimization should not seem spam or hurt the user experience. Additionally, add internal links and external links as you need.

Here are the meanings of each On-page SEO term:

1. Title Tag: A title tag is an HTML element that specifies the title of a blog post. It appears in the browser’s title bar and search engine results. It should accurately describe the content of the blog post and include relevant keywords for better search engine optimization (SEO).

2. Alt Text: Alt text, or alternative text, is a description added to an image in a blog post. It is used to provide text alternatives for visually impaired users or in case the image fails to load. Alt text should be descriptive and convey the meaning of the image.

3. Sub Heading: A subheading, also known as a subhead or subheadline, is a smaller heading within a larger blog post. It breaks down the text into sections and helps organize the information. Subheadings are often used to introduce new topics or provide a clear structure to the blog post.

4. External Links: External links are hyperlinks that point to web pages on a different blog or website. They connect your blog post to external sources and provide additional information or references. External links can enhance the credibility and authority of your blog post by directing readers to relevant and reliable sources.

5. Internal Links: Internal links are hyperlinks that point to other blog posts within the same blog. They help users navigate through your blog, discover related content, and establish a hierarchical structure. Internal links also contribute to SEO by spreading link authority and improving blog accessibility.

Quick guide on On-Page SEO

Off-Page SEO 

As its name suggests this practice is outside of your page, it’s creating backlinks.

Making backlinks on other’s blogs is off-page SEO optimization

Backlinks are the links you can make or earn on other’s blogs or websites.

Here’s what are Backlinks

Importantly, As with many others, there is also a misconception about backlinks.

Your backlink can only work efficiently if they are on your niche-related blog.

For instance, if you are in the finance niche your backlink should be on a finance blog as relevancy is the main factor for backlinks that can give you a higher ranking on Google.

Technical SEO 

This optimization is technical where you focus on your blog’s Loading Speed,  Sitemap, Mobile Friendliness (which is a prominent ranking factor suggested by Google) Robot.txt File, and all things you need to consider technically in SEO 

Because this topic is profound, I don’t want this post to be lengthy so I have summarized these small concepts in some sentences:

1. URL Structure: The format and organization of the blog’s URL, which should be descriptive, concise, and include relevant keywords for better search engine visibility.

2  Canonical Tag: A HTML tag used to indicate the preferred version of a blog page when there is duplicate or similar content, helping to avoid duplicate content issues and consolidate ranking signals.

3. Robots.txt: A text file placed on a website’s server to instruct search engine bots on which pages to crawl or not to crawl, ensuring that valuable content is indexed while blocking irrelevant or sensitive pages.

4. XML Sitemap: A file that lists all the pages on a website, helping search engines understand its structure and find and index content more efficiently.

5. Schema Markup: A structured data vocabulary added to HTML to provide search engines with more detailed information about the content on a webpage, enhancing the display of search results with rich snippets.

6. Page Speed: The time it takes for a blog page to load completely, which is crucial for user experience and search engine rankings. Faster loading times are generally preferred by both users and search engines. 

7. Mobile-Friendly: Refers to a website design and development that ensures optimal viewing and usability on mobile devices, as search engines prioritize mobile-friendly websites in mobile search results.

8. SSL Certificate: A digital certificate that encrypts data transmitted between a user’s browser and a website, indicating a secure connection. Search engines consider SSL certificates as a ranking factor and display warnings for non-secure websites.

9. Crawlability: The ability of search engine bots to access and navigate through a blog’s pages for indexing purposes. Ensuring proper crawlability helps search engines discover and understand your content.

10. Indexing: The process by which search engines store and organize webpages in their databases. If a page is indexed, it is eligible to appear in search engine results for relevant queries.

After looking at these terms make sure to have fixed all technical SEO issues in your blog to perform better.

This video will help you learn technical SEO

How To Grow Your Blog

Writing content with all SEO optimization is just beginning.

In the game of blogging, you need to promote your blog post in order to reach a wide range of audience.

From well-known bloggers around the world, we should spend 20% to 30% of our time creating and optimizing content and 80% to 70% of the time  promoting our content

That’s why it’s a crucial factor for beginners and even season bloggers considering these tactics:

Leverage Social Media

When it comes to getting around with a lot of people, social media is always the first spot. As the days, weeks, months, and years go, people are getting new phones, laptops, and tablets and increasing the number of social media users.

As a result, there are about 302.25 million users in the USA as of 2023 and it’s predicted to grow by 327.22 million as of 2027

So use Social Media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit, and more to promote your blog post not in a random manner but strategically and consistently.

Find your niche-oriented spots on there and post your articles. As in Facebook you can make a separate page for your blog and build loyal followers.

The pattern of your content post on social media platforms will vary as different platforms accept content differently. So make sure to familiarize yourself with these platforms first.

Leverage Email Marketing

To get your blog visitors to come back relentless time, you need to use email marketing. With this approach, you would use your audience to promote your newly published blog post.

Email marketing is a digital marketing strategy where businesses or bloggers send targeted messages to people via email to promote content/products/services, build relationships, and drive engagement.  

First off, you need to build email lists by using some software, online tools, or plugins that will pop up notifications to ask for a subscription from your audience, when they’ll show their email information, it will be deposited in one place.

Afterward, lay down a fixed schedule such as whenever you publish new content, use those email lists, and send blog posts to your audience.

Engaging With Audience

If you satisfy your audience and give them what they want, they’ll become the promoter of your business.

That’s why, the best way to promote your business is always to focus on how can you satisfy them and help them overcome problems.

Engage with them in the comment section, and reply instantly with generic answers. 

In your blog’s conclusion section, encourage them to take action and ask something if they still need to know more.

Aside from the comment section, if you have some followers on Facebook page Instagram, and Twitter (maybe later) try to communicate with them as your friends.

If possible, provide a Live session where they would interact with you and get answers to their questions directly from your mouth.

Eventually, If you do so, you will stand out from the crowd because only a few people do this.

This video is for how to Grow Your Blog

Here’s the interesting part

How To Make Money From Your Blog 

So this is the way to get the rewards for all of your efforts you would do for writing, optimizing, and promoting content.

This is why people or you would start a blog.

There are endless ways to make money from your blog. Most of them are complex and as you are a beginner you need to focus on some main or you can say the most used ways to monetize your blog.

Here are 

How To Make Money Blogging Without Selling Anything

These monetization strategies include the ways you don’t need to sell anything. These are going to make you as much money as possible in every way of monetization.

Show Ads On Your Blog 

Showing ads is the primary way for many bloggers to generate income.

Once you add Ads at the header, footer, or middle of your blog post, you will earn by how many impressions and clicks it gets.

Here’s the process

  • Firstly decide on an ad network on which you want to sign up and show ads on your blog
  • Fill out all the requirements when asked during sign-up.
  • Once you get approved, set up your ads setting of where you want to place it.
  • As you get visitors who will click on your ads, you will make money.

Let’s take a peek at popular ads networks that you can choose

  • Google Ads
  • Ezoic
  • Mediavine
  • Monumetric

Do you want to make money with the blog without AdSense or Ads?

Don’t worry

Use Affiliate Marketing

This is how to make money blogging with Affiliate Marketing.

From this approach, you would sell other people’s or businesses’ products through affiliate links, such that whenever someone buys a product by clicking your affiliate link placed on your blog, you will get a fixed commission on each sale.

That way, you will be selling products while sleeping, without having to promote and knock on someone’s door.

Here is how it operates

  • Find a product that is around your niche, could be digital or physical (such as an ebook, book, online course, laptop, etc.)
  • Explore Affiliate programs on each product you want to promote. (Majority of products come from Amazon Affiliate Program)
  • When Signing up for the affiliate program, fill in all asked information
  • Get a specific affiliate link for your product.
  • Add that link to your blog post with proper anchor text (such as Check Here, Buy Now)
  • Make sure to add a disclaimer page about you being an affiliate who generates commission from each sale.

The Bottom Line 

After all the steps I discussed before, it’s your turn to find a micro niche and set up a blog on a free or paid platform with a niche-oriented domain name and mobile-friendly theme.

Once your blog is ready, do keyword research to find topics to write about, write blog posts that align with the format I gave above, optimize for SEO, and publish.

Moreover, engage with your audience, use tactics to enhance your reach, and make money.

That’s it.

So, now I want to know, did this guide help you? Or do I need to add more information for you?

Don’t hesitate to comment below as it’s your blog.

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