A Personal Development Blog:Proenrichment.com Opinion On Blogging
Blogging is a long term ‘investment’. Spending hours away in front of the computer terminal just to get your blog move to the top of the front pages needs effort. It means wasted sunset to most bloggers : those who still think that blogging is a 100 meters sprint. It is not. Definitely it is not. It is a marathon competition – at least for now. How do you compete in the marathon race? As a personal development blog creator I adhere to the following concept of blogging.
Stamina – Preparation
My sincere advice to new bloggers. Do not be a full time blogger until you see some decent income from your blog. Unless your are born rich. I have nothing to say. Before entering into the bloggin areana you have to train your muscle and stamina. Prepare for the race.
Decide on the niche. What do you want to do : create templates; write about digital photography; discuss on arts; write poetry. You have decided to write about the challenges faced by bloggers. You need to choose the blog name :
- Use google keyword or wordtracker to search a popular word;
- If the search for a particular word is high use that as your blog name;
- A blog name has one or the most two words.
Change bloggging challenges.com to blog challenges.com as the word ‘blog’ has higher searches.
On Your Mark – Build Contents
Prepare at least 300 contents before you begin to blog. If you are using wordpress you can pre set the dates for the 300 post to be published. By this, you have at least 300 days to prepare your 301 post.:)
Perhaps it is a good idea to use this 300 days to prepare another 100 post.
Get set and Go – Build More Contents
If you happened to blog 10 years ago, its platform was at its inception. That was a good time to enter into this sphere. Less competition and whatever your write about will be in the front pages. Now the game is a little different. You have to beat the big guns. Right now, there are over 190 million blogs on personal development according to google search. Click personal-development to see. It will grow by the day.
I started blogging sometime in 2007. In my opinion, in the short run a blog hardly gets popular. It is because a blog has to have at least a 1000 pages to become noticeable in google. Content building takes time.
- Write at least 4 articles per week;
- In a year you get 200 pages of articles;
- In about 5 years you will reach a 1000 pages
Right Pace – Consistent Posting
Google algorithms capture the pattern posting of a blog. consistency has a mark in google rules. If your target is to post 3 times a week then stick to this pattern.
- Part-time bloggers : post at least twice a week and do it on weekends. You start on the last day of the week drafting the first post and use Saturday to edit and do a final posting. Perhaps you write a short second post on saturday and post on Sunday night.
- Full – time bloggers : they have to focus everyday at least 4 hours to do a post. Remember this is your rice bowl as blogging is your only source of income.
- The key note is to post your articles at a regular pace.
Know Your Competitor – Follow The Machine Head
A train has many compartments. The powerful of all is its machine head. In a marathon race, get close to the first runner in the race. Don’t lose him. Blogs are populated right now.
Use back link software to check who is in the lead of the competition. Understand what kind of plugins the competitor is using. How the blogger trying to promote his blog? What kind of topic he is writing about? Understand why the machine head blogger is outstanding?
Aim To Be First – Or At Least Finish The Race
What makes a winner? He is the person whose final goal is to finish what he started. He is a person who has passion for his blog. He is obsessed with his blogging.
Before you start your blog, you need to have a clear goal: what is your niche;how many psot you want to hit 10 years from now; what kind of articles do you want to include in your blog; what kind of traffic you want to see in 3 years from now.
Put The Trophy On The Finishing Line
Monetizing a blog is the most legitimate purpose of any bloggers. Let’s face it. We need to pay up the broad band service. We need to maintain our personal computer and gadgets. We burn hours of our lives which is actually a social cost to us and to our family. The time forgone is great. for all the loss there has to be a pacifier – cash.
By monetizing a blog does not mean we make money out of our blog instantly. It takes time. we need traffic. We need visitors to keep coming back to read our articles. So change your mindset of making quick bucks in the short run.
You are in the marathon race. Be progressive in your blog. Spend at least 1 or 2 hours a day learning new things to improve your blog.
Google adsense is a simple way of monetizing your blog.: at least for the start. Do not worry so much of monetizing if blogging is not your source of income.
Hi Gazzali,
Good I didn’t read this post before I started my personal development blog, otherwise I would have lost all appetite to blog
I agree you need some stamina for blogging, but maybe not to the extend you’re suggesting. I certainly didn’t prepare 300 post before I started. I just started with one post and builded from there. 1 article a week is all I can do right now.
well you need to beat the competition…:)