Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Today I want to answer frequently asked blogging questions to give you clarity on your journey.
Bloggers have asked me each of these questions over my 15 year blogging career.
Believe it or not, the more things have appeared to change since 2008, the more things stay the same, in reality.
Take the first question below.
Bloggers have asked the question: is blogging dead?
back in 2008 during the internet marketing orgy, hyped-up, money grab that seemed to make blogging obsolete.
After Matt Cutts made his infamous announcement in 2014 that guest blogging for links had died, bloggers panicked and asked: is blogging dead?
AI blogging recently exposed a tender, inner weakness in scared bloggers who ignored the fundamentals of creating authentic blog posts and building a loyal tribe of human beings. Each of these frenzied bloggers asked: is blogging dead?
Blogging became more important after each seeming death knell because owning your online real estate to publish a thorough resource makes you stand out from spammy internet marketers, spammy guest bloggers and AI bloggers.
Before you get your blogging panties in a bunch just remember that there is nothing really new under the blogging sun.
1: Is Blogging Dead?
Blogging is alive and well.
If anything, blogging is as important as ever to stand out from AI-generated content.
The split second any clear-thinking human being comes across Blogging From Paradise is the moment one realizes that blogging is perhaps the best way to stand out in a seemingly crowded online world.
Blogging offers you:
- unlimited branding potential
- unlimited customizing potential
- a platform for establishing your credibility
- staggering leveraging potential
- multiple streams of income
You still cannot find an online strategy as advantageous as blogging for entrepreneurs hungry to establish their digital footprint.
Ownership makes the difference.
Owning a self-hosted, WordPress Dot Org blog gives you the power to control your brand message. Controlling your blogging voice distances you from entrepreneurs who make the common mistake of chasing fads on cyber real estate that they do not own.
While the masses try to chase a quick buck through video marketing on social media and AI blogging, the genuine bloggers of the world will runs laps around trend chasers who find themselves perfectly equipped to deal with a world that’s already passed them by. Trends change quite quickly. After fads exhaust themselves the fads and fad-generated income dry up and vanish. Meanwhile, wise bloggers who stick to the fundamentals experience only exponential growth over the long haul because business fundamentals, unlike fickle fads, never change.
2: How Do I Get Traffic?
Drive blog traffic by helping people with:
- detailed, targeted blog posts
- guest posts on blogs from your niche
- genuine blogger outreach tactics like promoting bloggers on your blog and through social media
- authentic blog comments
Giving value through these strategies allows you to get blog traffic.
3: How Do I Make Money Blogging?
Bloggers make money by earning reader trust.
Readers buy stuff or hire bloggers if readers trust a blogger to be credible.
Publish detailed, targeted content and engage in genuine blogger outreach to gain credibility.
As for asking about specific income channels, creating and selling online courses, writing and selling eBooks and engaging in affiliate marketing are a few common blogging income streams.
Money responds to blogging skills.
Develop your blogging skills by patiently creating and connecting to make money through blogging.
Be patient. Blogging success requires patient practice.
The money will come if you lose yourself in the process of creating detailed, targeted content and helping fellow bloggers to build your blogging network.
4: How Do I Learn Blogging?
Learn blogging from seasoned professionals who teach how to blog successfully from their vast experience.
If pros teach how to go pro from their personal experience it makes sense to follow only their advice.
Learning blogging gets easier if you learn from pros.
Attempting to learn blogging from inexperienced beginner bloggers makes blogging tougher.
For example, new bloggers often advise fellow beginners to participate in blog sharing/commenting threads to increase blog traffic. Experienced, high level pros would almost never advise to participate in such threads because sharing group traffic is not targeted, quality, organic traffic. Fellow bloggers only share your posts to motivate you to share their posts.
Traffic originating from sharing threads is low quality, non-targeted, inorganic traffic that rarely if ever follows your blog closely, hires you, buys your stuff or grows your referral business. These bloggers just showed up because you’d share their blog post, not because of your niche expertise, genuine blogger outreach campaign, blogging authority or any other factor required to drive heavily targeted, passive traffic and blogging income.
Learn only from pros.
Do as pros do.
Avoid blogging headaches associated with “learning” from struggling bloggers.
Succeed.
5: How Do I Avoid Quitting?
Blogging is a marathon not a quick sprint.
Most bloggers quit during the marathon because the majority expected a quick sprint.
Avoid quitting by remembering why you decided to blog. Dwell on living a life of freedom through blogging. Remember how fun it’d feel to have fun helping people and to make a living through blogging from anywhere in the world.
Knowing why gets you through the tough blogging times all bloggers eventually face.
I love blogging deeply. This is why I rode out the ups and downs of a 15 year blogging career.
Fellow veteran blogger Donna Merrill noted recently how I’d been blogging for quite a long time. She has also been at it for a minute.
Donna and I genuinely love helping people through blogging.
Hold on to that love to get through the inevitable blogging bumps.
6: How Do I Get Google Traffic?
SEO-optimize blog posts to get Google traffic.
Steps:
- write long-form posts spanning 1200-1500 words
- include practical tips for readers to use
- drill down into tips or steps to create in-depth content
- make for easy reading by formatting posts with headers, bullet point links, paragraphs and short sentences
Optimizing posts for SEO takes practice because it is a highly-coveted skill.
Bonus tip: update old blog posts to drive Google traffic. The Google algorithm tends to favor seasoned blog posts updated regularly to be current.
7: How Do I Blog with No Experience?
Good news.
Every blogger begins blogging with no experience.
Before you blog you have no experience.
After beginning to blog you gain experience.
Like every one of the millions of bloggers out there, you have no experience before blogging and gain experience after deciding to begin blogging.
As for not having experience in a particular blogging niche, the same rule applies.
Learn about your niche through research to gain experience in that niche.
Perform simple due diligence to gain knowledge.
Apply the knowledge by writing and publishing blog posts.
Conclusion
There you have it guys.
Ultimately, stick to the blogging fundamentals.
Create targeted content, build relationships, trust yourself and trust in the blogging process.
Success finds bloggers who follow the blogging fundamentals.
