Hello everyone and welcome to my blogging for money series. The series will comprise of tips and techniques that will guide you step by step towards building your online business. Please note that this series is about blogging for money and not personal ramblings, inspirational writing or anything of the sorts. Many of the tips I will be giving may not apply to you, if you are just in for the fun. However, if you are serious about building your business online, I vividly recommend you to follow all these steps. The one thing that you will see very often in these series is the phrase “Take Action“. You will learn and build your knowledge, however if you do not take action, everything here will be absolutely useless. So sit back, relax and let the series begin.
Getting Started
To make money online, you need traffic. No traffic, no money. I am sure that in some form, you have already heared about this. Let’s push the rewind button and start from the most important part of your journey to make money online.
Make A Plan:
This part is not complicated and does not have to be. Make it simple and stick to it no matter what. At every stage of the way, review the goals you have set and see how it has performed. Have you accomplished something, do you need to revise your plan, what went wrong, are common questions that you need to be answered.
Some things that you should put on your plan are the following:
Initial Expenses (Cash Flow): As with everything else business, there is always a little investment required. Be it buying a Domain Name or self-hosting your blog, there is always some cost associated with it. Examples: Internet connection, Electricity, Web Hosting, Advertising, etc..
Establish your goals: The milestones of your business are very important, as they represent your achievements in what you are trying to accomplish. Your objectives are also here to keep you focused on what you need to achieve. Here is an example of milestone you can set for yourself: get indexed in 1 month, first sale in 1 1/2 months, Rank in the top 30 for my keyword X in 2 months, etc.. Try to look for small steps that you can achieve evenly spaced in time and be as realistic as possible with your expectation.
Your Financial expectations: Let’s be honest here, we are doing this for money, right? So set up your objective and define your financial goal. What do you expect to make in the next 3, 9, 12 months? What steps you’ll have to take to achieve it. Start low and revise your plan as time goes by. You will be able to have a better picture of it later.
Set your strategy: Once you have achieved your goals, what will you do next? Will you set new goals and expand your business even further, or would you sell it? Would you just get bored and let your site die?
Ok. Hands on. Start and scribble something on a pad and let your ideas flow. You might be saying that I’m a newbie and I do not know what to do. Fair enough, just keep in mind that it is important to have a plan and the sooner you have it done the better.
On our next series, we will focus on choosing our niche, choosing a domain name and web hosting. Until then.