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Do You Really Need To Choose A Niche For Your Blog?

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Choose A Niche

It is fairly acceptable practice to choose a niche before you start your blog. It gets you writing focused content, it attracts a targeted audience and all round it is a pretty good thing. But some people find a niche too limiting, or for some reason they think they can start a blog without a niche and become just as successful. So can they? Does it really matter if you choose a niche or not? It’s true that there are several advantages to not choosing a niche, but there are also many more to be found by having one.

Why People Go Without

The most common reason that people don’t choose a specific niche for their blog is that they are blogging as a hobby, and are not particularly interested in attracting any specific audience or running their blog as a business. That is perfectly fine – not everyone wants to make money with their blog, and people should be allowed to think they can blog purely for the enjoyment of it.

blogging niche

What is a little more worrying is that some people who do start a blog to make money also don’t choose a specific niche. Such people are often misled by others that tell them making money by blogging is easy, or they think that their daily life is so interesting that they will be able to attract many thousands of readers and monetize that traffic – unless you’re already a celebrity then most people probably won’t care. Most commonly though, people know they should choose a niche but don’t want to feel tied down by choosing just one, so they write about many subjects on the one blog.

What Are The Consequences?

The biggest consequence of not choosing one niche is that you don’t attract targeted readers for your blog – if you aim to make money with your blog then this can become very important down the line. If your content isn’t focused around one subject, then it can also be hard to attract a readership that comes back to visit your blog on a regular basis – so your blog will grow much slower than if your content was focused around a particular subject. A large majority of people also choose to monetize their blogs by releasing their own e-book or other information product. This becomes very difficult when you’re not building up a targeted audience to release that product to, not to mention bloggers usually use feedback from readers to release a product that is sure to meet their specific needs.

What Solutions Are There?

If you have so many interests that you cannot write about just one thing, then you may want to think about starting multiple blogs – or separating your main blog into several specific categories. Whichever option you choose, make sure that you’re building a separate subscriber list for each individual topic. Another possible solution (which I prefer) is to just stick with one niche blog, but write about your daily life and whatever else interests you in a way that relates back to your niche. This usually results in highly original and interesting content, and also prevents you from becoming bored.

These solutions still allow you to write focused content to build your readership and earn you money down the road, as well as preventing blogging from becoming a painful experience for you.

I hope you’ve found these ideas useful. Have you got any more to add? Please mention them, or any other questions you have, in the comments section below…

About

Brent McCoy is an experienced content marketer who recently established Millionaire Studio to help aspiring online entrepreneurs and bloggers. The site features regular inspiration, advice and contests that allow readers to share their thoughts in popular discussions.

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{ 43 Responses }

  1. Jim says:
    Don't most people use Google to find the information they want? Do most people bookmark a site because it is a niche? Who subscribes to blogs anymore? People with the same Interests? Usually I search Google, find the information I want, and that's it. Do people really subscribe like it's some sort of magazine?
  2. Pradeep says:
    Yes, we'll lose targeted readers, but having a niche limits the focus of the blogger into only one topic.
  3. Usman says:
    Niche sites are definitely better than all in one resources .. I usually look for niche sites for my solutions rather than general sites.
  4. Jeevan Jacob John says:
    If you ask me, I would say that we definitely need a niche - at least a broad one. If you are interested in more than one niche, you could choose a Broad Niche. Or if you want to change your niche (after the realization that you existing niche didn't work out) you could do so, as I have done - from Technology to Blogging. Choosing a Niche is important because it identifies your blog. If you just posting random stuff, you wouldn't necessarily have a target audience. I would like to hear your comment about this. Anyway, thank you for sharing your insights, Jeevan Jacob John
  5. Ryan says:
    If you do your niches right you also won't have to work much on each site since a lot of the information will be static. You can set up an alerts account for content ideas and maybe update once a week if it's specific enough. I think it's a lot easier than most people think and a lot better way to attract targeted "warm leads" type Google traffic than a generalist blog.
  6. Jerry Donovan says:
    This is a good article. Nobody wants to read content from someone that is just randomly writing. Find something you know and stick with it. Variations are okay, but skipping around too much makes people lose interest....just a thought.
  7. Jimmy Sigenstroem says:
    On choosing a niche to blog about, depends somewhat on the plan with the blog. Is it a blog as family and friends only reader, then it doesn´t matter. But it's a blog you want others to read on and make money on, then you without a doubt have to choose a topic to blog about. It is there several reason to.! 1) Seo-wise it a marridt to get an optimized 2) There is more work to write about 3 topics on 1 blog than it is to write about 3 topics on 3 blogs. 3) it is still a marridt to search engine optimize a blog with 3 topics than 3 blogs with 1 topic.! ;o)
  8. Jitendra Singh says:
    Nice, but people have to choose something for the fun of it Right ?
  9. Mani Viswanathan says:
    When I started Blogging I didn't know what niche to choose. But later I realized it's importance & the results are just a testimony of the same.
  10. Dennis Edell says:
    Some mixed bag blogs as they are called do well, I know a few successful. One key to the success of a non-niche specific blog is to be sure you're not limiting your promotional strategies either...you must be literally everywhere.
  11. James says:
    I think that regardless of whether you're blogging about a specific niche, a wider topic or anything that you want, to make money from blogging you need a readership. I make money from Adsense and affiliate links in some of my blogs - and most of that money comes from organic traffic and one time visitors - but my sites would have no authority without the involvement of the regulars and would struggle for SE rankings. A niche helps with the monetization, but where authority is concerned you've got to be able to write something compelling - and this is a skill you can apply to any or all subjects if you've got it.
  12. Justin Germino says:
    Affiliate marketing with niche sites is the right way to go if you want to target, not only a niche but some establish sites down to a specific type of product or a niche under a niche even. As a blogger you have some wiggle room and can broaden your topics, in the end though if you don't know what niche you want to be blog about anything and see what becomes most popular, this can help steer you in a direction.
  13. Christie says:
    I'm sure a lot of bloggers start out thinking they can have a blog all about their life like ThePioneerWoman - that their blog will be a "lifestyle" sort of magazine or something. But it takes a really entertaining life and entertaining writing to attract many readers with a blog about all of the different activities in that life! :) Much better to have some sort of focus, even if it's not a narrow niche, so that there will be a decent size audience to write for.
  14. Alex says:
    Hello Brent, Yes, choosing a niche is important especially if you want make money online, because you can't actually get targeted traffic if you are all over the subjects. But also, if you choose a too specialized or narrow niche, you will most probably make your readers get bored with what you write and you will most likely have to discuss about something else from time to time just to avoid monotony. But in rest choosing a niche is good depending on what you are targeting, more traffic or more targeted traffic.
    • Brent says:
      Readers can get bored, true, but it's likely your isn't the only blog they read so I'm sure they will mix it up themselves a little as well.
  15. Bican Valeriu says:
    If you don't chose a "favorite" niche you will become rapidly bored !
    • Brent says:
      Yeah, it should definitely be something you like writing about.
  16. Saket Jajodia says:
    If anyone wants more then one niche then they should use category method (as you said above) will be good then going with everything in one and all get mix up..
    • Brent says:
      Yeah, as long as you collect different sets of subscribers then you can still provide relevant info to everyone.
  17. Andreas says:
    Yes, Matt Cutts, the Google engineer, recommends starting out with a small niche and then advance from there by adding more competitive keywords for ranking purposes. If you can build trust and authority in your smaller niche, it will be easier for google to rank you higher for more competitive keywords later on.
    • Brent says:
      Probably someone you want to take advice from when it comes to search engine rankings!
  18. Steve says:
    You make an important distinction. Blogging simply for pleasure (with perhaps a Google adsense thrown up as an afterthought) it is perfectly fine to be all over the place. There are many people who may be interested in wide ranging topics. But... To make money this will not work since you really need focus and targeted followers
  19. Robert Dempsey says:
    Hi Brent this is an interesting question. I started my IM blog as a personal outlet to talk about marketing. That quickly changed as I saw an opportunity to connect with a community. Strategy quickly followed and it's working out well. The biggest point here is are you trying to use a blog for business or personal use? If it's business you need to pick a topic, determine who your audience is, come up with a metric ton of things you can write about on your topic (I like mindmapping for this) and start cranking out the content while you network like crazy. And on top of that, you need to figure out more than one way to make money just in case one of your income streams dries up. If you're just blogging as a hobby or for fun, and aren't concerned with business, disregard that last paragraph.
    • Brent says:
      There is a lot more to say about mixing up your income that I haven't mentioned in this post - actually, the most recent post on my own blog touches on that subject (link should appear thanks to CommentLuv).
  20. Tran Tinh says:
    My experience was that if you did not choose a niche to go with like you are driving on a road without a map :-)
    • Brent says:
      True, if you don't have a set topic each day it's easy to get lost!
  21. David says:
    I think its a small matter to to select and thought about a niche before starting to make a new blog, as most of the content we found from the net. Because net is an ocean of knowledge and experience.
    • Brent says:
      It's helpful to decide on one before you start, true, but sometimes you find yourself evolving in a different direction and that's not always a bad thing.
  22. HP van Duuren says:
    Thanks for your Post, Having a tight nich makes it a lot easier to position your blog(s) and to do your Search Enginge Optimalisation for your blog(s). That way making it easier to get Targeted Traffic and a better Sales Conversions. An interesting approach to make it easier to get an overview of all the topics and products you have on your blog(s) is to draw a 'MindMap' of your blog(s). That way as a 'Gardener' you can see more easy what 'trees' or 'branches' you want to grow and what you want to cut. Hope this can help you to make your blog(s) a little more 'Nichy?' :) All the Best, To your Happy - Home Business - Inspiration, HP
    • Brent says:
      A mind map is a good idea!
  23. Devesh says:
    Great Post. Niche sites works much better then am "all-in-one" blog. If you want to make money blogging then choosing a niche is very important. Btw. Making money from blogging is not easy, it takes a lot of hard work and patience. Anyways, Thanks for sharing this great post. ~Dev
    • Brent says:
      Right, there is more to making money blogging than just the niche you choose.
  24. Jan Husdal says:
    Making money by blogging is not easy, especially if you're not in he "blogging about making money by blogging"-niche, but it can be done. It can be done, but it takes time. As you say, the most important thing is attracting a targeted audience, and if you're not in the aforementioned "blogging about making money by blogging"-niche, the only way to do that is by having quality content, i.e. relevant and reputable content, to use Google's own words for the basic workings of their search algorithm. With consistent high-quality blogging, eventually, you may get noticed by the big professional players in your niche (because unless you have a really weird niche, there will always be someone bigger and better), and that is when the fun starts, as they might ask to advertise on your blog (for money of course), or ask you to guest post on their blog (also for money, maybe). That is what happened to me. And that is how I was able to scrap all the AdSense and other ads on my blog, since I was making more money by making just one guest post on a partner blog than all my ads brought me in a whole month. So my advice is to pick a niche and stick with it. It pays off, although it may take a while.
    • Brent says:
      The blogging about making money blogging niche is very saturated, and unless you're saying something that's better or different to someone else than it can be harder to stand out. The reason why so many people say that it's a lucrative niche is because a lot of people blogging in that niche make them think that. If that makes sense... Getting paid to guest post is a nice thing to aim for!
  25. kbharath says:
    Choosing a niche is very important for the people who wanted to start their online business and earn money and make it as full time job. for the people who want to blog just for hobby purpose can select any niche.
    • Brent says:
      There's no reason you can't like your job too!
  26. ariff says:
    As making money is concerned, people have to choose a niche but if you simply blog for the fun of it, then no, niches are not not necessary.
    • Brent says:
      You can have fun and make money - best of both worlds!
  27. Sandeep says:
    Yeah, there's no doubt you need to pick a niche if you're interested in Making Money Online... It's like saying "I want to start a business" but you have no clue what business to start. Picking a niche gives you focus and direction..
    • Brent says:
      Focus is important, not just for the blogger but the readers as well!
  28. Dana says:
    It is a must that we choose niche blog if want to make money from it. As you said, If want to cover various topic, we can create multiple blog for it.
    • Brent says:
      People think multiple blogs means more work, but it isn't really - at least in the early stages. When you start getting comments to reply to it can be, but you may have other options in terms of assistants and so forth. I'd like to think of it as a separate place to store my thoughts on each individual subject.