| Blogs can be a very marketable and very profitable | | | | blog. |
| tool if used correctly. Profiting from blogs is just a | | | | 3) Update Daily (nothing less) |
| matter of grabbing the attention of an audience and | | | | This step is a must and not a suggestion. Updating |
| not doing any actual salesmen selling. In this article | | | | your blog daily not only keeps your blog more |
| you will learn the 13 most essential steps to | | | | interesting to readers, but it also gives your blog |
| successful blogging. | | | | fresh content on a day to day making it more |
| 1) Where to start? | | | | appealing to search engines. Not updating your blog |
| You should begin your blog with a free blog hosting | | | | on an occasional holiday or one day here and there is |
| service such as Journal Home. I don't say that | | | | understandable to most, but missing days at a time |
| because I'm the owner, but a free blog host is very | | | | or weeks is unacceptable and will most likely result in |
| rewarding for a new blog. Starting with a free blog | | | | your blog being unsuccessful. To keep your blog |
| hosting service allows you to begin blogging instantly | | | | traffic and retain your visitors interest it is a must to |
| without having any advance knowledge of scripts, | | | | update your blog daily with multiple entries. Though, I |
| hosting, or programming. It allows you to build an | | | | am seeing a growing trend of successful blogs that |
| audience and buzz for your blog. It allows you to | | | | are not being updated daily, but they are successful |
| focus on your content and not the internal | | | | and have a stable audience who continue to visit |
| maintenance of the blog. The best benefit of starting | | | | their blog daily. Regardless, these blogs are still |
| with a free service, is in the case your blog doesn't | | | | updated weekly with multiple entries. Until you have a |
| become successful you do not lose any money or | | | | steady audience you should try to update your blog |
| are you left holding the bill. The great thing about a | | | | everyday with at least 3 or more daily entries. The |
| blog is that they are organized in chronological order, | | | | best way to accomplish this is to set aside 1-2 hours |
| your latest entry is displayed first. When your blog | | | | a day for tending to your blog and adding new |
| traffic grows greatly and you are ready to upgrade | | | | entries. It may even be wise to schedule a set time |
| to your own domain then you can simply make your | | | | which you dedicate to your blog each day. Give |
| last blog entry the announcement of your "move". | | | | yourself work hours and treat your blog as a job, |
| Simply add a last entry stating that your blog has | | | | what happens if you don't come to work for days or |
| "moved" and type the new blog URL address. Which | | | | weeks...you lose money or worse you get fired! |
| directs visitors to your new blog site, keeping your | | | | Same applies here...if you don't update your blog for |
| following, without a major inconvenience to anyone. | | | | days or weeks you'll lose visitors. |
| Upgrade as you need to...but only when you need to! | | | | 4) Traffic |
| 2) Niche | | | | It's no secret. You must have traffic to profit from |
| A niche is a targeted product, service, or topic. You | | | | blogs. There are numerous ways to build traffic. Paid |
| should first decide on a product, service, or topic | | | | advertising, free advertising, viral marketing, search |
| which interest you. Choose an area which you can | | | | engine marketing, RSS/XML feeds, and |
| enthusiastically write about on a daily basis. You can | | | | word-of-mouth. You should always use your blog URL |
| use keyword research services like Google Zeitgeist | | | | address in the signature of your email, forum |
| or Yahoo! Buzz Index to find popular searched topics. | | | | discussions, message boards, or any other |
| It does NOT matter if your topic is popular as long | | | | communication media. You should submit your blog |
| as there is a audience for your topic and the topic is | | | | URL address to search engines and blog directories. |
| precisely focused then your blog should be successful. | | | | You should submit your RSS/XML URL feed to blog |
| Anything can be considered a niche as long as it has | | | | ping services like Technorati, Ping-O-Matic, and |
| a target audience no matter how large or how small | | | | Blogdigger. You should confidently share your blog |
| the audience is. A blog about your cat can be a niche | | | | with family, friends, co-workers, associates, and |
| or a blog about the species of the cat family can be | | | | business professionals when it relates. Many blogs can |
| a larger niche market, if there are people who are | | | | be considered as a collection of articles, for this |
| interested in hearing about your cat or the species of | | | | purpose you should submit your blog entries (those |
| the cat family, then you have a niche...you can even | | | | that are valuable and lengthy articles) to content |
| choose to build your audience for a market which an | | | | syndicators like or Once submitted your articles can |
| audience does not exist, but first you must build your | | | | be picked up and published by others. |