Great Tips for Building a Profitable Blog

Let’s all be honest with ourselves and admit it, most of us (if not all) will certainly have making money on our list of priorities when it comes to blogging. Yes, there is a significant chunk of folks out there who are not in it for the money, especially the aid and charity blogs, and a few personal blogs as well. However there is no shame in admitting that making money is an important aspect of blogging, among other things.

This is particularly true for businesses which exist for the sole purpose of profiting from their blogs. Especially those businesses which are selling products and services online, or intend to do so in the future.

Reaping profits and making money from your blog(s) can only be a good thing. If you’re not doing so, it means that you are doing things the wrong way.

At this point, it is important to note that profiting does not simply refer to making extra money. Profiting refers to building a sustainable business that not only covers its own expenses but earns you money after doing so.

Here are 3 powerful ways of ensuring that you build a profitable blog from the ground-up:

1. Targeted Traffic

The Problem:

The ability to be able to drive targeted traffic is an invaluable asset for any firm, business or organization. Above all it is detrimental to the profitability of said business. Driving 1000 visitors to your blog who don’t care about your products/services is a waste of time and resources.

Most bloggers who fail in their blogging efforts and especially the ability to turn in a profit from their blogs fail because they choose to ignore this glaringly obvious principle.

The ability to drive in massive (or even reasonable) amounts of traffic is a good thing, but only on paper. People have certain interests, and everyone on the internet might not be interested in what you have on offer – it is simply no use to them.

But there are people out there who are interested in your services. If you’re the owner of an Internet Marketing blog, you would want internet marketers, SEOs and entrepreneurs to visit it. If you run a blog on Formula One racing, you would want F1 enthusiasts and fans on your blog. It all comes down to knowing what your niche is, and then the ability to attract people in your niche.

The Solution:

Focus your efforts on knowing who your audience is, and try bringing in traffic from that niche: make sure the ‘right’ people visit, share your posts and comment on them, buy stuff, subscribe to your list, tweet your posts and the like.

For more ideas, check out this informative post by Ana Hoffman titled: The Ultimate Blueprint to More Profitable Website Traffic.

2. List Building

The Problem:

Most bloggers fail to understand and appreciate the importance of building lists. It is one of the most invaluable and important tools for a blog that ultimately starts making some dough.

Right from the beginning, put an opt-in box either on your blog header or the sidebar. Alternatively, try getting one of those pop-up subscription widgets which welcomes your visitors and presents them with the option of signing up for your mailing list. The latter could be intrusive and annoying, but it is generally known to be an effective way to capture leads.  

If you're using Wordpress then you can use one of the many list building plugins out there.  Popular ones include Popup Domination, Opt-in Skin, WP Subscribers, and Hybrid Connect.  I've played around with each of them and the winner is definitely Hybrid Connect.  It has a very easy to use form builder, it's super flexible in terms of where you can place your forms and it keeps track of your stats for you.

There's a lot of Hybrid Connect reviews out there so I won't rehash one here.  But my favorite review that I've looked at so far is this one published here on MisterFong.com.

The cold, hard truth is that no one will really keep visiting your blog on a regular basis, however with the use of optins and subscriptions, you have at your disposal a way which lets you remind people about the existence of your blog, new posts, new products and/or services, promotions, deals, announcements and other things which could be of benefit to them.

Without such a list, you will, in all probability, fail to build up a consistent source of traffic to your blog, especially targeted, responsive traffic that is in your niche and interested in what you have to offer.

The Solution:

Do not underestimate the importance of list building and the ability to be able to get targeted traffic in the long run. Remember, that targeted traffic is the most profitable traffic. People who have chosen to be subscribed to your blog by giving you their email address obviously rate it high-enough, and have given you their approval/permission to get in touch with them. This list is a goldmine for you from a business perspective. And without such list, you’ll be missing out on an invaluable opportunity to make some real money.

3. Call-to-Action

The problem:

Even if you’ve done everything right – which includes having a good-looking blog, setting it up correctly, and the whole deal, if you don’t have a clear, strong call-to-action, you will never be able to earn a lot of money, let alone make a profit.

A strong, clear precise, well-defined and a prominent CTA is essential, for obvious reasons. A good CTA works like a good road-sign and provides a visitor with direction and lets him or her know what the purpose of your website is. This is particularly important if you’re selling something on your blog, such as a widget, plugin, a service, a tool or anything else.

The Solution:

A CTA with the aforementioned attributes will instantly call upon a visitor to easily take the required action. Your CTA should be authoritative, presenting the visitor with the same confidence that you have in your products. It should specifically tell your visitor what you want them to do (what action needs to be taken). It should never be over-exaggerated or over-hyped. There should be focus on a single CTA rather than having multiple ones. And above all, it should be the most prominent and instantly-noticeable object on your blog!

The text that accompanies your CTA tells your product’s features to your customers (why your product is worth your visitor’s time and money).

If your CTA is good enough, it will encourage people to make the purchase. The more the purchases, the better it is for you and your blog’s profitability.

As a concluding note, this is a great 7-pointer on how to build a profitable blog, by the good folks over at ProBlogger.