Yes! There is serious money in blogging but it’s not like picking fruit from a tree. You have to work with and around the system before you can see profits rolling in. Most important to know is what to avoid doing so you don’t waste time. The ways to make money blogging can come from affiliate marketing, ads, and subscriptions. The ways to avoid missing the boat is by not doing the following fatal errors on your blog:

• If you will start email marketing your blog, don’t be the kind of guy who hard sells. This is the kind of email that just persists too much, cajoles and tries to bully readers into action, and stops at nothing in sending out emails.
• Unless you really want to only attract your kind, avoid too much technical terminology and content without the corresponding explanation.
• Don’t de-segment your blog too much that it becomes confusing to look at
• Not allowing anyone to comment on your blog is one way to turn off your visitors

When does the money start coming in?

Profits from blogging will start as a trickle and can stay that way for a while. Don’t be discouraged about this. Not everyone will be an instant hit. You could try going viral with a video to stimulate traffic to your blog. However, before you do that, make sure your website is ready with the buttons and clicks that would generate income. Test everything on your blog yourself several times. Know how the payment system works and common troubleshooting solutions. Some blogs take as long as a year before it kicks in while others get going almost immediately. Those that succeed quickly usually already have an online presence.

Money-Making Blogs

Don’t sign up with just any affiliate product. It has to make sense and be relevant to your blog. For instance, let’s say that you have decided to focus on a dog blog. Well, you certainly wouldn’t promote items for cats on your blog. Instead, you would include dog bedding, dog food and snacks, dog collars and leashes,  and other similar items for your readers.  Instead, If you plan on selling ad space, put together a presentation on why it would benefit to advertise on your blog.  You could reel in the clients with freebies like a free week and a swap deal.

Planning on turning your blog into a business venture means discipline and more focus than a casual blog. Keep updated since the internet is constantly evolving and new money-making ideas are being introduced regularly.

As a writer, it’s essential for you to realize that you have a potential gold mine in your hands and mind. Many writers have successfully managed to increase their revenue streams in writing by attacking other writing modes. From being a blogger, you can try your hand at copywriting or sales. You don’t even have to stick to writing but use your skill as a stepping stone to being accomplished in other aspects like editing or running a pool of writers.

Whether you are a home worker, traveling writer, or part time writer with a full time job, there are many options to diversify. Using the computer and internet, there are jobs or contracts you can find. You will need to build up your reputation, so if you have a blog continue working on it. However, turn your blog into something less casual and geared more for snagging contracts and showing off your writing skills.

The blog can also be used as a jumping board to starting and managing blogs for other people. There are still many professionals who have no idea how a website or blog is set-up. Neither do they have the time to study and build one up. You could be their point man and run it as part of your business portfolio.

Diversify also by being a sales person if you have the skill and talent for convincing strangers to buy what you’re selling. It’s an art form to be able to sell and it pays huge dividends if you sign up with the right Multi Level Marketing (MLM) or affiliate group. Pick one that has a good support system with training, a refined commission structure and a reputable name. There are too many companies out there that do not pay the right commission rates or withhold the commission for unreasonable periods.

One last note that you should heed is that diversifying your skills is a long-drawn out process. One way you can hasten your spread is by consulting an expert or signing up with an outsourcing website. Naturally, there will be service fees to pay so just read and fully understand the agreement with the outsourcing website before you commit your time.

What’s in a blog that makes it more popular than others? Why are some people enjoying so much attention with their blogs while others are struggling to get even a few readers? Although blogs must be well written, contain correct grammar and appeal to their targeted audience, one must do a bit more to make your blog popular.  Here are the other elements that separate a hot blog from a not-so-hot one.

1. Popular Blogs are Unique. If you really want to have a popular blog, it has to be unique. What do you have that draws attention to your blog? Is it a unique design? Usually, great blogs start with an incredible tagline and cool visuals. This means it has to appeal to the senses and look fantastic. Blogs that have no color or design will be rejected by the reader right away. Not only will they bore the reader but they’ll put them to sleep too.  So, dress up you site – add a bit of creativity and finesse! For instance, Kevin, a reader and owner of the popular site Kevinfrank.ca has done a nice job with his Vancouver realtors blog. Although his blog is incorporated within his site, it is visually appealing and very well done. The blog content is informative, search engine optimized, and very well written. In fact, his tagline “Bringing Families Home” is spot on for an established realtor!  Kudos to Kevin’s firm and hope he sells all his gorgeous homes and condos for sale Vancouver.
2. Pay attention to your titles.  Many people don’t realize this but there is weight in titles and you should use this to invite people to read your blog. Stay away from boring, run-of-the-mill kind of titles. However, don’t use a title and not deliver with the contents that have nothing to do with the title.
3. Keep readers wanting more. Your content should keep the reader wanting more. Think TV series – why is the audience willing to wait 7 days to see the next episode, and why sit through one hour in front of the TV? They’re feeling the grip of the story and characters and it keeps them 100% engrossed. Your blog should try to achieve this effect with content. It’s what will make your readers want to come back for more.
4. Spice up your content with pictures or graphics. You can even using shading as long as it does not interrupt the flow of words or overshadow text. Keep your paragraphs short and your sentences simple. Unless your target audience is geniuses that appreciate the use of complex terms, avoid using unfamiliar words. That is, unless it is to emphasize a point and the definition is provided.
5. Be trendy. Talk about the world and what’s happening. Even for personal blogs it can get tiresome if you keep talking about “Me, I, and Mine.”But you can give an opinion and solicit feedback or response from your readers. Engage them in a thread. This is one way you get to know who’s reading you and use this information to proceed in the same direction or make adjustments to your blog to get the kind of readers you want. For instance, our friends at the Locksmith Spot are not only a directory for locksmiths but they are bloggers that cover great trending topics. For instance, their current blog post “the Age of Keyless Locks” recently discussed keyless locks that are very trendy right now. In fact, many individuals have switched their traditional locks for these clever devices because they are safer and harder to pick than traditional locks.  Kudos to the Locksmith Spot for their trendy posts.
6. Make it a habit to submit blog posts at least twice a week. The attention span for readers and fans is a small window because there’s a lot of competition so you need to keep writing your blogs regularly so your blog becomes a habit

Finally, you need that all-important key known as marketing. There are different approaches that can be used, some at the same time. One easy way is by using keywords in your blog. This helps bring in traffic if your blog shows up in a search engine because of your choice of keyword. Now, get out there and make that blog popular – you can do it!

As you probably know, Google updates site page rank (PR) every 4 months or so and the last update occurred on April 2nd. With each passing day, everyone (including me) is anxiously waiting for the PR to increase. Now, before you get all frustrated, you must remember that Google is Google and they are never ever typical. They are like a physician in a busy doctor’s office, they like to keep you waiting. So, instead of getting depressed that your page rank won’t update there are some things you can do about it. Ready?

1. Stop stressing and strike back. For every day that you don’t get a PR update, make it a point to get 5-10 quality backlinks so that you can show Google that you don’t really care about their Pagerank ranking system.

2. Focus on increasing your Alexa ranking instead. After all, with a better Alexa rank, you’l most likely see a PR increase anyway so you can’t go wrong.

3. Google “Why My PR won’t change or Why Google doesn’t like my great site” and then write post after post complaining about how frustrated you are about Google, how you can’t stand them and how you wish they would get their act together. By doing this, you’ll feel better and if you only choose do-follow sites, with higher PR than you have, you could actually increase your backlinks and ummm your ranking too.

4. Bookmark PR checker sites. Visit sites like Google Page Rank Update and check them every 10 minutes to see if your PR has been updated.

5. Stare at the Google PR and will it with your mind to change, change, change. If you can’t bear to see that PR move, you can always go on strike and start using Bing until Google updates your PR.

As for me, I plan on doing 1, 2,3, 4 and 5 (in that order) until I see some Google love or upward movement in my rankings. What about you?

When I first started setting up websites I honestly didn’t even think about the importance of PR. I simply built some quality sites, did a bit of article marketing and hoped for the best. It wasn’t until I got deep into internet marketing that I realized how very important PR is and how it really does matter. Ever so often, I get a few emails from newbies about the importance of PR and whether or not it really matters. Well, this post will attempt to explain this issue a bit more.

Basically Google ranks websites from 1 to 10, with a PR10 being the best. Very few sites are rated a 9 or 10, and one example is Wikipedia. Now, the reason Wikipedia has such a high rating is because they are considered an ‘authority’ site. They have many incoming links from high-quality sites, especially in comparison with the number of links going out. This makes the site more important in the eyes of Google, and with high-quality content and keywords, the PR can really rise.

Many people aren’t sure whether it matters, but when you’re considering offering spots for advertising, it does matter. People will take a good look at your Google PageRank before determining whether they want to place an ad on your site. The higher your page rank is, the more advertisers you’ll have lined up to place an ad on your site. For instance, if you have steady traffic, good PR and a decent Alexa score you can make money from ad sites like backlinks.com, buysellads.com and more.

Sound good? Well, there are many ways to increase your page rank, including:
- Obtaining more links back to your site, especially from high page ranks. It’s even better if there aren’t that many outbound links on your site.

- Using high-quality content that is relevant to your site’s theme. Strategically placed keywords can help as well, but too many keywords are a bad idea and will be classified as keyword stuffing.

- Provide valuable information for viewers, allowing them to be able to link to your site in confidence.

By increasing your Google PageRank, you can gain more advertisers willing to pay for spots on your website, enabling you to make more money and increase your income streams. Check out how to automatically increase your PageRank now.