Why some blogs will never make money

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    I think if most bloggers are honest they’ll admit that at some point they want to make money from their site, to me this is true even when blogging starts as a hobby. After all it’s supposed to be easy to earn money with the internet if you have lots of readers/visitors? Well no not exactly, just because you have lots of traffic doesn’t mean it’s worth money, just look at YouTube.

           it’s hard to believe but in my opinion there’s only one reason why most blogs will never make a return, its targeting. Most bloggers don’t really care where the majority of their traffic comes from but understanding visitor intent is the key to making money. For example if you have a general personal blog that covers your daily thoughts on everything from where to eat to that time your car broke down then there’s zero targeting. On the other hand say you had a blog covering a specific niche like “gaming laptops” then your targeted audience will be very valuable to advertisers. It may sound like an exaggeration but I’ll take the laptop blog with 200 readers over “Paul’s personal blog” with 10,000 any day. Even with all that traffic the general site will make less, next time you’re on a “general” blog look at the advertising and I’ll bet you see banners on everything from “home loans” to “floor cleaner”, they have no target audience and so have to shoot for everything.

   So if you’re reading this and thinking you’re going to have to start all over again with a new blog then don’t worry. It’s perfectly possible to re-define the target audience of almost any blog while still writing about what you love. The key is to find the niche within your site that you can expand upon. For example if you’ve written a lot of restaurant reviews in the past consider focusing your entire blog on this subject. You may choose to take it further by concentrating on a specific type of food or even city. The key principle is you want to be the big fish in the little pond and not the other way around.

I suppose some people are reading this and thinking:

“Why can’t I just write about whatever I want? I don’t want my blog to only be about one thing.”

Well I’m definitely not saying you can’t, after all that’s what makes the internet great. But the point I am trying to make is that when it comes to making money at this game the rules are different than when it’s just for fun. All advertisers demand results and it’s only when you deliver that your hobby can turn into a living.

For more blogging advice and ideas on how to earn money with your site check out Paul’s new webmaster blog.