Post by Adi Englander
There are plenty of ways for bloggers to generate revenue, but writers can easily become discouraged when they don’t see an immediate ROI on their efforts.
The most successful bloggers generate income from ads, paid subscriptions, featured content and more, but how did they get started? As the content marketing industry becomes more saturated, it’s hard enough for writers to grab the right audience’s attention and develop a steady user base, let alone make a profit.
And when looking at the overcrowded nature of the blogging industry, this concern is completely valid. According to StrataBeat, there are more than 250 million blogs online today that is viewed by more than 409 million users each month. In result, bloggers are left wondering how long it will take before they see substantial conversions.
Although writers should expect that it will take time, there are some ways that they can maximize their efforts to speed up the process. If you’re a blogger looking to generate revenue, these are some of the most powerful strategies for expediting your path to conversions.
Build an audience via social media before you launch
With an overwhelming amount of content available at our fingertips, thought leaders and brands can no longer depend on selling their products alone. Instead, they first have to develop brand personalities that offer authentic, valuable content in order to develop loyal followers.
Before launching your blog, try to build relationships with your target audience to establish brand familiarity. Once they already trust you and believe in the value you’re offering them, they’ll be much more inclined to pay for your content down the line.
Utilizing social media is a highly effective way to connect with potential readers and gain brand awareness. However, many bloggers fail to develop social media followings because they’re simply using it as a self-promotional tool instead of a relationship-building tool. If users feel that you’re providing information that brings real value to their lives, just like any other Facebook friend, they’re much more inclined to trust and feel connected to you.
The next issue that bloggers struggle with is finding the right audience on social. How are they supposed to attract specific users if they don’t even know where to start? There are plenty of tools that can help you identify and attract the right people, Narrow being one of the most popular. Narrow is the ultimate solution for finding and interacting with Twitter users interested in similar topics as you, which naturally leads to developing online relationships and brand loyalty.
Social media optimization tools like Narrow are ideal for those looking to expedite the relationship-building process and getting close to their monetization goals.
Nail down your personas
A persona gives passion and clarity to your writing. You will find that when you’re thinking of your persona and writing to them, your style of writing will really come alive.” On the contrary, bloggers who lack a consistent and engaging persona will have difficulty building relationships with their target audiences. In order to create an online personality that resonates with their ideal users, bloggers need to examine who their target audiences are in terms of demographics (gender, age, location, etc.) personality types, insecurities and motivations, professional occupations, learning interests, behaviors, and purchasing criteria. Every aspect of this online personality should reflect these characteristics in order to attract genuine interest and engagement.
Once you have your persona nailed down, design a marketing strategy that will allow you to connect with your users in the right context, whether it’s through a particular medium (video, image, infographic, etc.) or reaching out at the time of day that your users are most likely to engage with you. Having this awareness will help deepen brand awareness, brand trust, and eventual conversions. If you’re having difficulty constructing a persona that best reflects you and your users’ values, there are plenty of platforms, such as Xtensio, that will do all of the work for you.
By helping you identify your ideal user types, the tool can identify the exact online personality that you should create in order to attract the right users.
Invest time and money on an awesome editorial calendar, and get help with the writing
Without an organized editorial calendar, bloggers can easily get stuck in the mud. What if you wake up one day and don’t have the creative energy to come up with today’s blog post? It will inevitably make your content, brand voice, and value seem unengaging and random. That’s why it’s so crucial to have a schedule that lays out your content production well in advance. Having a clear calendar to stick to enables you to think ahead and properly prepare for each piece of content so that your voice remains consistent and your audience stays satisfied.
But, a lot of bloggers wonder, how am I supposed to come up with ten, 20 or 30 blog post ideas in advance that are all high-quality? How am I supposed to enjoy writing if it’s so forced? ClearVoice is a popular tool used by bloggers to gather ideas, inspiration, and support for their content planning needs.
Providing a comprehensive database of the most trending content around the web, ClearVoice helps analyze your content’s performance, identify potential topics, create engaging concepts, and build your production calendar so that you don’t have to do it alone. By seeing the most trending content internationally, you can easily become inspired and accelerate the planning process.
Are you ready?
Today’s biggest bloggers didn’t generate revenue on their first day writing. It can take a substantial amount of time to discover what you’re passionate about, build a brand voice that’s true to you, connect with the right audiences, and eventually turn a profit. But with the right strategy and tools in place, there are unlimited ways that you can accelerate the process and turn your passion for blogging into a lucrative career.Adi Englander is a freelance writer and social media expert who writes for Gerris digital, a full-service digital strategy firm in the Washington, DC, area.
Leave a Reply