Starting a Blog? You’re Going to Need a Niche
Contrary to popular belief, starting a blog is relatively easy. You just have to read first some of the top rated free web hosting reviews and sign on to a free web-hosting service and start writing. The problem arises when you decide you want readers. This probably happens pretty quickly, since most people who are writing solely for their own benefit would rather keep a journal than produce their most intimate thoughts for public consumption. No, bloggers ply their craft in the sometimes futile hope that someone (or a heaping lot of someones) will read their blog. The area in which many bloggers fall short is that they skimp on the planning phase. Raring to go, they jump the gun and are out the starting gate before they really have any notion of what it is they’re doing. And easily the most important part of a good plan (and often the most neglected) is finding a niche. It is especially vital if you are looking to monetize your blog.
You no doubt have a topic in mind, and that is a good springboard, if nothing else. When attempting to determine a niche, there is a fine line between being too generic and being to precise. If you choose to blog about a theme that is overly generic (“furniture”, for example), you’re going to find that a Google search yields a lot of competition on the subject (almost fourteen million blogs, in fact). If however, you narrow your field of vision somewhat (focus on, say, “eco-friendly furniture”), you stand to cut your competition significantly (by about 13.5 million contenders). And while it might be tempting to restrict your concentration even further (oh, let’s just say “eco-friendly furniture of Nepal”), you may find that you’re practically a lone wolf in the wilderness of the worldwide web (with only about 1,000 competitors). But how many people will search for your particular topic? Probably not too many. And now you begin to see the importance of selecting a proper niche.
But how do you settle on a mystical niche? The first thing to know is that if you have no interest in the topic you choose, there’s a fair chance that nobody else will, either. So you must first and foremost select a focus that you are passionate about. You’re going to put a lot of time and effort into this undertaking, and a labor of love requires, by definition, at least a modicum of love. Readers, especially those interested in the topic you present, are often savvy enough to spot a fake. And they certainly won’t appreciate posts that are less than enthusiastic or filled with misinformation.
You also need to remember that entertainment is a supply and demand industry, so if you’re not presenting a product that people want, you’re going to be hard-pressed to sell it (and a public that doesn’t want to consume your wares will leave you virtually bankrupt since traffic is one of the major ways to get advertisers and affiliates on board). A good way to gage interest in your topic is to check out the competition, but you should also take the time to uncover what exactly they are offering, and more importantly, what they’re not. This will not only give you a good idea of the current trends that are catching attention, offering some much needed direction, it will also help you to determine what you can bring to the game.
Sarah Danielson writes for Online Schools where you can find the top ranked online colleges and a variety of online education programs to fit your needs.
