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Last updated on December 13, 2021 at 07:15 AM.
Running a successful blog is not that easy. It’s not enough to just fill a few posts with content and hope that by magic enough people will be found in the internet’s vastness to read the content. It takes an excellent strategy, a lot of staying power and also a bit of talent. But the best thing about it is: The start of blogging costs next to nothing. Wordpress CMS, nice templates, pictures and visibility on Google are free. Only the hosting costs as much per month as a latte macchiato in Friedrichshain. So that this Latte Macchiato is also well invested, we dedicate this article to blogging in detail: What blogging is, how blogging has developed and changed over the years, which niches are worthwhile and last but not least, who became a multimillionaire through blogging and why. In this second part, we will look at success factors, blog millionaires and your next steps.
The 3 Success Factors For a Blog
The blogs mentioned in the first part have not become so successful by chance. The following factors were decisive.
Write For Your Readers
As much as you enjoy reading your blog posts after you published, you are not the only reader - at least that shouldn't be your goal.
When you blog, the ideas come randomly and you hold on to them because you like them. Just because you like an idea doesn't necessarily mean that others do.
By understanding the problems of your readers and customers and summarizing them in a persona, you can suggest several solutions and recommend exactly the one that only you can offer.
By talking about your persona's pain points, challenges and goals and making the reader feel that you are addressing them directly, the reader builds trust and accepts your offer.
Write Actionable
High quality content must be useful. Therefore, it is not enough to describe a subject and present the knowledge gained, but to draw conclusions from which the reader can derive the next steps.
Theoretical knowledge is a good thing, but a result based on practical implementation is even better. The most successful blogs are those that provide how-to's and tutorials. The evaluation of Neil Patel's wide-reaching blog shows this once again.
Blog Continuously in High Quality
Writing blog posts costs time, even more so if they contain analyzes. However, these posts are also the ones that are read the most, because they decipher a previously unknown secret. Other types of posts can be produced faster, but are also read less.
In this context, the frequency of publication depends on the type of content, and consequently publication is irregular. As a result, readers cannot develop a habit of visiting your blog. This is bad.
It is better to provide a fixed time budget for the monthly publication, set a monthly publication volume and then determine the topics and formats. They are the ones who determine the time spent on the individual post.
Only if you publish regularly under always the same conditions, you can consistently measure the performance of your posts and optimize your blogging.
The Most Successful Blogs 2020
It's obvious: Blogging may not cost much money initially, but it's a lot of work. Logically, the question arises whether it is worth it. For this reason, we show three of the most successful blogs of 2020, which turned their operators into multimillionaires.
PerezHilton: $41.3 Million Per Year
Blog Perez Hilton, Crispy Content®
In fact: PerezHilton.com still exists. And he has increased his sales enormously in the last six years.
He has remained true to his style and still writes stories about stars like Lady Gaga, Johnny Depp and Miley Cyrus. PerezHilton is one of the biggest names in showbiz journalism.
Among the most popular features of the PerezHilton blog are gossip stories, photo galleries and quizzes. Overall, the content of the blog resembles that of a traditional glossy magazine like "Closer" or "Heat".
One of the greatest strengths of the PerezHilton blog is the effective use of celebrities, who link effectively to the blog's content. Famous names and famous faces are in focus, e.g. through category headlines for certain celebrities and the obsessive use of red-carpet photos. Perez Hilton knows who he wants to reach and what he has to do to get there. But the most important success factor is his stamina.
Envato Tuts+: $10 Million Per Year
Blog Envato Tuts, Crispy Content®
Envato Tuts+ is an extensive library of tutorials, courses, guides and eBooks provided in blog format. It covers topics such as coding and web design, business, photography, music and graphic design. Some Envato Tuts+ content is freely accessible, while others are available on a subscription basis.
Envato, the company behind Tuts+, was founded in 2006 by Collis Ta'eed. The headquarters are located in Melbourne, Australia.
The blog is so successful because it imparts knowledge that the reader can immediately apply. This implementation leads to a result, and that is the best thing a reader can wish for in any book.
Smashing Magazine: $5,2 Million Per Year
Blog Smashing Magazine, Crispy Content®
If you are a web developer or designer, we bet that at some point you have read an article that was published in Smashing Magazine. This blog was founded in 2006 by Sven Lennartz and Vitaly Friedman and has become one of the leading sources for tutorials about web design and development, from information architecture to website aesthetics.
A key element of Smashing Magazine's success is the membership offer, which motivates readers to pay between $3 and $7 per month for premium features. Interestingly, the blog has a live membership counter on its home page, which we think is a clever way to help readers quantify the value of their financial contribution to the blog.
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The Next Step: Find Your Niche
If you feel like blogging yourself, decide in which area you want to start. After all, it would be a pity to publish for a year and then find out that too few people are interested in the subject area to earn money with it.
Important for the decision is that you feel at home in this niche, because in the beginning you write alone. Only then can authentic content be created. The niche should have a large target group that you can monetize later.
We can't say much about your interests, but we have listed the niches where you can earn good money with blogs.
Travel Blogs
Travel blogs have a huge potential to generate a lot of traffic and monetize it. Everyone loves to travel and they will always look for alternative ways to go somewhere they have never been before to discover new cultures.
With your travel blog, you can take many directions. You can have a region-specific blog, a blog about food traveling, or a personal travel blog filled with your own exciting adventures and travel guides.
Your blog can also focus on hotel or restaurant reviews or travel gear, so you can make money with affiliate links. This niche is huge!
Parent Blogs
Another perennial favorite: Moms and dads are everywhere and growing back, so you'll always have a large audience interested in useful tips and advice for parents. The audience is constantly renewing itself (this is exhausting); the topics are always the same (this is great). You just have to repackage the latter again and again.
There are hundreds of themes to choose from, all of which have to do with caring for babies and children and help young parents choose the best food, the best clothes and the safest toys for their little ones or plan a perfect child's birthday party.
The best way to monetize your parent blog is through affiliate marketing, by promoting the best products for children and parents.
Health Blogs
This niche also offers great opportunities for affiliate partners, as you can write about food, supplements, fitness products and much more.
You can focus your blog on healthy recipes, diets, morning routines, training at home, gyms, health tips and much more. There are many opportunities for massive traffic and income, the possibilities are endless.
Tech And Gaming Blogs
Gamers are interested in the technology market, the combination of both is profitable. In this niche there are many sub-sectors and just as many affiliate opportunities.
So you could write app and video game reviews, reviews of technical gadgets, tips on how to repair cell phones and PCs, video game tutorials or any other related topic. The glorious thing is: There is a lot of money in this industry because of the high sales and margins. You could get something out of them.
Device Blogs
Device blogs aim at technically experienced people. These blogs contain the latest information about the devices, their features, functions, etc. With the rapid development of technology, it is no problem to find inspiration for topics in this niche.
As in the previous section, we can only repeat: There is a lot of money in this industry because of the high sales and margins.
The Next Steps
At the end of this article we can definitely state one thing: Blogging is worthwhile if you do it right. How to do it right is shown and the examples of the most interesting and successful blogs 2020.
If you now want to start with a blog, these are the next steps you have to take:
- Find a niche that interests you.
- Check if the target group is big enough.
- Check if you can monetize the target group profitably.
- Develop a persona.
- Develop theme worlds and themes.
- Install a Wordpress blog at your favorite hoster with one click.
- Install an appealing theme.
- Set up your page.
- Start publishing.
- Measure your successes and failures.
Everything else comes later, when publishing has become routine. Learn everything you need to know about content development and creation in our free online course "Making Content". Just click on the banner below and off you go.
Crispy Content® Team
Creative, smart and talkative. Analytical, tech-savvy and hands-on. These are the ingredients for a content marketer at Crispy Content® - whether he or she is a content strategist, content creator, SEO expert, performance marketer or topic expert. Our content marketers are "T-Shaped Marketers". They have a broad range of knowledge paired with in-depth knowledge and skills in a single area.
