These two key factors will determine your success or failure.

They often elude us like a two-year-old let loose in the clothing section of a department store (he’s in there somewhere).

Once you find these two qualities, you should do whatever you can to keep them.

What are they?

Clarity and focus.

Clarity tells us what to do next, while focus helps us get it done.

To help you have more clarity and focus, I recommend adopting five daily habits. Try these five daily habits for a week and you’ll 10x your productivity.

Habit #1: Your Morning Success Ritual

How you start your day will determine how the rest of your day will go. If you lazily roll out of bed after hitting the snooze button a few times, the rest of your day will carry that same theme.

How different would your morning feel if you woke up energized and ready to attack your day? That’s what a good morning ritual can do for you.

Many experts across various industries talk about the value of a morning success ritual. The important thing to remember is quality of time is better than the quantity of time. It may not make sense to have a 90-minute morning ritual given your current season of life. Start with what you have available to you.

To get started, follow these guidelines:

• Brainstorm all the possible activities you could do during your morning success ritual
• Place an approximate length of time each activity would take
• Select the activities that mean the most to you given your time available
• Write down your new morning success ritual in the order you want to follow

Once you begin, don’t be afraid to tweak your schedule as necessary. Keep adjusting until you have a morning ritual that works for you.

Here’s my personal schedule:

• Drink a bottle of water
• Cardio exercise (30 minutes)
• Strength training (20 minutes)
• Stretching (10 minutes)
• Bible reading/prayer (10 minutes)
• Journaling (10 minutes)
• Review book notes (10 minutes)

The schedule above sets me up for a successful day. I’ve given time to the important areas of my wellbeing (physical, mental, and spiritual). Find a simple morning ritual and get started tomorrow!

Habit #2: Your Workday Startup Ritual

I first heard of the concept of a workday startup ritual from Michael Hyatt. It makes perfect sense when you think about it. How many of us casually fall into our workday only to wonder a few hours later what we’ve accomplished? A workday startup ritual will give you the jump-start you need.

Possible workday startup activities could be:

• Check your email (put a time limit on this)
• Review your major goals/projects
• Check your voicemail
• Check the Slack App (a tool used by virtual teams)
• Scan your project management tool for updates (we use Asana)
• Determine your top three most important tasks for the day

The point of this daily workday ritual is to clear the path so you can spend the rest of your morning with complete clarity and focus.

Tip: Try to spend less than thirty minutes with this ritual so your mornings don’t get away from you.

Habit #3: Your 3 Big Daily Wins

I first heard this concept several years ago from a fellow blogger named Leo Boabota. He would often refer to it as his 3 MIT’s (most important tasks).

Many of us have long never-ending to-do lists. When our lists are long, two things happen:

• We can become paralyzed and de-motivated to do our work
• We only work on urgent tasks which are not always the most important tasks.

To set up a game you can win, you must practice the art of selecting your daily big three tasks. Every morning I ask myself a simple question: “What would make today great?” The top three things that come to mind become my daily big three tasks.

For example, I use ConvertKit as my email marketing software. If I wanted to reach out to my audience, then I would add “send a marketing email” to my Daily Big 3.

This does not mean I only accomplish three tasks a day. In fact, I strive to accomplish my big three tasks before lunch. Once you begin to implement this practice, you’ll discover that you get more done than you did before.

Habit #4: Maker Mornings, Manager Afternoons

If you desire to work for yourself, an essential habit to develop is managing the tension between being a boss and being a worker in your business. You must learn to wear both hats in order to be successful.

There are times you need to work “on” your business and there are times you need to work “in” your business. One of the most helpful practices I have adopted is called: “Maker Mornings, Manager Afternoons.”

This strategy comes from an article published in the Harvard Business Review. The concept is simple. Use your mornings to work in your business, and your afternoons to work on your business.

I rarely allow for morning appointments. I like to leave my mornings open to do creative work. I’ve even adopted a motto called: “Do creative work first.”

Following this simple plan has allowed me to carve out focus sessions in the morning to get work done while leaving me more available to work on my business in the afternoons.

Habit #5: Celebrate Your 3 Big Wins from the Day

Celebrating your wins is hard for most high-achievers. We often get so focused on the next mountain to climb that we fail to stop and enjoy the view around us.

Goals are great to have but be aware of the gap they create. They create a gap between where we are and where we want to be. This can leave you in a constant state of discontent unless you adopt a simple daily practice.

I learned this practice from Dan Sullivan of Strategic Coach. Every evening before you go to bed, share your three biggest wins from the day with someone else. I do this practice every evening with my wife and it helps us stay on the same page.

This simple practice also leaves you in a state of gratitude before you go to bed. It’s a powerful reminder of the joy each day can bring.

Habits can be a powerful force for good in your life when used the correct way. Do you have a set of daily habits that help to propel you toward your dreams and goals?

The post Blogging Habits: 5 Daily Habits to 10x Your Blog Productivity appeared first on Blogging Your Passion | How to Start a Blog.

When I first heard those words, I was taken aback. As the founder, after all, I want my online business to succeed more than anyone else.

Yet, after I digested that statement, I knew it was true.

Whether you run an online business or the small brick-and-mortar down the street, there comes a point in time when you become the bottleneck to everything.

In order to grow to the next level, you have to change your thinking. Specifically, you’ll need to:

• Let go of the tight grip you have on everything
• Get comfortable with things not being done exactly the way you would do them
• Grow your own leadership skills as you lead others

If you are just getting started with this idea of outsourcing, I want to offer you a simple six-step blueprint.

How to Hire on Upwork and Build Your Dream Team

A great place to start your outsourcing journey is Upwork.com. Not only do they have one of the largest databases of available freelancers on the planet, but they also have some awesome built-in tools. Let’s walk through the process of how to hire on Upwork.

A few of my favorite features include:

• Time tracking of freelancers (including random screenshots)
• Weekly pay every Monday to your freelancers (great for budgeting)
• Hourly and project pay rates
• Handy built-in messaging tool to communicate with your team

Whenever I feel the need to get more help and expand my team, I follow these simple six steps.

Step 1. Create Your Workflows First

Back in 2011, I hired my first virtual assistant. It was a disaster. Afterward, when I analyzed what happened, I had to come to the hard truth. I was the problem. I made the following mistakes:

• I tried to hire a superstar to do everything (that wasn’t fair)
• I expected them to catch what I taught them with no detailed instructions
• I expected them to do things exactly like me

A few months later, I re-grouped and decided to try this outsourcing thing again. This time I started by documenting my work first. I took a look at the recurring tasks in my business and wrote out detailed instructions.

I personally use Loom to record the workflow and then store all the links on a Master SOP Google Spreadsheet that I created. When you hire someone, you can give them access to the handful of workflows you want them to do for you.

Step 2. Sketch Out Your Dream Org Chart

Documenting all of your workflows will feel like extra work at first, but it is setting up a foundation for you to take a massive leap forward in the days ahead. After about 90 days of documenting workflows, I began to group them into potential positions to outsource.

This lead me to open up a spreadsheet and begin to envision what a dream team would look like for me. At first, my name was attached to each role on the org chart, but my plan was to slowly change that over time. As I delegated more to others, I was freed up to grow the business.

Step 3. Post Your Job Specifics

Now it’s time to post a job on Upwork. The good news is that posting a job is free. Oftentimes, within an hour you will begin to receive applications from qualified freelancers ready to work for you.

We follow this seven-step checklist to create awesome job descriptions:

• Attractive headline – Be descriptive, direct, and intriguing with your headline.
• Summary – Give a sentence or two that explains the job responsibilities in a succinct manner.
• Example tasks – Share specific tasks they will be performing for you. (Get this from your workflows.)
• Ideal candidate – List out any software or skills the ideal candidate will possess.
• Preferred experience – List any other programs you use to run your business that would be helpful (but not required) for the candidate to know. Maybe you love for them to have experience with Kajabi or ConvertKit.
• Personal characteristics – What qualities should the candidate possess for this role? Do you need them to be organized, friendly, positive, and/or detail-oriented?
• Time required – Be clear about how many hours you expect per week and what the working conditions would be like.

Below you will find a sample job posting we’ve used in the past that fits the criteria listed above:

Step 4. Narrow Your Candidate List

Within an hour of posting, you should begin to receive candidate proposals. It’s not uncommon to receive proposals from a wide variety of countries and pay level. We usually give it 24-48 hours before trying to narrow down the candidates to a short list.

While Upwork gives you many different ways to filter the candidates that have applied, we typically filter in two primary ways.

• Filter by job success percentage – I like to set this at 90% and above. This success rate is determined by the rating system of other clients on Upwork. It’s important that I know a candidate values their reputation on Upwork.
• Filter by money earned – Upwork will also display for you the total amount a candidate has earned on Upwork. I want to hire people who heavily depend on Upwork as a primary source of their income. This means they are logging in daily to do their work and they will typically be more responsive.

Step 5. Start with a Trial Job

When hiring someone new, it’s a good idea to crawl before you walk and walk before you run. See if they would be open to either a trial task or a trial time period (7 days) before you fully integrate them into your team.

Note: Do not take advantage of them with trial tasks. Let them know up front you will pay for their work whether or not you decide to move forward on a more permanent basis. 

Step 6. Integrate the Freelancer into Your Team

Once a candidate has proven to be a good fit, take the time to fully integrate them into your team. Here are a few ideas for you:

• Put them through an orientation course – I put together a simple five video course that walks them through our mission, core values, our tools, and our team structure.
• Create a communication structure – We use Slack to communicate, but you can also use the built-in messaging feature of Upwork, too.
• Add them to your project management tool – We have all of our team members on Asana. This gives us a central place to assign projects and tasks.

If you follow the steps I’ve outlined, you can begin to build your own dream team one position at a time. Remember, slow and steady wins the race. The more you begin to delegate, the less of a bottleneck you become in your own business.

The post How to Hire on Upwork and Build Your Dream Team appeared first on Blogging Your Passion | How to Start a Blog.

A lead magnet is a piece of valuable content you give away for free in exchange for an email address.

Why would you want a reader’s email address? If you want to build an online business, there’s one essential skill you must develop: email list building.

Your ability to capture new leads (subscribers) will determine the success or failure of your online business. It’s simply that important. List building is a fundamental skill every successful blogger must master.

Yet, many new bloggers (and more experienced ones, too) struggle with getting their lead magnets in place. My goal for you is not only to better understand what a lead magnet is but why it’s vital to your success as a blogger.

The “Join My Newsletter” Trap

There’s a deceptive trap that is easy to fall into when you first start blogging. I call it the “join my newsletter” trap. Give me your email address, and I’ll send you a newsletter every week.

This strategy may have worked in 2007, but it no longer works today. In some ways, people are more protective of their email address than ever. Just setting up a capture form on your blog is not going to compel someone to give you their email address.

The whole concept of “join my newsletter” is more self-focused than others-focused. Your audience is instead asking: “What’s in it for me?”

If you want to triple your email list size over the next thirty days, then adopt one key strategy: Create content upgrades.

Why Content Upgrades Work

A content upgrade is a piece of bonus content related to a topic your audience is already highly interested in. You place it right in the middle of a blog post (or mention it in the middle of a podcast or YouTube video) Below is a screenshot of one I use in the middle of my blog posts on my blog:

See how powerful a content upgrade can be for growing your list?

Examples of content upgrades might be:

• A worksheet or spreadsheet
• A checklist to follow
• A short PDF guide
• Video bonus content
• Audio bonus content

For someone to get access to this content upgrade, they need to opt in with their email address. You can implement this strategy for blog posts, podcasts, and even YouTube videos.

Let me share a few recent examples:

Example 1: The 90-Day Review Checklist [Blog Post]

Below you will see a screenshot of a blog post I wrote about how to do a quarterly review. In the post, I mention an opportunity to download my PDF checklist (see arrow).

How effective is this strategy in collecting new email subscribers? Here’s a screenshot of my ConvertKit account just a few days after the post went live.

As you can see, nearly 14% of visitors to that blog post became email subscribers from this strategy. If you think that post was just an outlier, I have example after example of how this strategy just keeps working.

Example 2: Blog Business Plan Template [Blog Post]

Here we see an almost 14% conversion and 167 new email subscribers in a matter of a few days.

Are you beginning to see the power of content upgrades? Think of content upgrades as super-targeted lead magnets.

The 12 Types of Lead Magnets

The good news is there are no limits as to what qualifies as a lead magnet. There are only two critical factors in creating an effective one:

• It must add value in some way
• It should be easy to consume (quick read)

When it comes to creating our lead magnets for Blogging Your Passion, we tend to select from the following twelve types of lead magnets. I’ll give a brief explanation of each.

• Checklist/Resource List: A one-page summary list of what was discussed in the blog post
• Audio Transcript: A written transcript of a podcast interview
• PDF Blog Post: A handy, printable PDF version of the entire blog post
• Tip Sheet/Resource List: A one- or two-page list of tips on a topic
• Useful Worksheet: A simple question-and-answer document to help someone apply what they learned
• Report/Case Study: A three- to five-page case study or a report on recent trends
• Excel File/Spreadsheet: A helpful spreadsheet related to the topic discussed
• Example Template/Word Doc: A template that can be used to apply what was learned
• Manual/Starter Guide: A getting started guide on an important topic
• Audio File: A bonus audio recording in addition to the original content
• Instructional Video: A bonus instructional video in addition to the original content
• Learning Challenge/Free Course: A free three- to seven-day course to help your readers apply what they learned

Want even more content upgrade ideas? Check out this blog post from CoSchedule on 35 Different Content Upgrade Ideas

The 3 C’s of Lead Magnet Creation

Now that you understand the limitless possibilities of creating lead magnets, I want to help you get started. If you are trying to create your first lead magnet, then I recommend starting with one of the three C’s.

• Content: Find an old blog post and turn it into a PDF
• Checklist: Create a one-page summary checklist or resource list of links
• Challenge: Create a three- to seven-day email challenge/course

I placed them in order from easiest to most difficult. An easy place to start is to go over your old blog posts and find the one that either has the most engagement or the one you are the proudest of. Copy and paste your entire blog post into a Google Doc. Download your document as a PDF so you can easily deliver it to anyone who signs up.

To see how easy this is set up using ConvertKit, see our blog post: ConvertKit Review: 7 Big Reasons I Made the Switch

Another easy lead magnet to create is a checklist. Using the same process mentioned above, brainstorm a list of helpful links or checklist items based on a certain topic. People love to download PDF checklists. For an example, check out our post: 17 Facebook Live Video Tips for Better Results. 

While it is a bit more challenging to pull off, free multi-day challenges are extremely popular right now. If you have software like ConvertKit, you can easily create a three- to seven-day automatic email series. Each day, you send a short email with a specific action step for the subscriber to take. To see an example, check out our free list building challenge below:

Now that you know what a lead magnet is, which kind will you create first?

The post What is a Lead Magnet? (Plus 12 Easy Ways to Build Your Email List Fast) appeared first on Blogging Your Passion | How to Start a Blog.

If you are looking to launch a membership site, then check out our blog post: How to Launch a Membership Site: 8 Simple Steps.

If you want to grow an existing membership site, you need to get creative about how you market it all year long. We use six powerful promotional strategies that work together to add new monthly members on a consistent basis.

How to Promote a Membership Site: 6 Key Strategies

We’ll start by walking you through the front door (public enrollment) promotion campaigns we use to get new members. Then we will share a few of our favorite back door (private enrollment) strategies that have worked well.

Strategy 1. The Seasonal Public Launch

By far, one of the most effective promotional strategies for a membership site is the seasonal public launch. To use this strategy, you’ll need to publicly open and close your membership site a few times per year.

Here at Blogging Your Passion, we have both a spring and fall launch. Typically, we will have a week of creating buzz, followed by a week of open enrollment. At the end of the promotion, we will publicly close enrollment.

Does this strategy work? The numbers don’t lie.

A few years ago, I decided to leave our membership site registration open all year long. I wanted to allow new subscribers to join at any time and not have to wait. I thought for sure that over the course of a year we would add many more members.

But the results told us otherwise.

We added more new members in fourteen days of open enrollment during a “launch” than we did keeping the membership site open all year long.

The reasons this strategy works are simple:

• Excitement – You create anticipation for enrollment by creating buzz the week before
• Urgency – The open and closed cart creates an immediate buying decision
• Exclusivity – The opportunity to be part of a private community is attractive

If you do nothing else, use this promotion strategy with your membership site.

Strategy 2. The Free Trial Downsell

A free trial downsell is ideal for people who showed interest in your public launch, but they did not enroll. One of the best ways to execute this promotion is to offer it the day after you close your public launch.

We either make the offer a 7-day free trial (we have them add their payment method to get access) or offer a one dollar 30-day trial. We also make this offer only available for 24 hours.

Below is an example of the marketing email we send. Again, this email is only sent to people who visited the sales page but did not enroll.

We’ve added 76 additional members so far using the above email and downsell strategy.

Strategy 3. The Early Notification List Funnel

Once your enrollment period is closed, you can change your sales page into an “early notification” page. This will allow you to collect email addresses of people who are interested in joining your membership site the next time it is open.

If you don’t want to wait to allow them to join, then you have two promotional opportunities:

• Do an email promotion just to the early notification list allowing them to join through a private launch. This would typically last one week.
• Set up an automatic funnel for your early notification list. You can schedule an automatic email to be sent out a few days after they join the list.

Strategy 4. The Splinter Class & Upsell (Internal Promotion)

One of the beauties of running a membership site is that you’re always creating new, valuable content for your existing members. Why not strategically sell some of this content to non-members? It gives them an opportunity to test out your training.

For example, inside my membership site (Online Business Fast Track Lab) I host a 60-minute training each month called: Fast Track Class. We cover topics like email list building, social media traffic, and audience-building techniques. Every few months, I then take one of the training videos and set it up as a separate product inside Kajabi (see below for an example).

Now I’m able to sell the training separately from my membership site to non-members. Even better, I will do a one-week flash sale to my list and offer a training similar to the one shown above for just $7.

After a non-member makes their purchase, they are then presented with a 7-day free trial to the membership site. Every time we execute this strategy, we not only convert many more new customers but we add new members during our closed enrollment period.

5. The Facebook Ad Splinter & Upsell (External Promotion)

Want to grow your membership outside of your existing membership site? The Facebook Ad Splinter & Upsell strategy is similar to the last method except for two critical points:

• We will be promoting to a colder, but targeted audience on Facebook (people who are primarily unaware of us).
• We will start by offering a free lead magnet.

So the customer journey looks like this:

• New subscriber opts in to receive the lead magnet
• They are shown the $7 class special on the thank you page
• Offer is made for the free 7-day trial of the membership site

When done correctly, this Facebook Ad campaign has three primary benefits:

• Builds your email list with new subscribers wanting your lead magnet
• Lowers your ad budget costs by making $7 sales through impulse purchases
• Adds new members to your membership site during the closed enrollment period

If you are able to dial in this strategy and make it work, it can be an extremely effective promotional campaign–even for those who have a small email list.

Strategy 6. The Product Upsell Private Invite

Do you have other online courses to sell? If so, you should consider offering a one-time free 7-day trial as an upsell when they buy a course. We use Kajabi to deploy the upsell, so setting it up is fairly easy.

When a customer buys a course, they’ll also see a two-minute video that shows the inside of the membership site. We also state in the video that even though it is currently closed, for today only you can get a free trial (see below for an example).

Every week we see new people join our membership site through this strategy. Think about the other products or services you are already selling and add a simple upsell to a free trial to your membership site.

What I love about the above six promotional strategies is that you can incorporate all of them into your yearly marketing calendar. By doing so, you will add many more members throughout the year than if you just simply left your membership site enrollment open all the time.

The post How to Promote a Membership Site: 6 Key Strategies appeared first on Blogging Your Passion | How to Start a Blog.

At least weekly I get asked that question in some form.

My answer?

Don’t wait.

The biggest difference between a “hobby” blogger and a “full-time” blogger is the full-time blogger has a way to get paid.

Now, before you go hide in a cave and spend twelve months building an online course, I have something I’d rather see you do first.

It’s called affiliate marketing.

Table of Contents:

• The 3 main steps to be a success with affiliate marketing
• 9 reasons I love affiliate marketing for beginners
• What is affiliate marketing?
• How does affiliate marketing work?
• What are the different types of affiliate marketing?
• How to create your affiliate marketing library
• My top 8 favorite ways to promote affiliate programs

When I started my career coach blog back in 2009, the very first thing I did to monetize was research and find affiliate programs in my niche.

Now, my niche at the time was accounting & finance professionals. So, my first thought was, “I doubt that there are any affiliate programs in my niche.”

Boy, was I wrong!

After a little bit of research, I found:

• a BIG 4 accounting hiring guide that earned me $12.50 for every sale
• CED (Continuing Education Credit) online classes that earned me 50% of every sale
• an online CPA certification prep course that earned me 50% per sale
• an online job board that earned income every time someone clicked to view a job opening

All of the above (and more) allowed me to monetize my career coaching blog BEFORE I had created my own products.

The good news is learning how to make money with affiliate marketing is fairly simple:

• Step 1: Register for Affiliate Marketing Programs
• Step 2: Create Your Affiliate Marketing Library
• Step 3: Promote your Affiliate Marketing Products

It really is that simple.

We will go further in-depth on each of the three steps in a moment, but first…

9 Reasons I Love Affiliate Marketing for Beginners

There are at least 9 reasons I LOVE affiliate marketing for beginners.

1. No barrier to entry: You can literally sign up today and start promoting offers.
2. No hidden costs: There’s zero cost to sign up.
3. No risk: There’s no huge investment of time.
4. No fulfillment: No customer support service needed.
5. Monetize now: You can start promoting today.
6. Serve your audience: You become a “resource” to your audience.
7. Learn what your audience wants to buy: You can create your own products and services once you know what they want help with!
8. Learn how to sell: Selling is part of operating a business and a skill you can develop.
9. Income is mostly passive: You can earn affiliate income today from a blog post you wrote several months ago.

I guess you can tell why I love affiliate marketing.

Before we get into our 3-step plan for affiliate marketing success, let’s answer a few common questions.

What is affiliate marketing?

What exactly is affiliate marketing to begin with? Is affiliate marketing an MLM (multi-level marketing) business model? Is affiliate marketing just a get rich quick scheme? The answer is no to both. Affiliate marketing is when creators of products allow you to promote their product and, in return, you earn a commission when someone buys.

The process is similar to you being a salesperson in the real world and earning a commission when other people make a purchase. However, what makes affiliate marketing so attractive is that you can scale your promotion strategy beyond having to talk with each person you come in contact with.

How does affiliate marketing work?

The great thing about affiliate marketing is there is zero startup cost to get started. All you need to do is get approved to promote the product (the process is easy). You will then be given a special affiliate link that is specifically attached to you.

When other people click on your link and then make a purchase, you will get credit. You will receive your commission check either by Paypal, checking account deposit, or a check in the mail.

What are the different types of affiliate marketing?

For simplification, I’m going to break affiliate marketing into four different categories. Each of them has its own unique advantages.

1. One-Time Affiliate Program

This is the most common type of affiliate program, and it’s been around since the dawn of the internet. You can find one-time affiliate commission programs all over the internet, including places like Amazon, Walmart, etc.

I’m calling it a one-time commission because you will receive a commission from each purchase made. Later, I’ll share some of my favorite ways to promote these programs.

2. Recurring Affiliate Program

What if you could make one sale and receive an on-going commission each and every month? The recurring affiliate program is by far my favorite one. You will mostly find these programs on products that have a monthly subscription. For example, I use and promote ConvertKit as my favorite email list building service.

Besides being a great tool, they currently offer a lifetime, recurring 33% commission on every person you refer. In other words, you make one sale, and then receive a commission check each and every month for as long as that person is a customer of ConvertKit.

3. Affiliate Launch Program

Affiliate launches have become powerful promotional tools over the last decade. These are usually related to online course programs that open once or twice per year. The reason they are such a powerful marketing tool is the built-in scarcity involved. They often have a limited time enrollment period.

Also, you don’t have to have a huge audience or mailing list in order to qualify to promote these programs. If this method interests you, I’d encourage to sign up to Matt McWilliams’ Affiliate Launch Notification List. You’ll hear about upcoming launches you can promote.

4. Affiliate Webinar Program

To take advantage of this program, you’ll need to be able to attract at least 150 or more webinar signups. The way you earn income with this strategy is to promote a webinar that someone else (your affiliate partner) will be teaching. They will handle all of the tech setup, running of the webinar, and even the promotional pitch.

All you are responsible for is promoting the webinar and getting people to register.

How to Make Money with Affiliate Marketing in 3 Easy Steps

Affiliate marketing is not a “get rich quick” scheme. But it is a simple model to earn an income once you know the steps. In order to be successful with affiliate marketing, you’ll need to execute three vital steps.

Step 1. Register for Affiliate Marketing Programs

For the majority of affiliate programs, you’ll just need to register an account. There is no approval process needed except for providing the right information. Every program will ask you to provide either a social security number or an EIN (Employer Identification Number) during the registration process.

I’d recommend that you apply for a Free EIN Number so that you’re not sharing your personal social security number all over the web. Check out our blog post on how to easily apply for your free EIN Number.

Secondly, you’ll also need to provide a way to get paid. Many affiliate programs pay via Paypal so it will be a necessity that you get a Paypal account. All you’ll need to share is your Paypal email address. Still, other programs will want to pay via direct deposit into a checking account. This is why it’s also a good idea to register for a free business checking account.

While it would be impossible to share all of the affiliate programs out there. Below is a list of some of my favorite places to register to get started in affiliate marketing. Later in step three, I’ll share what to do with your affiliate links in order to start making money.

Affiliate Marketing Directories

• CJ.com – Also known as Commission Junction, CJ.com has been around for decades. What’s great about this program is that it’s a directory of thousands of affiliate opportunities. Companies register their products and services with CJ in order to share their products with potential affiliate marketers. CJ has both physical and digital products to promote in their marketplace.
• ClickBank.com – ClickBank has also been around for a long time. Most of the products you’ll find here are digital in nature. They are usually either a software tool or an online course of some kind.
• Amazon.com – Yes! Amazon does have an affiliate program. You can read this blog post on how to get started with Amazon’s affiliate program. There are two primary benefits of registering as an Amazon Associate. First, they are a trusted brand online. Second, you get credit for everything in a customer’s shopping cart (not just what you referred them for).
• Linkshare.com – Another solid program that has some great products and services you can promote no matter what niche you serve.

Individual Affiliate Programs

In all of the programs shared above, you get access to promote products from many different companies. However, there are many companies who simply use their own affiliate program. The best way to find these programs is to:

1. Go to their home page
2. Scroll down to the bottom of the page
3. Look for “Affiliate Program” or “Partner Program”

Below you’ll see an example from Shopify.com.

If the company’s page doesn’t have an obvious affiliate or partner link, you can also Google the company name with the phrase “affiliate program” or “partner program.”

Step 2. Create Your Affiliate Marketing Library

If you haven’t noticed by now, you’ll discover soon enough that it’s easy to become quickly scattered. Each affiliate marketing program has a unique login, a certain pay structure, etc. In order to keep your sanity, I’m going to recommend that you create a spreadsheet directory where all your programs will live.

The Affiliate Marketing Library Spreadsheet

I created a simple spreadsheet that helps keep me organized. With this spreadsheet, I’m able to quickly find my affiliate links at a moment’s notice and be reminded of the commission structure.

I have four columns on my spreadsheet to keep me organized: Name, Affiliate Link, Type, Special Notes.

• Name – This can be helpful when you need to find your affiliate link fast. You can sort the column by alphabetical order saving you precious time.
• Affiliate Link – This should be the “pretty” link you’ve set up NOT the raw affiliate link you were given. Sometimes affiliate programs switch the affiliate software you use. If you’ve created your own link using a plugin like Pretty Link Plugin, you’ll be able to easily change the target URL without changing your link.
• Type – Some affiliate programs pay instantly, lifetime recurring, or a certain percentage. This is where you can easily recall the terms.
• Special Notes – You can place anything you’d like in this column that would be helpful to remember.

Step 3. Promote your Affiliate Marketing Products

Now that you’ve registered and organized your affiliate links, it’s time to start promoting! I’m going to share with you my top eight affiliate promotion strategies.

Strategy #1: Blog Post Review Promotion

An easy and evergreen way to get started is to do blog post reviews. Write a post where you share the good, bad, and ugly about the product. The goal is not to “sell” the product, but to share either how to use it or your own personal experience with it.

As you write the post, you’ll share your personal affiliate link throughout the post.

Here’s an example of one I did for my review of Kajabi: The New Kajabi Review: Is It Really Worth It?

What’s the cool part?

Months from now, you could receive a commission check from a blog post you wrote a long time ago.

PRO TIP: Be sure to use a free link shortener plugin like Pretty Link. Not only will it make your links look better, but it will be easier to change the raw affiliate link if that product ever changes the affiliate program they use.

Strategy #2: Website Recommended Tools Promotion

If you’re doubting whether or not your niche has affiliate programs, then at the very least you should follow this strategy. Set up a page on your blog called “Recommended Tools.” You can then share the products and services you use to run your own blog or online business.

You can share affiliate links for web hosting, email marketing, social media scheduling, etc. Once you have it all set up, be sure you have a link to this page in the navigation menu from your home page.

Strategy #3: Blog Post Mention Promotion

While this may sound similar to the first strategy, it is different. As you write blog posts, you’ll inevitably mention a product or service that has an affiliate program. Even though the focus of the blog post is not about that product, you have two choices. You can either place your affiliate link in the post or create a link that points back to your blog post review of that product.

This is a great way to sprinkle in affiliate links throughout your entire blog.

Strategy #4: YouTube Video Mention Promotion

Do you ever record videos for YouTube? If so, you should absolutely include affiliate links in the description area below your videos. I’ve done video tutorials showing how I use a software or tool and then mention my link that is displayed below the video.

This can be a great evergreen strategy to set up in your online business.

Strategy #5: Podcast Mention Promotion

If you have a podcast, you can also share affiliate links on your podcast episodes. There are two effective ways to do this.

First, you can create a 15-30 second commercial about the product. You can say something like, “This podcast episode is brought to you by…” Then share the link where they can go to learn more.

The second way you can share affiliate links on a podcast is to mention them in the content of the podcast itself. So, if I have a podcast about email marketing, then I might mention my affiliate link for ConvertKit since it’s my email marketing tool of choice.

Strategy #6: Webinar Promotion

If you love to teach, then you’ll love this strategy. Promote a free webinar on how you use a certain tool, product, or service. Spend 90% of the webinar on just showing how you use the tool. The other 10% of the webinar share your affiliate link as an easy way to get started.

Strategy #7: Facebook Live Promotion

If you have a mobile phone and a Facebook account, then you can do this strategy. Go live on Facebook and share your own experience or review of the product, then share your affiliate link in the comments.

Strategy #8: Email Marketing Promotion

Whether you have a small list or a large list, if done correctly, you can earn affiliate commissions by sending emails. You should disclose your affiliate relationship in the email.

This often works best if there is a time-sensitive discount or flash sale happening. You can also get effective results by sending an email that lists the benefits you’ve received by using the product.

Honestly, there are many more ways you can promote affiliate products, but these are my favorites.

If you follow the three steps above, you’ll begin to set up an evergreen system for obtaining affiliate commissions. Again, this is not a get-rich-quick scheme, but you can definitely earn some solid income over time.

The post How to Make Money with Affiliate Marketing in 3 Easy Steps appeared first on Blogging Your Passion | How to Start a Blog.

The reason they are not successful is not due to a lack of information. Once you understand this, you can begin to help them. So, what is the solution?

People want transformation, not information.

Once you understand this fundamental difference, you’ll begin serving your audience in a better way.

The easiest way for you to make this shift is through online challenges. While you are giving them information, you are incorporating baby steps of action along the way. As they get results, you’ve just won over a fan for life.

What exactly is a 5-Day Challenge?

The length of your challenge can be anywhere between 3-7 days. You want it to be short enough that they don’t get discouraged and quit, but long enough to be of value and get results.

• It’s a Free Course – Your online challenge should be free for people to participate. This is what makes it attractive. It will feel like going through a mini-online course. You can and should add paid upsells at the end of your challenge, but it’s not mandatory to getting started. The main goal here is to build your email list.
• It has a specific outcome – Your online challenges should move your readers to a specific result. There should be a goal that they can reasonably accomplish during the challenge. Be sure not to tackle too big of an outcome in the time you are giving for the challenge. We want our audience to experience a “quick win.”
• Mainly driven through email – Your entire challenge should be delivered through email. For example, if your online challenge is five days long, then a participant will receive a new email each day during the challenge. By doing so, you are conditioning your audience to attribute value anytime they get an email from you. If you want to include a training video each day, just place the link in the email.

Why Do Online Challenges Work So Well?

Before you go and build out your first online challenge, it’s important to know why they work so well. There are at least four reasons this strategy works:

• It’s fun – People love the feeling of making progress, even if it is incremental change.
• It’s tied to getting a result – Information can be paralyzing, but a simple task can be energizing.
• It builds authority – You win a customer for life if you can deliver a “quick win” for them.
• It can go viral – Participants will share your free challenge with their friends and on social media

5 Easy Steps to Creating Your Own Online Challenge

Why don’t more people use online challenges to build their email list? The biggest reason is they get lost in the details and set-up. The truth is there are only five simple steps you need to take to have your online challenge up and running.

Step 1. Select the right topic for your challenge

To begin, select a topic that is your audience’s “first problem.” In other words, what’s a common first challenge facing the people that you serve? I find that they are often related to one of seven core topics:

• Identity – We all want to live lives that matter. What’s a challenge you could do to help someone improve their identity?
• Health – We want to live with energy and vitality. Hold challenges that improve someone’s health report, lack of energy, or inability to follow through on projects.
• Wealth – You can focus a challenge on helping people pay off some personal debt, create a savings fund, or put some money away in investing.
• Relationships – Host a challenge related to improving dating, marriage, or parenting relationships.
• Spirituality – Help your audience with a challenge related to praying more, reading their Bible, or releasing guilt.
• Time Management – Everyone struggles with managing time these days. Help them become more productive, learn to say no, or get their daily calendar organized.

As you can see there’s an endless amount of ideas that you can turn into an online challenge. Pick one and go for it!

Step 2. Write out your outline

Once you’ve nailed down the topic and length, you’ll need to break your challenge into some simple steps. Here are a few tips to help you organize the content of your challenge:

• Do a two-minute brainstorm – Write out everything that comes to mind in order to achieve a successful result. If this takes longer than two minutes, you may need to simplify the outcome of your online challenge.
• Think steps – Remember, you are the guide and you only want the participants to be focused on the next step only. Set up your online challenge so that each day is another simple step that builds upon the day before.
• Each step should have a simple action – Each day should have an action that only takes 5-15 minutes to complete. Remember, your participants are busy and we don’t want them feeling behind.

Step 3. Fill in your content

Next, you’ll want to begin the process of writing out your lesson for each day of the challenge. Like I mentioned earlier, each day of your online challenge you’ll be delivering it via email. Open up a document on your computer and write out each email for your challenge. A simple format I like to use is:

1. Announce the theme for the day.
2. Do some teaching on that theme.
3. Give a daily “action step” for the day.
4. Tease what’s coming tomorrow.

It really is as simple as that. Each email in your sequence can use that format (see below for an example).

Step 4. Set up Your Tech

In order to make your challenge evergreen, you’ll need to set up an email sequence. Sometimes they are called autoresponders, email funnels, etc. I like to use ConvertKit, who calls them email sequences. Creating a sequence is simple in ConvertKit because you can see all of the emails of your challenge in one window (see image).

Step 5. Share Your Challenge

Once your tech is set up, be sure to test it. If you can confirm that you are receiving emails, now it’s time to promote it. Here are a few of my favorite places to promote your online challenges.

• Your email list
• The sidebar of your blog
• Inside blog posts as a content upgrade
• On your social media channels
• A Facebook paid ads campaign (to build your email list)

The best part about online challenges is you can create multiple challenges over time. I currently have five online challenges I have created and plan to create more. Each week, I have brand new email subscribers going through my challenges.

If you are struggling to build your email list, put together an online challenge and you’ll both serve your current readers and add new ones to your list.

The post Online Challenges: 5 Easy Steps to Grow Your Email List Fast appeared first on Blogging Your Passion | How to Start a Blog.

Yet, we know that content marketing is an essential strategy for us to grow our audience. So, what’s the answer?

Create a blog post checklist.

One of the main reasons we don’t publish more blog posts is because we see it as a task, not a project. Amateurs sit down and think they can just knock out a blog post in one sitting. What often happens is they grow frustrated with how long writing and publishing just one blog post takes.

But if you follow your favorite bloggers’ writing habits, you’ll notice something interesting.

They have a process.

In other words, they have a well-documented blog post workflow to follow. Here are a few benefits of having a blog post process:

• You can focus on just the next task
• You can see all of the steps and improve (or simplify) your workflow
• You can begin to delegate parts of your creation process
• You’re not dependent on one 30-minute session to get it all done.

There are many ways you can create and execute your blog post checklist, but I want to show you our current process using Asana.

How to Create a Blog Post Checklist in Asana

We use and love Asana at Blogging Your Passion. It’s a simple but effective tool to keep a virtual team productive, but it also works very well for bloggers who are still a team of one.

Let’s walk through the steps on how you can create a blog post checklist in Asana.

Step 1. Create an Asana project called Content Calendar.

You’ll want to start by creating an Asana project just for your content creation. Click on the “plus” sign and select “list” layout. Name it what you’d like, but we call ours “Content Calendar.”

This will keep your content creation efforts separate from your other projects. Also, once you assign a due date to a blog post, it will show up under your “calendar view” for that project. In this view, you can see your upcoming blog posts (see image below).

In this view, you can even “drag and drop” your blog post on a new date. We personally use Asana for our checklists and CoSchedule for our content and promotional calendar. In a future post, I’ll share how we have integrated the two to work nicely together.

Step 2. Create an Asana Section called “Templates”

Sections in Asana are useful to categorize your tasks into different categories. Click on “Add Section” and create a section called Templates. It will make sense later why we are doing this.

NOTE: If you upgrade to the paid version of Asana, you can skip this step and step four. We have found the free version of Asana good enough to meet our needs.

Step 3. Design your blog post checklist template

Now it’s time to create our blog post workflow. As you can see from the image below, I started the task with a label: [TEMPLATE]. This was very intentional. We never actually complete (or check off) this task, but we are going to duplicate it once we have our blog post checklist set up.

Next, we will add “sub-tasks” to this task that will represent each step in our blog post workflow. To do this, you need to click on the “sub-task” icon (see image below), then list all the steps you need to take to publish a blog post.

Again, this template will serve as a checklist that we will duplicate for each blog post. This will make more sense in the next step.

Below is an example of all the steps we have on our current blog post checklist.

Step 4. Duplicate your blog post checklist for each blog post

One of the goals of setting up your checklist this way is to eliminate having to write all nine steps from memory for each blog post. Since we now have a template task set up, we can simply “duplicate” the task for each blog post.

See the image below for the following two steps:

1. Click on the three dots on your template task
2. Select “Duplicate Task”

Now, rename the new task the name of your next blog post. Meanwhile, all the steps in your writing process will appear in your task.

Step 5. Delegate and work your way through your blog post checklist

Your goal as a blogger should be to do only two things and then delegate the rest. First, you decide the keyword/title of your blog post. Second, you write the first draft of your blog post. All other tasks can be delegated (eventually) to someone else. The beauty of setting this up in Asana is that you’ve made it easy for yourself once you’re ready to outsource.

Delegating is as simple as assigning each sub-task to someone else. They will get notified and complete the work. When they check the task as complete, you will see that, too.

Bonus: Design checklist templates for other content creation activities

If you also create podcasts or videos for YouTube, you can use this same strategy. We currently have checklists for all three types of content (see image below).

Treating each blog post as a project (instead of a task) forces us to see all the steps in the process. When we list those steps out in a blog post checklist, we now have a repeatable tool for getting those posts done more consistently.

The post How to Create a Blog Post Checklist in Asana appeared first on Blogging Your Passion | How to Start a Blog.

Because of this failure to start, many aspiring bloggers lose their way in a sea of information. The good news is there are only three things you must know before starting a blog business.

1. Purpose: Uncover Your Core Gift

The best place to start is to look within. This is one of the biggest mistakes most entrepreneurs make in the early stages of their business. We want to look “outside” in the marketplace first.

Which topic will make me the most money? What’s the fastest way to get cash in the door? Don’t get me wrong, nailing down a profitable market is important. But your fastest path to income and impact is to look within first.

In an effort to help more entrepreneurs get this right, we created a 32-question assessment that helps you discover your influence “strength.” When it comes to creating influence online, I believe every influencer has a primary influencer “strength” in one of four key areas: writer, speaker, coach, or online teacher.

Let’s look a bit more closely at each:

• Are you a writer-first? With the writer-first strength, you look forward to processing your thinking through writing books and blogging. With this strength, you are able to organize your thoughts and think through your messaging. Once you have it all out on paper, you can then more easily convert your message into speaking, coaching, and even teaching.
• Are you a speaker-first? If you struggle with the “blinking cursor syndrome,” then you might be a speaker-first personality. If that’s the case, then you may not want to write out your thoughts first. Your strength would best be leveraged by recording a video or podcast first. As a speaker-first, it’s easier for you to process your thinking through speaking. Later, you can take that video or podcast and convert it into a blog post.
• Are you a coach-first? With the coach-first strength, you shine best in a small group. You are great at asking questions, showing empathy, and being resourceful. Before you write the book, create the keynote, or design the online course, you should get 5-10 people into a six-week coaching program with you. After that, you can more easily move to the other income streams.
• Are you a teacher-first? If this is true for you, your strength is going to be best used in creating online courses and membership sites. The fastest path to impact for you is to begin organizing your topic into an online course outline. Then, you can work back into creating blog posts, podcasts, and videos.

Once you discover your influencer strength, your creativity will be more easily unleashed inside you!

2. Passion: Rally to Your Cause

Once you know your own core genius, the next step is to make it profitable. In other words, you need to make your gift useful. We do this by connecting it to a real passion in the marketplace.

For many people, this is where they get stuck. Passion should never equal pressure. Finding your passion is different than finding your calling in life. Your calling or purpose in life is uncovering your core gift.

Your passion will fluctuate throughout your life, but your purpose will never change. Passions change, but your purpose remains.

I want you to select a passion that you are willing to attach yourself to for the next 2-5 years. We take our blogging students through a proven 6-point checklist to help them narrow down their passions to the right one for them.

Let me share with you three of the questions from our Passion Filter Scorecard in order to get you started.

• Do you enjoy learning about this topic? In order to attach yourself to a passion for the next 2-5 years, you need to be willing to read books, watch videos and listen to podcasts on this topic. In order to be resourceful, you must be willing to grow yourself on this topic.
• Does this topic solve a problem or satisfy a desire? If there’s no problem to solve, there’s more than likely no money to be made. At the heart of a blog business is the ability to solve problems for a certain group of people.
• Do you want to serve the people who need help with this topic? You must fall in love with the people you want to serve. If you are annoyed with beginner questions, you shouldn’t work with beginners. You should target people who are more advanced on your topic.

Remember, finding your passion should not equal pressure. Find a passion you are willing to serve for the next 2-5 years and give yourself to the cause.

3. People: Decide Who You Want to Serve

This final piece of the puzzle brings everything together. Before starting a blog business, you need three things in place: purpose, passion, and people. Now, let’s take a closer look at choosing an audience to serve.

We have developed a tool called the 11-Point Audience Discovery Checklist. This checklist helps you to “check all of the boxes” on selecting the right audience that will be profitable from the start.

Going through this entire checklist would take us outside the scope of this blog post, but here are three of the most important questions to consider:

• Are there other blogs, podcasts, and YouTube channels on this topic? You do not want to be the first person to the market on your topic. I often hear people who are excited about the fact there are no blogs or podcasts on their topic. For me, that’s a clear “no” that this market is not proven. We want to see that people are consuming content on your topic of choice.
• Is this topic just a fad or is it evergreen? Another mistake new bloggers make is to try and jump on fads. Don’t pursue a fad that is here today and gone tomorrow. Remember those fidget spinners? Go over to Google Trends and put in “fidget spinners.” You’ll find a huge spike in interest with a dramatic fall off. We want to start a blog business that will still have demand ten years from now.
• Is there evidence of other people making money online on this topic? If someone is already making money with your idea or topic, this is a good sign, not a bad one. Our competition has already proven that the model works. If you want to be a writer, look for evidence of books being sold. If you want to be a speaker, look for evidence of events and conferences on your topic. Bottom line: we want to find evidence of money being made before we pursue a market.

Once you have confirmation on your purpose, passion, and people, you have the confidence to move forward. A successful blog business must have you working in your strengths, connected to a real passion, and working for a specific audience.

The post 3 Things You Must Know Before Starting a Blog Business appeared first on Blogging Your Passion | How to Start a Blog.

I think if you asked the average person, they might say:

• We just lose motivation over time.
• Life gets busy and in the way.
• It’s easier to just stay the same, and change is hard.

3 Little-Known Secrets to Achieving Your Biggest Goals

While there is a certain truth to all of the above statements, I believe that achieving your goals really comes down to three little-known secrets.

1. Know the Difference Between a Goal and a Project

If you are having a difficult time narrowing down the number of goals you have, I have a pretty simple solution. The number one reason you have too many goals is that you’ve failed to distinguish between a goal and a project.

Once you understand what is a goal and what is just a project, you’ll have deeper clarity and focus.

First, let’s look at a project. A project can be described as:

• Boring. You’re more motivated to finish it than to start it.
• Bland. It doesn’t stretch you, make you nervous, or give you “butterflies.”
• Obligation. It’s not something you want to do but more like something you have to do.

But when we look at a goal, we find that it is the exact opposite:

• Exciting. Just seeing your goal written down gives you a sense of excitement. It will introduce something new into your life.
• Challenging. To reach this goal, it will stretch you, push you, and may even scare you just a little bit. It’s out of your comfort zone, but in a good way.
• Desire. It’s something you want to do, not just something you feel obligated to do.

Action Step: Take a look at your current list of goals and decide which ones are truly goals and which ones are just projects.

This doesn’t mean that you ignore the projects, but it does mean that you treat them differently.

A project is something you do on Saturday or even a day off of work. A goal is something you review daily, weekly, and quarterly.

2. Use the 3x Achievement Strategy to Catapult Your Success

I want to give credit to this specific strategy to Michael Hyatt. He recently taught this strategy at his Achieve Conference. The strategy is simple but very powerful. It includes the following:

• The Quarterly Big 3
• The Weekly Big 3
• The Daily Big 3

First, at the beginning of every quarter (for me it is January, April, July, and October), look over your goals and decide which three are you going to focus on. Setting 90-day goals can be a game-changer for you, and I’ve written about my strategy extensively on other blog posts.

Most people make the mistake of selecting more than three quarterly goals. It’s easy to rationalize that we want to get more than just three big things done in ninety days. So, we mistakenly select ten goals and end up accomplishing none of them. Instead, try selecting just three quarterly goals. Then, as you complete them, you can always add a new one.

Second, begin each week by selecting your Weekly Big 3. It’s easy to jump right into our work week without much thought. After all, there’s emails, voicemails, and meetings that want to fill up our to-do lists. Instead, be proactive. Start your week strong by selecting the three biggest things you want to accomplish.

Pro Tip: Write your Weekly Big 3 down on a 3×5 card and place it somewhere visual. When you get distracted, this will remind you to get your focus back.

Finally, each morning you should start your workday by selecting your Daily Big 3. Make sure these are tasks and not projects or goals. It must be specific enough to accomplish in one workday. I always try to accomplish my big three tasks before lunch. On days that I do, I find my afternoons are freed up to do other things I enjoy.

3. Do a Roadblocks Brainstorm Before You Start on Your Goal

Once you establish your goals, whether they are annual or 90-day goals, you have one more step to go. Brainstorm on a sheet of paper all the possible roadblocks, challenges, and obstacles standing in your way. This seems counterintuitive, but it is very effective.

All of the latest brain science confirms that the mere act of writing down our roadblocks emboldens us to push forward. By clearly identifying those things that stand in our way, we begin to see a clearer path ahead. Your greatest opportunities for growth are just on the other side of your biggest obstacles.

If you know these three secrets and begin to put them into practice, especially in your planning, you will be so much closer to achieving those goals that you have for yourself.

The post 3 Little-Known Secrets to Achieving Your Biggest Goals appeared first on Blogging Your Passion | How to Start a Blog.

As you can see, there are many purposes behind why someone might start a blog. Here at Blogging Your Passion, we are dedicated to helping people use the medium of blogging to increase their influence, impact, and income online.

But, that leads us to a real question. How do you find a blog niche that is profitable from the start? After all, who wants to waste all their time and energy on a failed idea from the start?

Inside the Discover Your Blog Niche Course, we teach a very detailed process called the 11-Point Audience Discovery Checklist. Today, I want to share with you three of the most thought-provoking questions you must answer to confirm your blog niche will be profitable before you ever begin.

Does Your Audience Have Worthy Goals?

We tend to put time and attention toward our goals. A profitable blog supports an audience in pursuit of a goal. While passion is an indicator, we can’t depend on passion alone. Just because I’m passionate about eating pizza, doesn’t mean I can make money blogging on that topic. Is it attached to a worthy goal?

The best way to figure this out is to ask this question: Is my ideal audience already consuming content on this topic?

If the people you want to serve are searching for articles, podcasts and YouTube videos on your topic, this is a positive indicator. In fact, here are three practical questions to ask:

• Are there other popular blogs with shares and comments on this topic?
• Are there other podcasts with a decent number of ratings on this topic?
• Are there other YouTube channels with active subscribers on this topic?

Is Your Audience Passionate?

You also need to find a blog niche that is deeply passionate about their topic. Shared passions are the fuel that ignites a tribe and a movement. The challenging thing is nailing down a profitable passion can be difficult to gauge.

Remember the “fidget spinner” craze. You couldn’t go anywhere in public without finding someone with a fidget spinner. Today is just the opposite. Below are three questions to get you started:

• Is this topic just a fad or is it evergreen?
• Is there evidence of real, lasting enthusiasts?

While this may be difficult to gauge, a great tool to consider using is Google Trends. Just put in “fidget spinner” and you’ll see why that would have been a bad topic to pursue. Then, put in a topic like “start a blog” and you’ll find a consistent, steady demand for the topic.

Is Your Audience Spending Money on This Topic?

Many aspiring bloggers see competition as a threat. They mistakenly think if no one is making money with their idea it must be a great niche to pursue. Nothing could be further from the truth.

We want to find evidence of profit being made with our idea online. While there are many ways to make money blogging, I believe the most profitable is an information business. This type of business makes money through teaching, writing, speaking, and coaching. It’s all about creating your own products. Which leads us to this set of questions:

• Is there evidence of money being made in writing? Look on Amazon for books and audiobooks on your topic.
• Is there evidence of money being made teaching online? Are there courses and membership sites on your topic?
• Is there evidence of money being made speaking? Are there conferences and events on your topic?
• Is there evidence of money being made coaching? Are there paid coaches online who have programs and offerings?

Just be doing a bit of market research online, you can find a blog niche that will be profitable from the start.

The post How to Find a Blog Niche That is Profitable from the Start appeared first on Blogging Your Passion | How to Start a Blog.