Starting a blog allows you to share your passions online, potentially earn income, boost your writing skills, and more. However, blogging also requires consistency, adaptability, and the hustle to put in the hard work required.
From my 10+ years as a professional blogger and digital marketer, I‘m going to share the biggest pros, cons, realities, and my best advice on succeeding if you want to jump into the blogging world.
5 Major Benefits of Blogging
1. Express your creativity and knowledge
One of the best parts of blogging is providing value to others by sharing your expertise, experiences, stories, perspectives, how-to advice and more on topics you genuinely enjoy and care about. Your blog gives you a platform to showcase your skills, help others learn, and connect with readers who share your interests.
According to HubSpot [1], brands that prioritize blogging generate 67% more leads than those who don‘t blog. Why? Because blogging establishes you as a subject matter expert and gives people a reason to trust you.
2. Potential to earn consistent income
Once you build a solid audience over time, you can leverage your traffic and authority in various ways to earn an income from your blog including:
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Display advertising – Get paid based on ad impressions and clicks. Earnings depend heavily on niche and traffic. According to MonetizePros [2], rates average $20 per 1,000 impressions. With 50,000 monthly page views, you could make $1,000 per month.
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Affiliate marketing – Earn commissions promoting other company‘s products. Rates vary based on vertical. According to Square‘s Affiliate Program [3], their payout is $300 per sign-up.
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Selling your own digital products/services – Create an eCourse, virtual coaching program, development services, paid newsletter, etc. and earn with every purchase. Marketer Sherise Palaoan [4] says you can expect to earn around 50-70% profit margin on your own digital products.
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Sponsored posts – Get paid by brands to create content featuring their brand/products and link back to them. Depending on your niche and audience size, sponsored posts can earn anywhere from $500 to $5,000+ per post [5].
3. Build a community and connections
Active online communities exist across all blogging niches. Self-hosted blogs built on WordPress even have access to an open source community of developers, creators, and professionals who drive the platform forward with tips, plugins, themes, and ongoing support.
Attending niche conferences lets you meet up face-to-face with engaged readers, fellow bloggers, industry experts, brand representatives looking for partnerships, and more.
4. Gain valuable skills
Simply by dedicating time to maintaining your blog, you‘ll gain technical skills like:
- Optimizing websites
- Basic design practices
- Writing search-friendly headlines & meta descriptions
- Using analytics platforms to gather audience insights
- Building email lists and segmentation
- Leveraging social media to promote content
You‘ll also naturally improve writing-related skills including:
- Discovering your unique voice & style
- Learning what content resonates most with readers
- Interviewing relevant experts
- Expressing thoughts clearly
- Formatting posts for maximum skimmability
These abilities can translate into a profitable career as a digital marketer or freelance blogger/writer.
5. Freedom and flexibility
While blogging does require consistent effort and work hours, you largely get freedom in choosing how, when, and where you work.
You might blog full or part-time from a home office, coworking space, or while traveling if location independent. No boss looking over your shoulder either. With commitment and focus during the hours you designate, blogging allows control over your schedule.
Income Potential is There, But Takes Commitment
Blogging can become quite a lucrative endeavor, however it takes most bloggers over a year of consistency before earning any significant income.
Some key stats on average blogger earnings over time, according to Orbit Media [6]:
| Years Running Blog | Average Earnings |
|---|---|
| < 1 Year | $30 per month |
| 1-2 Years | $300 per month |
| 2-5 Years | $2,000 per month |
| 5-10 Years | $8,000 per month |
| 10+ Years | $20,000 per month |
As the stats show, bloggers generally don‘t earn sizable incomes until after years 5-10 when traffic, authority, trust, and monetization options have substantially grown.
However, Orbit Media found that bloggers who stick with it long-term enjoy much more favorable earnings thanks to sources like recurring affiliate income, established products/services, sponsored posts, and accumulated assets like resource libraries or courses.
Some well known professional bloggers easily earn over $100,000 a month. However, this level of success is rarer and requires not just years of experience but also fantastic branding, marketing savvy, high-quality content catered towards monetization, email list building, social media leverage, and an incredibly engaged audience.
Just remember – passion pays off more than a desire to "get rich quick." Stay focused on serving your audience, getting your work seen, building genuine community, and the income growth follows.
Skills and Commitment Needed to Succeed
Let‘s explore the key abilities and effort required to stand out in the saturated world of blogging.
Solid Writing Abilities
While great writing comes with practice, having a base level skill for clearly articulating ideas, formatting posts for readability, and editing your work is vital.
Writing sharable "pillar content" around popular topics will help attract and retain new readers. If writing doesn‘t come naturally, invest time into developing this core skill.
Social Media and Marketing Savvy
You won‘t attract much of an audience without effective promotion. Spread your posts via your own social media channels and interact within niche communities, relevant groups and hashtags.
Email marketing, SEO optimization, and paid opportunities should also be explored once you grow beyond an engaged social following.
Be sure to track analytics so you can double down on what content and platforms drive the most traffic.
Ability to Put in the Hours
There‘s no way around it – successful blogging requires a tremendous amount of effort, especially in those early days. Along with writing/publishing content, expect to spend hours:
- Promoting on social media
- Building relationships with influencers & brands
- Creating visual assets
- Setting up technical elements
- Researching content ideas
- Engaging with readers
- Analyzing site traffic data
- Continually learning industry skills/tools
Blogging is not a "set it and forget it" endeavor – even with a solid initial strategy in place. Actively put in the hours daily, or progress will plateau.
Thick Skin Against Criticism
Not every piece of content will resonate or be well received. Some people will downright dislike your writing style or message. You have to be okay with a bit of criticism and negativity at times.
Remember that no successful blogger pleases everyone. Stay confident in your knowledge and message. Feedback helps guide improvements too.
Patience to See Results
A high-earning blogging business won‘t materialize overnight. Or even over a few months. This is a long game.
Set reasonable goals, tackle one task at a time, stay focused on serving your niche over making money, and don‘t compare your success to others. Measure growth against past versions of yourself. With consistency and commitment, you will see tangible progress over months and years.
My Top Tips for Blogging Success
If starting a blog still intrigues you even after digesting the realities around effort needed, fluctuating income, thick skin required against criticism, and patience around growing an audience/income – then wonderful!
I wholly encourage you to start your blogging journey as long as you manage expectations around the commitment required and align your motivations accordingly.
Here are my top strategic tips for maximizing long-term blogging success:
1. Start niche, expand breadth later – Establish expertise around a tight niche first before writing on peripheral topics. This helps attract the right readers quicker.
2. Schedule content in advance– Maintain momentum by planning posts and publishing on a consistent calendar, especially at first. Scheduling also allows breaks.
3. Invest in premium tools – The right blog hosting, themes, email services, graphic software, membership plugins etc. vastly improve the professionalism, security and performance for visitors.
4. Monetize intentionally, not intrusively – Once you build an audience, introduce affiliate links, products etc. subtly. Prioritize reader experience over maximizing income with ads and sponcon.
5. Own your domain name – Don‘t blog on free platforms. The nominal annual investment in a domain establishes your authority and brand recogntion.
6. Make your blog "findable" – On-page SEO, keyword research, alt text, meta data, backlinks and more help readers discover your content.
At the end of the day, fuel your passion first not income goals. Pour your knowledge and enthusiasm into posts. Connect authentically with readers. The money follows longevity, authority and audience relationships – not the other way around.
If you maintain realistic expectations around effort needed, handling criticism, and pace of growth while leveraging best practices – you absolutely can build a thriving blogging business over the long-term that supports your dream lifestyle.
Next Steps If You‘re Serious About Starting a Successful Blog
If you‘re ready to dive in, awesome! Here are my recommendations on first steps:
1. Choose your blog niche
Brainstorm topics you can discuss ad nauseam that also have an interested audience. Narrow it down to a niche that balances passion and profitability.
2. Secure your blog domain + hosting
A custom domain like yourname.com or nichesite.comcritical. Self-hosted WordPress allows full customization. Avoid free blogging platforms.
3. Install WordPress + template
For easiest setup, use Bluehost‘s auto WordPress installer. Next, pick a professional theme like GeneratePress or Astra with built-in customization options.
4. Set up essential plugins
Critical plugins include security protection, SEO optimization, site backups, contact forms, popups, and Google Analytics integration.
5. Create an editorial calendar
Map out what content you‘ll publish and when over the next 3-6 months. Scheduling maintains consistency for readers.
6. Promote your blog intentionally
Share new posts on social channels, interact within your niche, use relevant hashtags, link to influencers, encourage email signups. Monitor analytics to see what works to drive more traffic.
That covers my best tips if you‘re ready to create a website and dive into blogging! While it takes serious work, staying focused on serving your readers, sticking to fundamentals, and investing time into community building leads to fruitful results long-term.
What questions do you still have about getting started or maintaining your blog? Ask below!
[1] https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/blogging-roi[2] https://monetizepros.com/display-advertising/how-much-money-can-you-make/
[3] https://squareup.com/us/en/townsquare/affiliate-program
[4] https://www.becomeablogger.com/how-to-make-money-blogging/
[5] https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidnazareth/2021/01/07/how-much-should-you-charge-for-sponsored-content-on-instagram-tiktok-youtube-and-facebook/
[6] https://orbitmedia.com/blog/how-much-money-blogs-make/
