There are so many blogs out there and a lot of people are unsure of how to take their site to their next step. t is important to keep some type of plan, much like a business. Even if your site only has advertising or even if you are just wanting people to hear what you have to say, you need a plan!
Here are 5 steps to building a business plan for your blog.
- Write your site’s focus. This is what you will refer back to when things are not going well. You will put what you want your site to do, who you want to reach, and how you will go about doing it?
- Set some long and short term goals. Sites fail because they only have a short term goal. It is important that long term plans are put into place in order to keep your site relevant to your visitors and for the times. The Internet has changed a lot throughout the years and putting goals out will allow your site to last.
- Site design and content are important. This must be planned out and executed carefully. It does not need to be perfect, but your site should be planned so you are directing your visitors to what you want them to see. If you are selling something, you need to convey that by having a banner or something to draw your visitors attention, even if you have a blog. As you build your influence and reputation, people will inquire about your special services or products.
- Have a monetizing strategy. Whether it is banner advertising, text link ads, paid to blog entries, or just selling your own services, you need to decide what is best for your site and for your visitors. You could literally hurt your own earnings in choosing the wrong services.
- Having a marketing strategy for your site. Even if you are on a budget, there are still plenty of ways to get the word out. Making a marketing plan to promote your site is important because frankly, if you never tell people… how will you get traffic? You have to be knowledgeable of where it is best to promote your site- find the niche you best fit in.
These are just a few general steps to building a business plan. This is important for practically all bloggers out there. It can also give you a clue on how much time and money you are willing to spend working on the site and eventually get a return on your investment.
What other steps do you have for newbie bloggers needing a direction with planning their blog’s future?
Thanks for that, Nile. These steps should help bloggers to focus on a clear plan for their sites.
Some great info here, thanks for this. I am going to take your advice and write a plan because after 9 months of blogging I think I need a clearer strategy to what I want to achieve in the short term AND long term.
Yeah content and design of the site is the most important part of one web site.
Thank you for the info.
Writing a business plan for your blog: brilliant! I have seen that even in this community people all over the place. We can have a plan without making every blog entry into a sales page also.
Having both the short term and long term goals is definitely essential. What I didn’t see you say is a clear call to action!! Very Key!
Business plan for your blog is always great.
Great advice I have been learning the hard way with some help from a friend but posts like yours help alot.
I have recently realized that i need to start a business plan. It will keep everything in focus.
Thanks,These steps should help bloggers to focus on a clear plan for my sites.
This is yet another thing for me to consider. At first all I know is write article and post it on my blog didn’t think of having a business plan and direction for my blog. Thanks for sharing.
The biggest point was your last one — have a marketing strategy. Until there is a critical mass that sees the blog, none of the rest will matter. Word of mouth can take over but there needs to be initial marketing.
The point about deciding on the right monetization strategies is very important. If one is selling some product in their website, there is no point of having ads next to it (as it may be from the competitors)… I guess its just fine not to monetize a blog for a couple of years, and focus on the income after that.
From my point of view, there are three main things that an online entrepreneur should take into account when building a business plan for a blog. First of all, it is the topic of a blog and it is very important for a blogger to select the topic of a blog correctly. There are also another 2 important moments in blogging. These are blog promotion and monetization. Also, you beginning bloggers should know that a blog is a long term project and it may take a lot of time before your blog will become popular and you will earn good money on it.
I’m not a ‘professional’ internet business guru – but what I find is that if I do about one hour work on the web a day, I see a steady growth in clicks to my sites etc. I try and focus on some sites that have great SEO already (Webanswers and Hubpages) so that some of my sites get decent ranking in Google etc.
I then visit as many blogs as I can during this time and post decent comments.
Great tips – there’s only one other thing I can think of and that’s to understand that virtually everything you do will take longer than you think it will. Underestimating the time it takes to complete tasks (especially the first time!) is one of THE biggest stumbling blocks to effectively managing our time – and it can also create a fair amount of stress.
Great ideas.
I have a blog running, which was basically an outlet for me to share thoughts. It has recently seen an increase in traffic, which I obviously want to take advantage of.
However I’m still undecided on what route of monetizing I should use. Adsense, affiliate, cpc, cpa? hmm food for thoughts.
Writing a business plan for your blog is a fantastic idea! So many people don’t appreciate the fact that your blog is your central hub of business. It may take a while, but the above suggestions are great. This works for newbies as well as the seasoned blogger.
Thanks!
Donna
I’m so glad to find this post, Nile.
Even though I am not a newbie, I’m just starting to create a couple of new blogs. While that may sound simple, the FOCUS, and really knowing Who your blog targets, and What content and offers you need to give them is deadly serious stuff!
I see people all the time give a lot of thought to their site’s focus, only to forget all about it once they start rolling out content. They get distracted, their readers get confused, and the site does nothing for anybody.
I could easily go that way myself, so I am spending a LOT of time on the first step, because even though it’s the first step… it’s not over when you go live. You must always, always, always revisit that step… each and every day to stay in tune with your readers.
Thanks, Nile. This was really good stuff for me to read at this time.
Great post, Nile! You are so right about the importance of having a plan. Sometimes, it isn’t obvious at first, but once you see what it is, it makes it a lot easier to get your ideas together as well.
I love the idea of writing a plan for my blog. That is something I really need to do, especially for my self-esteem for network marketers blog.
very perfect information and nice suggestion given by you.
our blogger or also any website should have unique content and quality content. you are right if we write our business plan to the blogger it will great for user also they could know what do you want from your blogger.
Thanks
thanks for share, this is what I need at this time 😀
That a good plan , thank you for sharing this post
I’m full agree with Dave.
Great post.
Regards…
I think that the best tip that you gave in this article is writing your focus in your blog. I know that it is great if we can be focus on a lot of niches, but focusing on one and be good about is the best thing that you can do.
Hey Nile,
You give some wonderful insights here. I believe we need a balance of all of these elements for a long term successful blog.
Google requires regular posts, and keeping content on purpose with your theme is the key to keeping your audience.
Once I sent an email that was irrelevant to my audience and you should have seen the unsubscribes!
Google really does not require regular posts, as even regular posts could be once a week. It is covering topics what your visitors are looking for when they land on your site is the best thing. If you are covering those, then you are filling that need for information and also, Google smiles even bigger when your site covers those topics.
Also, because Google search have become more social oriented in the past year, those recommends even have more impact than normal search.
Hey Hi,
I’m a new blogger and was looking for something like this for help.
Great post helped me understand how blogs work and how to plan for blogging ahead. I will definitely try out some of your pointers. Thank you for providing information.
‘Set some long and short term goals’ – Ha, My problem exactly. You hit the nail on the head. But I still never get round to doing it. As the old Spanish proverb goes – Tomorrow is often the busiest day of the week!
Building a business plan is actually the hardest part at all, it requires a lot of knowledge on what is working now.
These are some excellent tips for Beginner Bloggers like myself. Thanks so much for sharing! I feel now that i have a “plan” that i can look at instead of dream about, i can get on the right track to being a better blogger
Thank you for stopping by and reading. I always hope articles like this one are helpful and glad you enjoyed it. A good plan can always be improved and revised anytime. 🙂
Hi Nile,
Great tips on building a business plan. I talk to many new bloggers and many of them haven’t even put much thought into their business plan.
It’s like just write some content, comment on other blogs, some adsense ads and affiliate stuff and that’s it. That’s what they tell me.
A lot of new bloggers never think about that. A little over 10 years ago, I was not even sure on the first site I started. The problem is that many of them like the wham bam thank you mam method like you said: comment, have adsense up, have some affiliate ads up, and maybe even social network a little. It takes a lot more than that, especially if you want to become more serious.
Most paid web hosting services offer to transfer your Blogger site/blog to their servers. So when you’re choosing a paid hosting site, consider this transfer service as a factor in your selection.
One web host, Hostgator, offers to move Blogger sites/blogs for free. But before moving, talk first with a Hostgator officer to make sure. There are things you need to do and not do so that there would be no downtime, you do not lose backlinks and you do not lose certain features of your site.
Thank’s for the great advise. Many sites fail after they just start up. They are a ship without a rudder.
Hi…
i just want to say that as a blogger these steps are very useful for me …to make my plans regarding the same….
For the newbie like me there are many things we overlook.. the focus is to earn that’s why it ends out nothing.
There are things you need to do and not do so that there would be no downtime, you do not lose backlinks and you do not lose certain features of your site.
I have been working for 1 1/2 years on making enough on the net – not there yet – building WP blogs with Amazon products -hardest part is getting traffic – I like your info and will stop back to read more…
Great Blog tips! I really need these tips because I want to be successful in this blogging world. Thank you for sharing Nile…
Great tips Nile thanks for sharing..building a business plan to our blog can help to make a successful blog..
great tips, developing a plan prior to jumping into a campaign is crucial for top ROI.
thank you for sharing a very imp article for a blog.
Setting your goals and planning on how to achieve them is one good way of starting a blog.
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I think this is really helpful to all bloggers…Thank you for the great information here…
Interesting points, I am actually working on a complete Business plan for bloggers. Out of Box package, where you can simply fill in the details and have your blog business plan.
Hi we need first step is quality, reading, faster, important is, focusing, conversion, then it became commenter actually we not concentrate the step of blogging so need to first focusing article. That;s it Thanks
Very interesting post..Thanks for sharing this great information..Hope you can post more..
Thse are very useful tips, especially beginners miss them. If somebody is planning to use mostly SE traffic then keyword research is also important.
This is a great post , for some one like myself who is just starting to blog this has been a great help and made me realise that planning is so important , thankyou
Thanks for the posting…I have started now the business….At first all I know is write article and post it on my blog didn’t think of having a business plan and direction for my blog.
http://www.findghar.com
Hey Nile,
Great tips.
Gary Vaynerchuk in his book “Crush it” he lays down same principles but he emphasize the importance of dropping some extra dollars on designing the website well. Anything else can be done with diligent, devoted work that does not cost money but sweat.
Thanks
Akos
This article is absolutely awesome. Not only does it target the the important things to note in a business blog but it also lets individuals know the negatives during a business blog. So a very great article.
Excellent post Nile!
Any type of plan definitely beats nothing! Besides, once you commit to a written
plan of some kind, you can start adjust as you surely will need to!
And not having some type of plan just compounds your challenges! Thanks so
much for sharing your thoughts!
Utterly composed content, appreciate it for information. “The bravest thing you can do when you are not brave is to profess courage and act accordingly.”
I have a blog running, which was basically an outlet for me to share thoughts. It has recently seen an increase in traffic, which I obviously want to take advantage of.
Writing a business plan for your blog: brilliant! I have seen that even in this community people all over the place. We can have a plan without making every blog entry into a sales page also.