Last updated on November 2nd, 2017
Blogs are conveniently categorized into two: lifestyle blogs and niche blogs. These categories also represent two kinds of bloggers. First, are those who want to write about everything and the other, are those who want to write specifically about one thing.
Typically, most bloggers start blogging without knowing what to blog about so they end up with a blog that talks about anything and almost everything. Blogs like these are common among those who haven’t made the decision on what to focus on. This is also one of the reasons why some bloggers find it hard monetizing their blogs.
People naturally look for answers on the internet, to search for a solution regarding a problem. Blogs that contain random topics may tend to look less credible than those that center on a specific topic. Because ultimately, people who go through these blogs cannot find answers to their questions.
So if you are thinking about earning from your blog, you must first learn to concentrate on a certain topic which means doing niche blog.
So, what is a Niche Blog?
Niche blog is a type of blogging where the content is all about one topic. This type of blog focuses on ideas, solutions, information, ways or methods that support the topic and that is directly significant or related to it and not outside the discussion. We can say therefore that a niche blog is locked on an point and has only one purpose.
Sounds boring? It may not be as fun as you would like your blog to be but a niche blog is one that has a solid traction and generates traffic. Just take yourself as an example. If you want to keep up on the latest news, you will follow news blogs for updates, right? You know which blogs to check for an issue and you trust these blogs because they consistently give you the information you are looking for. For example, if you want to know trends about travel, you’ll follow travel blogs like tripadvisor or lonely planet. If you’re having a bad day or you feel bored, you might surf on 9gag.com or other entertainment websites to laugh or ease your boredom. People easily trust specific blogs that give solutions for a certain problem on specific topic.
Suffice to say, a niche blog will solve a problem which is why it receives a higher traffic compared to a blog that offers just random topics.
The driving force of a niche blog is that it points the target audience to the right direction and makes them easily remember your blog. And because you gave them the proper information they needed at that moment, they will keeping them to come back for more.
Now that you know what a niche blog is, how do you “find your niche?”
Creating your own niche blog is just like creating any ordinary blog. You will still need to do research and do some planning. What will make a the big difference is to be particular on what to blog about.
If one of your goals is to earn from your blog, then you have to be careful and exact in choosing a niche topic.
Consider a Topic that You Know and Passionate About
Most of the time experts would encourage to blog about your passion. It may sound common and cliché but when you do it, there are positive things that you can expect to happen on the way you blog:
- You are more likely to make your blog shine by spending extra time and effort.
- You will probably be obsessed (in a good way) and blog everytime.
- You will always have more vibrant ideas.
- You will write passionately and the readers will be able to relate. Eventually, you’ll gain more followers and retain the current ones.
How does passionate blogging impact the blogging business? Let’s see it from the views of leading bloggers.
However, if you are going to choose a niche just because you believe it is going to bring in profits, you will most likely lose interest or get dissatisfied later on. The main disadvantage would be that the topic might be something you do not know very well and that you are uninterested with.
How can you write well with a topic that you don’t have an idea about? Unlike with a niche that you are so passionate with, the readers can see that you are enthusiastic about the content of your blog and how well versed you are about the matter.
Discovering Your Passion
A lot of people would tell you that when you do any kind of business, it should be in line with something that you are passionate about. So, if you are to choose a niche, it should be one that you live by. Consider what you are good at and do it. It is totally easier to start this way.
But there are people who find it difficult to identify their passions. If this is struggle for you, you may want to take time to reflect on the following questions. In one way or another, it will guide you towards knowing about your passions:
- What are the things that you love or enjoy doing?
- How do you like to spend your free time?
- What topic do you find yourself talking about for hours?
- What subjects do you enjoy most at when you were at school?
- What topics are interesting and worthwhile for you?
Still not able to identify your passion? Then do the next exercise. The rule is to go with your instinct. What would you like to do for the rest of your life? Make up a list of 10 ideas blog, headlines or ideas. If you find it hard to create 10 lists, then scratch this off as a possible niche. But if you are able to list 10 and yet not too excited about writing about those blog posts, then maybe you have to consider a different niche.
Now, if the 10 ideas you’ve listed make you feel all jumpy and thrilled to start writing, then do so before starting to build your blog. But if you find yourself discontented and start to think about switching for another topic, then you have not found the right one yet.
The process can be frustrating. But it is not over yet. You still have a chance to find the niche that will fit you. At least, you weren’t able to waste time, money and effort on a blog that you may not pursue sooner or later on.
But if you are giddy and couldn’t wait to write more after listing the those first 10 posts? Then everything looking great for you. The best part of it is that you already have a couple of posts to start your blog with.
But what if you can’t decide among the many passions that you have? How can you stay focused on a niche?
A common problem among bloggers, especially those who are just starting out, is that they are too passionate about a lot of things. Others end up creating too many niche blogs than they can handle. While the more is merrier can be true, it does not apply with niche blogging.
You see, there are few bloggers who have multiple blogs and who we can consider as successful but they are very rare. Most of them are a pro at blogging and they find no trouble managing all of their blogs at once.
But for newbies, I highly suggest on setting your focus on a single blog. Why don’t you deliver all your excitement to it? Pour all of your excess passion into it so that all the good stuff flows continuously. Here is a useful link to know is you Should You Have Multiple Blogs.
It is by narrowing the list down to a single niche that you can easily track success. You will find no trouble in managing the blog, creating content, and finding an audience because you stay focused on a singular goal.
Don’t be afraid to research about the niches that you can’t decide with. For example, if you find travel and fashion as good niches, you can use Google’s Keyword Planner to identify which topic is more popular.
A quick search would reveal that Travel receives around 1M-100M searches every month and Fashion has about 100K- 1M searches, both with low competition. From this result, it is obvious that travel is the better niche for the number of possible audiences. Aside from Google’s Keyword Planner, there are other means of identifying profitable niches.
If you don’t want your blog anymore and you feel burnout with your chosen niche, feel free to let go of it. Just remember that jumping from one niche to the other will make you waste time, effort, and a lot of earning chances. Take time to think and explore about a possible niche before going for it head-first without a clear idea about it.
Consider the last failure be a lesson. Move on to brighter things and see the last letdown as a stepping stone to success.
But I don’t have a passion in blogging. I don’t know how to set up one and I don’t find writing appealing. All I have is an interest to earn from blogging. Can I still give it a try?
If All You Have is an Interest and Don’t Have a Passion…
Passions are not necessarily innate. They are most likely learned beginning with an intense desire to know more about something. The best thing that you can do is to create a list of ideas that spring out of nowhere. Listen and watch everything around you. By being observant even on nonsensical things, you are most likely to become interested and be inspired to research about it. Every idea is important so it shouldn’t be wasted no matter how dumb it sounds or looks.
Passion vs. Interest
It is always preferred to have passion on a chosen niche. But if that passion is too hard to come by, don’t let that trouble stop you from doing business. You see, being completely passionate is really not that significant. The main factor to have and you shouldn’t lose is interest. Be it a mild curiosity or an excitement about something. Use it to get started and consider that interest as your fuel to move on.
I have experienced making websites that I wasn’t interested with. I made them mainly because they came out profitable according to my research. Want to know what happened? I have abandoned all those sites because they were a failure.
On a lighter note, there are a lot of success stories about businesses that grew out of a simple interest. The owners were nowhere near being experts in their chosen industries and all they have were curiosity about their niches. To them, the key is always about being interested enough to have that motivation to move forward and do everything to make it the best site.
In fact, Jason Fried, the CEO of Basecamp have discussed about this matter. He talked about how a lot of people started out new companies and products out of frustration from a current situation. Instead of wallowing on their failure, they rose above the challenges because they love what they do.
Passion is Still the Big Player
Although it’s been pointed out that success comes with interest and not from passion alone, let me still say that it is important. Not necessarily a passion for the topic but rather for a deeper purpose or purposes.
- It can be a passion to give a solution in order to help other people.
- It can be a passion to develop something for business, entrepreneurship, or simply being passionate to earn one’s keep.
These kinds of passion are what success is made of in many businesses.
By now you may already have an idea on what your passion is or the things that you are interested with. Do you think it will be a good niche? Do you know how to make that niche profitable?
Identify What People Want (in relation with your passion or interest)
Truth be told that choosing a niche is much more like identifying what your target audience want. You need to choose a niche that will be interesting to the readers. When it comes to choosing a niche it really goes down to understanding what people want.
Choose a niche that attracts more readers. Here are primary areas that appear attractive to almost all kinds of readers. After each is a set of useful tips on how you can select the best blog topics:
1. Readers are looking for answers.
People get frustrated on a lot of things. Can you offer a solution for a particular frustration? That is how you can start knowing what to blog about. Personally, I used this trick to find my niche. I learned that newbie bloggers are frustrated about the basic steps in blogging like setting up a blog and other technical stuff. I ended up writing about various blogging tips to make blogging easier for newbies. I identified the problem and provided a solution.
2. Readers are haunted by their fears.
People are sometimes unaware that they are searching the internet for their fears. It can be a good thing to give these people ideas on how to overcome those fears. Perhaps you can talk about healing and recovery for those who have lost a loved one. You can give tips on how to cope up with a breakup.
3. Readers are hungry to learn about new things
Think about exciting experiences that most people would love to do but does not know how to. What do you know about it that you can offer to them? Maybe you have skills that are uncommon and interesting? Maybe you can do tutorial videos or write ups about it?
4. Readers want to achieve something
What goals does certain group of people have? Perhaps they want to achieve financial stability. Do you have the same goals as them? Why not write about it? Share the steps you did or is still doing to achieve such goal. Inspire other people by making yourself as an example. It can be lonely to pursue any goal and knowing that you are there to accompany in every step makes it much lighter.
5. Readers want entertainment
Are you able to make people laugh in real life? Why not try bringing that funny self on your blog? If you are wondering what to blog about, remember that a lot of people go online for a good laugh. Make sure that you give them what they want, and more. You can give people advice on certain mistakes by narrating a funny story related to it. Make sure that you offer something fresh, unheard of so you get to keep the audience interested and on their toes waiting for the next post.
In a sense, people look for niches that give more benefits than what is initially expected. It is never enough to offer raw information. What others look for are the extras.
For example, travel is a popular niche. A lot of travel blogs already provide information about certain destinations.
Why not take it a notch higher by offering tips on how to travel for less? You may also want to give information about local beliefs and taboos.
These are uncommon but welcome information that gives a positive impression to the readers.
Find Your Keyword Niche
With the millions of blogs out there, it is very impossible to have a niche that does not exist elsewhere. This is a challenge for those who want to make money writing. After all, popular blogs lean unto the number of followers to make money and having millions of competitors slims down the already small chance of being on the top.
But there is one trick in niche blogging that not many bloggers are applying to their blogs. The secret is all about knowing specific niche keywords. These are precise keywords that rake in traffic and, of course, money into your blog.
Going back to our example earlier about having “travel” as your niche, you already know how broad the topic “travel” is. With the help of Google’s Keyword Planner, you can shorten the list of keywords to only those that sums up a specific niche. So if you are going to write content about travel, write about something that travellers will most likely search for. Travel must-haves, travel medications, travelling with kids, etc. Internet users are now very particular with their searches because they know that Google will be glad to pin-point exactly what they want.
Study how Google’s Keyword Planner tool works and you will surely ace the keyword finding game.
Of course you can also use SEMrush, it’s another trusty app to use for niche research. If you get over the basics of using it, you will find that it is also effective as a nifty tool to find great blog post ideas. Also observe the competition for their keywords ranking and trends to figure out what and what not to write next.
After having your niche and finding suitable keywords for your posts, you might be wondering about the next step.
What you actually need to do is to test out your niche among communities. Look for blogs that are somehow related to your niche and find out how much of the issues you need to cover. It is by being in the community that you get to learn how the trend moves. This way, you can predict what to blog about next. You can see firsthand what information is lacking and how you can fill in that gap.
Got a blog? Why not turn into a niche blog? Here are effective tips to do it right:
The problem is mainly because your current blog became your worst nightmare: a generic blog that talks endlessly about everything.
Pay attention to your categories. It is through this that you will notice how you seem to write more about a single category. Take it as the first tell-tale sign of a niche. You like to write about such topic so maybe you can consider it as the focal point of your passion or at least interest.
Observe your stats. Identify which posts have the most traffic. It simply indicates that a lot of people consider your blog as a great source of information for such category. Next thing to do is to closely observe the posts. Is there a certain pattern on the way you wrote each of them? Why do you think search engines like those posts? Strive to make more posts bearing the same topic and write them well.
Thin down topics. One way to put everything on track is by cutting down the categories. Remove those topics that are way off the topic of interest. You may consider creating another blog where you can place all of those out of topic posts if you would like to keep writing about those topics. You have to make it clear that your blog is only about your niche.
Avoid spontaneous posts at all times. Always stop yourself from posting personal stuff or anything that is inappropriate on the blog. By inappropriate, it means those blog posts that are not at all related to your niche blog. Consider posting those kinds of post on your social media account or on to your other “personal” blog.
Having a wayward blog should not let you down. It is never too late to start pruning the blog to bring it to the right path. Keep a positive mindset that will let you do the changes as soon as now.
Having a niche blog means having a blog with a purpose. You have set a goal for that blog. If you are not able to commit writing hundreds of blog posts about the topic, then maybe you still haven’t found a niche yet.
Remember that niche blogging should be fun. It shouldn’t feel suffocating or exhausting. In fact, a niche blog is one that makes you excited to plan on what to blog about in the future. It should also keep you looking forward for the audience to affirm that you are helping them. This should keep you happy more than the fact that you make money writing.
How to Make Money from a Niche Blog
Some generic or multi- topic blogs rank well but nothing is as good as the rankings of niche blogs. Consider looking at it this way: If you write about only one topic, you can be considered as a master on that field. Google will most likely consider your blog as an authority as you publish more content about that topic.
Being able to make Google believe your blog to be legit is the first step of monetizing it. That is how you are going to earn from your passion. If you are going to represent a niche, it will be easier to market your goods because you have specific people who need the specific products that you offer.
In a way, you attract business owners who are related to your niche. With an admirable number of followers, advertisement offers will come. Advertisers will see your worth as a blogger because you are focused with your niche blog.
Conclusion
A niche is as important as the whole blog. A blog may cease to exist on search engines without a niche. The same thing happens if you fail to choose your niche well.
Do not waste your time and money over a generic blog. Instead, stay focused on finding your niche and willing yourself to keep the passion in writing about it alive. Focus your attention and knowledge to a niche blog and you will gain the best results from blogging.
Are you ready to start a blog? Do you have any niche ready? If you started a blog already, how did you find your niche? Inspire other bloggers about your story by commenting below.