The Editor’s Introductory Guide to Blogging Profits

Written on October 31, 2007 – 6:34 pm | by Wordpreneur |

Blog Stuff A “blog,” as you all know, stands for Web log, At its core and most basic, a diary, in case anyone’s asking. But just like everything else in this world, it’s morphed into something else that people need, in this case a very powerful but yet relatively easy to implement — but more importantly, easy to comprehend — online publishing solution.

Which means that never before has it been easier (and I do mean that quite sincerely) for editors to get into publishing online without doing much in the way of creating new content. Through the use of all this new-ish blogging tech and other resources available today, in other words, it’s now relatively simple for a solitary editor to become a productive (and profitable) publisher.

Right about now is when a discussion (argument) usually starts among my peers over whether we should be devoting our energies and scarce resources on merely processing and regurgitating existing content (I actually consider it more as facilitating, a very simple viewpoint shift that however makes all the difference in the world).

Yada yada yada blah blah blah. All that’s fun and no doubt useful to ponder. But not now. We can leave all that cranial stuff for later, for future posts and comments, if we’re so inclined. For now, let’s get into the HOW, shall we?

Here’s the basic start-up and operations formula for this blog-based online publishing project:

1. Go to free article directories like EzineArticles and Article City. I like these because the articles on these sites are sufficiently categorized for our purposes.

Start researching your pool of content. It’s important, maybe even critical, that you pick a niche topic/category that you’re very interested in and won’t tire of, even through repeat and constant exposure.

The goal here is to find a niche topic/category you like that has a nice supply of free content to sustain a good-sized website focused entirely on that niche.

NOTE: Even if you’ve already found your content niche, take the time to familiarize yourself with all the other categories and content available.

2. Go to GoDaddy or your domain name registration service of choice and find/create and register a dot com domain name that fits your topic.

Stick with dot coms, I feel. I’ll explain why in my next post on this topic.

3. Get cheap Web hosting, if you don’t have hosting already. Budget hosting that allows you to set up multiple domains/websites for one low price is the way to go at this stage. I’ve been using Site5 as my hosting service… tons more out there for you to choose from.

It’s extremely important, I feel, that you select a host that provides a third-party script installation interface called Fantastico (or, at least, something comparable to it). It just makes it very easy to install and update scripts and software you’ll be using, like WordPress. Site5’s got Fantastico, but it’s far from the only one that does — Fantastico is a very popular option, so it shouldn’t take much effort to find a host that provides it at no extra charge.

4. Start going through the content from step 1, adding each article to your blog periodically. Find ways to organize the articles in more useful ways (e.g., subcategories) to help your site’s visitors; proof and edit as needed; etc. etc. etc. Do your “editor” thing, in other words. We’ll cover this part in more detail in a future post as well.

And that, ladies and gents, is all there is to the basic plan.

Simple, huh? In my next post on the topic, we’ll look at the basics of monetizing this online publishing operation. But before we do, let’s visit an issue we somewhat just stepped over as we zoomed through the steps above…

…technical complexity.

Well, I’m a bottom line kind of guy, and the bottom line as far as this issue is concerned is: You already know whether you can handle it or not. Some people can. Some people can’t (or won’t — same difference). That’s just the way it is.

On top of which, this is your business. So, if all this blog stuff is new to you, it’s your call whether you want to learn how to do the tech stuff yourself (counting the time involved to get from learning to actually being productive), or whether it may be smarter for you to hire someone like me (or the millions of other “consultants” out there) who can get you set up very rapidly for a small fee.

Maybe you’ll find this encouraging: My mother-in-law never touched a typewriter keyboard, let alone a PC, before she retired a few short years ago. She didn’t even have a High School diploma. Last year, on her own volition, she bought a new laptop. She took some free local classes to get started. Within a month she was trading on eBay. Not once did she call me for help or instruction.

On the flipside: My mom, who has a Psychology degree (with honors) and has been “using” a PC since the 80s, still can’t figure out how to deal with and view email attachments. And I’m not even going to tell you what she does with cell phones.

Like I said: Some can, and some can’t. I’ve given up trying to figure out who’s who. Your call exclusively on what you can handle.

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