People have been keeping journals and diaries for centuries. Without them, much of the world's wisdom would have already been lost. Why? Because some of the greatest writers of all time have used their journals to jot down their thoughts and ideas each day. They would then refer to these daily notes while they were writing their books and articles.
Without their diaries, Sam Clemens (aka: Mark Twain), Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, George Shaw, Bertrand Russell, Oscar Wilde and thousands more, wouldn't have been able to produce the masterpieces that they did.
Decades later, the internet has changed the way that people keep diaries.
What has advent of the internet done to change this? Well, in a nutshell, it has transformed what was once a very personal pastime, into a very public affair. Instead of keeping your innermost thoughts private, people can now share their thoughts, feelings and ideas with the whole world, at least, with anybody who has an internet connection and a computer with a web browser.
So what has all this to do with making money on the internet? Well, a "blog" is a shortened term for "Web Log" and "blogging" has come to mean nothing more than simply making a log of your daily thoughts, feelings and ideas available to anyone who wants to read them. In other words, an online journal.
Several years ago, around about 1997, somebody (there is some debate as to whom the very first blogger was, but the names often mentioned are Justin Hall, Jorn Barger and Dave Winer) created some simple software that made it possible to write down their daily thoughts and publish them to the internet. Since then, millions of people have chosen to do likewise and the number is growing by the day.
The number of people blogging has grown rapidly for several reasons, not least of which is the software itself (otherwise known as a "blogging platform"), which has developed to such a degree that it is not only easy to set-up your own website as a blog, but it is also a perfect way to both FIND and COMMUNICATE with LIKE MINDED people. The old way of journaling simply couldn't do this.
So, instead of relying on your location on the planet, and fate in general, you can now actively find people who are interested in the same things that YOU are interested in, regardless of location, age, race etc. Language IS still an issue, but with online translation tools, even that is becoming less of a problem each year.
The software currently available has many features, allowing a blog reader to search older articles (called "posts") by name, keyword, category or date, and it also allows for readers to COMMENT on each post, so it makes for a very INTERACTIVE environment, often attracting many people from all over the world who have something to say about what the author has written.
Blogs are often simply personal thoughts, written by people who would like to hear from other people who have similar ideas. They can be little more than a history of a family growing up, or of vacations that people have had. They can be about literally anything in which humans are involved, from pet care to astro-physics.
What are people doing to make money with blogs? Typically, they choose a subject that they are interested in (or preferably PASSIONATE about) and in which they are quite knowledgeable, and they start writing about it. Businesses, ALL business, are little more than people offering products or services (or both) to other people. When the offer is accepted, trades are made; it's that simple.
But what could be sold via a blog? The honest answer is "pretty much anything". How is this done? Typically, a good blog demonstrates the author's expertise in a certain area. It could be horse-grooming or computer-science; whatever it is, when people find your blog, they are almost always looking to GET something.
To actually make money blogging, you have to offer the same thing; products or services. You can create your own product such as a book that you can offer your readers, but, just like a retailer with a shop, you can also offer OTHER PEOPLE'S PRODUCTS. To find products related to your blog, which your readers might be interested in buying, you can go to Clickbank.com or Commission Junction.
Here you'll find an array of both digital (videos, pdf books, audio files etc.) and physical products that you can promote for a very high percentage commission. If your reader clicks a link on your blog (which directs them to the product owner's sales page)and then proceeds to buy the product, you make money. In the case of Clickbank, they will mail you a check every two weeks, if you have made sales.
You can even display Amazon.com books and sell those if you wish, though the percentage commission is much lower, often just a few pennies on the dollar.
Always remember that your readers typically want a SOLUTION; that is, they are looking for a solution to a problem that they currently have. It could be a medical condition they have, or it could be instructions on how to repair a vehicle. Whatever it is, they want to get something, and often it is little more than information; though very SPECIFIC information that will help them solve their problem.
Most new bloggers expect people to find their website quickly and start commenting immediately, but alas, this is not how it works. You could write a three hundred word post each day for months and not get more than a handful of visitors to our blog. Why is this? There are lots of reasons, but two come readily to mind.
Firstly, if you don't really understand the subject you are writing about, you will not be using the right terminology (otherwise known as "jargon") in your posts, so the search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo will not find your posts. That's not exactly true; the search-engines WILL find your posts, but they will index them in such a way that people SEARCHING for solutions to their problems will be typing different keywords into the search-engines, so they will find OTHER people's websites instead of yours.
Secondly, if you rely totally on the likes of Google and Yahoo to find and index your blog, you are missing out on potentially thousand of readers, because there are MANY more things you can do to drive visitors (otherwise known as TRAFFIC in the internet marketing world) TO your site. So, instead of being passive and hoping for the best, you actively go out and look for potential readers. This article is a good example of just ONE way that you might get people to visit your blog.
