Comments on: Why You Need a (Blogging) Business Model

By: Karl Craig-West

Karl Craig-West — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 16:02:29 +0000

Excellent article, time to get really thinking about how I’m planning to take my online blogging business forward.

By: Eugenia

Eugenia — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 09:20:04 +0000

Hi,

I like your advice and I find it necessary to have a plan.

However, when you’re just getting started, you don’t know what works for you until you experiment with it.
“Is Adsense more productive for me? ”
“Which affiliate network brings me more commissions? ”
“Do paid ads work better than stumble upon or digg?”

These are all questions you cannot answer right from the beginning, so my opinion is the blogging business model should be created after you have experimented a little with your blog.

Best regards,
Eugenia
http://www.startupnewbie.com

By: Kalyan

Kalyan — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 19:55:02 +0000

Of the 3 model you described (Content, Marketing and Monetization), I’ve recently finalized my Content Model. The blog focuses on Bengali Cuisine [for the uninitiated, Bengal is a region in South Asia, comprising a state in India and whole of Bangladesh]. There would be 2 kinds of posts – 1. Recipes – by my partner (Sudeshna) would write these 2. Webmaster related (keywords, traffic, model, visitors, plugin, theme, how to build a food blog etc) – me.

Excellent tips to get someone like me thinking.

By: Joan Dempsey

Joan Dempsey — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 12:58:37 +0000

I came across a template for determining a business model that has worked for folks I know – it’s simple once you read through the concepts and it’s a great tool to help you think through each area of your blogging business. And it’s given away free under a Creative Commons license.

Here’s the link:
http://www.slideshare.net/Alex.Osterwalder/business-model-template

By: Zawad Iftikhar

Zawad Iftikhar — Sun, 31 May 2009 18:40:23 +0000

Great Ideas but Ideas need implementation and Implementation is hard…..

By: shannon

shannon — Thu, 28 May 2009 17:15:08 +0000

Bloging helps business of all types it brings traffic and sales. After reading this I’m still not sure how to make bloging business model.

shannon
web / mktg
http://www.eighthorses.com/

By: Paramendra Bhagat

Paramendra Bhagat — Sun, 17 May 2009 05:10:38 +0000

How do you grow traffic? How do you go from 60 page hits per day to 600 to 6,000?

By: Claire

Claire — Fri, 15 May 2009 23:38:00 +0000

This was an intriguing post, but I wish it had gone further. I’d like to get a walk-thru of how you find a system and identify what’s been done to make that system successful. Without knowing details how can you determine if it’s a system worth emulating?

By: Jack Corbett

Jack Corbett — Fri, 15 May 2009 16:41:37 +0000

“The statistics are “against” blogging success” – I would argue that this depends on what your idea of success it for your blog. I do blog, but I’m not even trying to make money through it. I blog to stimulate my mind through writing, demonstrate my professional development by sharing what I’ve learned, and to increase my “google” footprint. There are other reasons as well, but those are the main ones. Sure, I’d like to be read by thousands, but if it what I post helps 1 person a week or gives a potential employer a positive result when they “google” me then I’d consider my blog a success.

By: Yogoer

Yogoer — Thu, 14 May 2009 20:48:14 +0000

I’m on the fence about business plans. I had a 10-page plan, complete with call-outs and pie charts, but I never finished it. I finally “scrapped” it (tho of course it’s still archived), and wrote a 2-page action list (based on this post). We’ll see if it helps…

By: ricky

ricky — Wed, 13 May 2009 07:50:17 +0000

This was exactly what i thought.Many fail in this aspect.It took a long time for me to get this fact too.

By: Annette

Annette — Wed, 13 May 2009 04:21:17 +0000

I am just starting a blog and I hope to move toward monetizing it. I am curious about why it is naive to build content before advertising. Is it naive to not *think* about advertising? Or is it naive not to immediately advertise? My fear is that without solid content and a history of information, people coming to the site won’t have a reason to come back or delve further into the site.

Would love comments.

By: Rocket Resaler

Rocket Resaler — Wed, 13 May 2009 02:56:57 +0000

Interesting post because I myself had never considered a business plan, but you are right, I can see how it would be essential. I have done a lot of other strategizing and marketing research and development but never sat down to actually conceptualize a business plan on paper.

Great morsel for me to chew on for the night, I think I will see if I can’t get a plan drafted this weekend and see where to go from there.

By: Agent SEO

Agent SEO — Tue, 12 May 2009 14:21:10 +0000

Thanks for the valuable insight Shaun!

It is important to have a blogging model. Starting a blog without a direction or a goal of where you want to be is just like starting anything wihout an end game in mind. It’s just pointless.

With the odds against any blogger making it big, it makes it more important to have an end game plan up front.

By: ezFreeSamples.com

ezFreeSamples.com — Mon, 11 May 2009 21:30:35 +0000

This is a great idea. Another one to help me out with my new Freebies Blog. Thanks.

By: ohmelayu | melayuboleh

ohmelayu | melayuboleh — Mon, 11 May 2009 15:36:28 +0000

blogging model? It something new to me. But we need to have plan and strategy for long term and short term. Hope i can follow my plan well.

By: Tom

Tom — Mon, 11 May 2009 08:29:53 +0000

I agree. However, I think there is something small I think worth adding – when defining and designing a plan for blogging, it’s better to define the high end goals, rather than to get to details. I mean workout the neaty gritty details later. The business module needs to have “systems” in place to adapt to certain circumstances.

By: Josh

Josh — Mon, 11 May 2009 00:56:19 +0000

I totally agree with this angle. To me, if you’re intending on making some or any sort of income from a blog, you should approach it like a business and at the very least, have a plan.

I would suggest that for each model you presented, content, marketing, and monetization a quick 1 page (or less) summary of the key points on a sheet of paper is sufficient for most beginners.

Expanding on the plan is something that will happen as you take action and taking action at the start is the most important thing. Be smart and be prepared!

By: Sami - Life, Laughs & Lemmings

Sami - Life, Laughs & Lemmings — Mon, 11 May 2009 00:42:49 +0000

I’ve had an offline business before and now an online (still very much developing) business. With my offline business I had a 100+ page business plan that I very rarely looked at. It was updated once a year. Whilst it did help in giving us direction and focus, because of its size, it was rarely referred to. Then I read a book called “Re-imagine” by Tom Peters.

This book basically outlines how businesses in the modern era need to operate. One of the ideas presented was to have a business plan but keep it to a couple of pages rather than a massive document. I switched to that format and found it far more beneficial and user friendly.

I’m very much an advocate of the principles in Re-imagine, including the 2 page business plan idea. In this time poor world we live in, I fine a 2 page business plan that can be easily amended and referred to makes far more sense than a 100+ page document that sits on a shelf.

By: Avalon

Avalon — Sun, 10 May 2009 22:06:14 +0000

I’m trying to go at it from all three angles:
Content: I’m the only vendor for my product. There is virtually no other sales training program for my specific niche market.

Marketing: I get a lot of traffic from my non-target market due to the novelty of the content. I’ve developed my reader base via myspace, since that is the experience level of most of my target demographic.

Monetization: currently setting up affiliates, adsense, learning as I go!