More and more people are finding ways to make money from blogging but few pro bloggers are making their money from their personal, general themed blogs. In most cases it takes a blog either with a tight niche or fresh idea to make it big in the blogosphere – but how do you find those ideas? Before reading on you might like to read Part 1 of this series.

3. Dream – Most mornings you can find me at a local cafe for at least for 30 – 60 minutes. The reasons I go there are numerous. For one coffee is an essential ingredient in me thinking creatively (that should almost be a point in and of itself) but secondly I do it to intentionally get out of my ‘Blog HQ’ (my office) and into a different space. I usually leave my laptop at the office and just take a pen and my journal and use the time to dream.

You see I find it easy to fill my head up with wonderful information, observations, predictions and knowledge but unless I put time aside to dream about how blogging could fit with the information I’m gathering the dots may never be joined. Get out that journal again and add to your list of potential topics – what would you love to write about? What would be an outrageous topic to blog on? What type of person would you like to write a blog for? Think outside the box you’ve been living in – open your mind and come up with as many creative ideas as possible. Nothing is too stupid – not until the next stage anyway.

[Read more...]

Susannah linked up to my How to Research a Profitable Blog Topic post and writes:

‘What Darren doesn’t say is just how to come up with those money-making ideas. He’s clearly got the knack of latching onto current issues appropriate for blogs, but not everyone does.’

That got me wondering – how do the ideas come? I started jotting down a few ideas this afternoon about how I coax ideas for new blogs and posts out of my mind and soon found I had more than a single post on my hands. So here is the first part in my mini series on how to find money making blog ideas:

1. Observe – I am an information junkie. I watch too much TV, read too many books (I never make it to the end though), spend way too much time on the internet, squander hours in the news agents flicking through magazines, spend more time at cafes watching people than eating food and am a sucker for any article, website or conversation that is about ‘trends or predictions‘.

If you want to create a blog that is going to be read by as many people as possible you must be in touch with where as many people are at (or will be at). What are they eating, drinking, doing with spare time, watching on TV, thinking about, lusting after, obsessing about etc. Don’t only observe what others are doing – take a look at your own life, look at your spending paterns, TV watching habits, interests and passions and you might just find a great topic in your own life! I also find that stimulating myself with new sights, sounds, tastes, places, people can also help get the creative juices flowing. Keep a journal (I use a whiteboard and a spreadsheet) of your observations which you can come back to later.

[Read more...]

A while back when I asked you what you’d like to ask professional bloggers in my upcoming interview series MM asked:

‘I want to know what kind of research they did before they jumpstart a new blog. How do they gauge the “marketability” or earning potential of a new topic?’

I’ll ask the question when I start my interview series (first interview will be released this week) – but thought it was worth attempting an answer here also from my own perspective.

I’ll let you in on a little secret. The best research that I’ve ever done on a topic for a potential blog is this…
[Read more...]