Last Updated on November 3, 2021 by Kelly Thoreson
Blogging niches are an important decision. I’m going to let you in on a painful secret: my first blog failed because I picked the wrong niche.
When I started blogging, I didn’t understand that picking the right topic will make or break you as a blogger.
Through my failure, I learned was is and isn’t important when picking a niche. I want to share what I learned with you so you don’t waste time and energy like I did! Below we’ll look at 5 elements that make a blog niche PERFECT so you can build your blogging empire!
#1 You’re Passionate About It
Are the blog niches you’re considering for your new blog ones that you can’t STFU about? Do you talk about it at parties? Are your friends sick of hearing about it? If so, it may be the perfect niche for you.
Passion is extremely important when picking your blog topic. That excitement will carry over into your writing and carry you through tough times. There are two reasons why you must LOVE your blog’s niche:
Your readers will know if you don’t really care about your topic.
Have you ever read an article that was only 300 words long, riddled with spelling errors, and seemed like it was written in about 5 minutes? Yeah, I have too. Did you go back to that blog and read more posts? Nope, I didn’t either!
If you’re bullshitting your way through every blog post, your audience WILL notice. Your lack of authenticity will shine through your BS and your readers will go find an author who cares.
Related Reading: Read Write Epic Shit by Corbett Barr of Fizzle.co. It’s about why quality content, written by a passionate author, is the keystone to blogging success.
Also, it freaking sucks to write about blog niches you don’t really enjoy day after day. Don’t do that to yourself. Life is short, write about shit you love.
Lack of passion for your niche will lead to rapid burn out.
Blogging is a LONG game.
It is also 100% doable if you’re willing to put in the time and persist where others give up.
You’re going to be spending 20-40 hours per week working on your blog, maybe more. Is the blog topic you have in mind one that you can think about all the time and not want to barf?
Also, it takes time for people to start visiting your blog and even longer for them to start trusting you enough to spend money.
Can you write about your niche for 6 months without the gratification of website traffic or revenue? Do you love your topic enough to spend money on your blog even though it’s making nothing?
Eventually, your blog will have traffic, readers and make a profit – but you must enjoy your topic enough to get to that point. When you’re enthusiastic about your blog topic, that passion will allow you to keep going when you’re feeling discouraged.
Ask yourself: do I adore this subject enough to preach about it to an empty room?
If yes, that’s the niche for you. If no, time to go back to the drawing board.
#2 You’ve Got Mad Niche-Knowledge
For perfect blog niches to work, you need to be knowledgeable about them and/or willing to put in the time to learn.
Let’s say you want to start a blog about pugs, but the only thing you know about them is how cute their smushed up faces are.
That’s nice but smushed-up-face-cuteness is just an opinion and your readers are going to want more than that.
They’re going to want to know WHY pugs have smushy faces, curly tails, and snort like little piggies.
You don’t have to know everything about your niche right away, but you do need to be willing to find out.
Sidebar: According to the American Kennel Association, pugs have smashed faces because they were bred to have wrinkles on their forehead that resembled the Chinese character for, “Prince”. Mind. Blown.
What does, “doing the research” entail? Time. Oodles of it.
Every day you’ll be consuming articles, videos, documentaries, books, and journals pertaining to your blog’s focus. This is why the aforementioned passion is so important: do you love pugs enough to learn about them 15 hours a week from now until forever?
Knowledge of your niche is similarly valuable for SEO (search engine optimization). Page Authority is an SEO metric that pretty much boils down to the internet trusting you to be an expert on your topic.
Higher Page Authority = higher opportunity to rank well in search engine results.
Related Reading: Learn more about Page Authority in this article from Moz.com.
Your Page Authority goes up when high quality, related websites link to your blog. How do you get leaders in your niche to link to your blog? Write authoritative, well-researched, insanely delicious content.
Again, to learn more about the importance of non-crap content, you’re gonna want to check out Write Epic Shit by Corbett Barr.
Ask yourself: am I interested enough in the blog niches I am considering to continually learn about them? Yes? Great! Go on to fabulous element #3. No? That’s okay, it’s better we figure this out now than 8 months into a blog that’s failing.
#3 There Is a Demand For It
Researching the demand for blog niches is crucial. If you’re new to the blogging game, you may not know where to begin demand research. Don’t worry, I got you. You can use a free tool that we all know and love to evaluate the demand for your niche: Google.
Do a quick Google search for your subject and look at the number of results that come up. Let’s take a look at the search results for my niche, blogging:
Whoa mama, 122 MILLION results! Yeah, I’d say there’s a demand for the blogging niche. In fact, there may be an oversaturation of blogs about blogging.
If you’re finding that your desired topic has a super crowded market, you can use those same Google search results to niche down.
Niching down is when you take a broad subject, like blogging, and focus on a small part of it, like blogging for beginners. Scroll down to the bottom of the Google search results for ideas on niching down:
Ah, that’s better, only 12.6 million results! You can see that this practice has yielded a niche that is high in demand but not as oversaturated as its parent niche.
Use this method to suss out the demand for your niche and confirm that you’re not going to start a blog about a topic no one has an interest in.
#4 It Can Be Monetized
Thanks to the internet, all blog niches can be monetized. However, some topics are easier to monetize than others.
When picking a niche it’s not just important that it can be monetized, it’s also important that you’re comfortable with what it takes to monetize it.
Here are the 3 most common ways to monetize a blog:
- Ads – anyone can place an ad on their blog, it is the easiest form of monetization. You may have noticed that Blogfiti has zero ads. This is because ads can cheapen your site and dilute your brand. If you’re going to place ads, do so tastefully. Tailor them so they’re relevant to your content, provide value to your audience, and for the love of god don’t place them every other sentence. Ads work best with high traffic sites.
- Affiliate links – an affiliate link is a special URL that allows you to receive a commission if the clicker of the link buys the product it leads to. You can obtain affiliate links for anything under the sun and they work best with high traffic sites.
- Paid Content – Examples of paid content are courses, ebooks, and the like. Paid content is more difficult to sell but usually more lucrative per sale. Often, paid content is offered in low to medium traffic sites with a loyal readership.
Think about what type of post you’re going to do most often with your chosen topic and consider the infographic below on how to monetize it.
Are you planning on starting a fashion blog? Then you’d better get comfy with the idea of pitching yourself, blog, and ideas to brands for sponsored post opportunities.
I’m not saying you shouldn’t start a blog because you’ve never pitched your writing before and it’s scary. By all means, do it scared! But you should have a good idea of what monetizing your niche will look like and be getting comfortable with that concept from the get-go. Knowledge is power, baby!
#5 You Enjoy Writing About It
This is the most important element, and it is why my first blog failed. If you don’t enjoy writing about your topic, your blog will fail.
I love my first blog’s niche, meditation and mindfulness, and I love writing. But as it turned out, I didn’t enjoy writing about meditation and mindfulness. In fact, I loathed it. Each post was agonizing. How’s that for a plot twist? Needless to say, I didn’t produce enough content to have a successful blog.
Related Reading: 3 Reasons You’re NOT Producing TONS of Quality Blog Content
Now that you’ve confirmed that your topic meets the criteria of the first 4 elements, it’s time to put it to the test. Before you move forward with your blog, start writing about your niche to see if you like it.
Taking the time to evaluate blog niches now will save you a lot of trouble later. If you find that you do enjoy writing about your niche, this practice will give you a head start for when you begin publishing posts. Win-win!
Takeaway
Picking the right blog niche is easy when you use these 5 essential elements to evaluate your options!
Remember what to keep in mind: passion, knowledge, demand, profitability and most importantly your enjoyment!
Do you have questions about choosing your niche? Leave them in the comments below and I will help you out!