What They Don’t Tell You
The first step to making money online is getting a website. It’s so cheap and easy to setup a website in 2015. The most complicated part is deciding what the website should be about.
The simple answer is to chose a topic YOU have an interest in, because this is a topic you will want to consistently write about. There are no rules about WHAT you should chose, but it is better to be as specific as possible. Online, being a big fish in a small pond is easier than being a small fish in a big pond!
Some of the “make money online gurus” suggest spending money on products or courses that will help you find the most profitable topics with low competition from existing websites. Those may have been necessary a few years ago when websites were mainly started by computer science programmers.
Today there is no substitute for an authentic point of view.
Readers are attracted to, like & share genuine content, resulting in increased traffic which usually translated to increased profit.
Website Ideas VS Income
Generally, the more expensive the topic you have chosen, the more money you will be able to make from ad sales and affiliate marketing.
However, other people know this too & the more expensive topics are also more competitive. So, find a balance between your interest in a topic and potential for income from ads & commissions.
Bath Toys & Baby Showers
The first website I started focused on bath toys for babies & kids: www.bathtimefuntime.com. I chose a simple topic, so I could spend time learning how to build & monetize a website.
In hindsight, bath toys were not a great choice, because the potential income from ads and commissions on bath toy sales is so small (bath toys are so cheap!). I also lost interest in the topic because bath toys are, well, not exceedingly interesting.
Strangely most of my traffic for www.bathtimefuntime.com is related to baby shower planning. I wrote 1 article about baby shower gifts (assuming people would buy bath toys as baby shower gifts), and the baby shower concept generated more interest than the bath toys (as you can see from my 2014 income report). Personally I was more interested in writing about baby showers, so that content took over the site.
Because websites are so inexpensive to create, the site still makes money, but definitely not enough to qualify as a part-time job. And now my bath toy website is full of baby shower content – not a very cohesive message!
Priority #1
Having a topic you can stick with should be the most important factor when choosing which website idea to run with. Despite all of the research I’ve been doing, I am STILL drawn toward writing about baby showers. Maybe this is because of my own experiences trying to conceive. Maybe it just seems easier to stick with a familiar idea, rather than start again with something brand new.
What do you think? Should I create a website in the baby shower niche using some of my existing content from www.bathtimefuntime.com or start over with something new?
I’d love to read your comments below.
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