I have five that actually have WordPress installed and at least one blog post up. I have two that are current. I also have multiple other properties set up on Blogger and Squidoo type platforms. And don’t get me started on domain names. Just this minute I pulled myself away from NameCheap where I was thisclose to buying yet another domain for a fantastic Amazon site that I’m sure would have made me millions. Or not.

Clearly, I need to focus.

Tristan, over at Blogging Bookshelf, has a terrific post about how to manage (or not) multiple blogs. (Love the infographics!) He’s spot-on about all the reasons we start multiple blogs, and all the reasons we fail at it. Then he offers advice about how to make it work, if you feel you need to.

Me, I have this image of myself as a super-organized, get-everything-done kind of gal. I can eat right, work out regularly, keep a business running, excel at my job, and get the oil changed in the car, all while running five blogs. Only I can’t. Something’s got to give, and often, that something is a blog.

So here’s what I did. I listed all my domains (about 20 total, which probably doesn’t qualify me for a twelve-step program…yet), noted whether or not there was a blog installed, how current it was, and whether the domain is earning its keep. Then I sorted them by current and future potential for both holding my interest and making money.

I did not include the free Web 2.0 stuff, simply because I don’t feel any pressure to either keep them current, or to market them. They’re simply feeder sites that help drive traffic to the money blogs.

Now I can look objectively at the list and make a commitment to the top choices, while letting the rest go. There are some I’ll just let expire, and others I may put on hiatus for a time while I decide if they’re worth cleaning up to sell.

What I’m keeping are this blog, a niche site I just started and want to see if I can develop into a regular paycheck, and a flower gardening blog I’ve had for years. I also have one site which I am sentimentally attached to that I will put on hold while I decide if I really want to keep it.

What I’m not keeping are a personal weight loss blog (who needs more of that?), a rather mundane Amazon site I never really had any interest in anyway, a dog training site (really – what was I thinking?), and a camera site.

Your Turn: How many neglected and abandoned blogs are lurking on your web server? Do you feel guilty for letting them wither and die? Or do you convince yourself that someday you’ll do something meaningful with them?

Get more great self-employment tips by visiting Cindy Bidar.

I just installed two new plug-ins (new for this blog, anyway) that I think you’re going to like. The first is a Do-Follow plug-in, which means that your comment links (like your name and any links you leave in the comment itself) are passing on a little tiny trickle of link juice to your site.

The second is KeywordLuv, which allows you to actually use keywords in the name field when you leave a comment.

The price for these two great plug-ins is that all first comments will now be moderated. I know Scott Stratten thinks I’m killing my blog, but I trust that you’ll be understanding about the need to moderate at least a little bit. After you’ve had one comment approved, you should be cleared for all future comments, unless you include a link in the comment itself. Those I will still be approving manually.

So subscribe to my feed, read the blog, and come back and talk to me. I’d love to hear your opinions about my opinions!

Get more great self-employment tips by visiting Cindy Bidar.

Markets and Niches

Along with discovering your ideal niche, you also need to consider the market you’re trying to attract. While a niche represents a certain subject matter, a market is the people who are interested in that subject. Markets can have many niches, and niches can have many markets. For example, dog owners are a market. Their niches might include organic dog food, interactive dog toys, and training collars.

Both niches and markets can be broken down into smaller and smaller groups, as well. Dog owners is a pretty broad group, but owners of German Shepherd Dogs is much smaller. Training collars is a larger niche than is Martindale collars or head collars.

Brainstorming Time

A lot of new marketers get hung up on choosing a market and a niche. They think they “don’t know anything” or are “not interested in anything” or even worse, that everything they are interested in is “too saturated.” For this exercise, we’re going to put away all those self-limiting beliefs and just brain-dump everything you’ve ever learned or been interested in. In other words, we’re going to have a brainstorming session of one.

The way brainstorming works is that you’re required to write as fast as you can, without allowing your internal editor time to say “That’s a stupid idea” or “you played basketball for like three days and you hated it, you can’t blog about it!” We’ll look at those comments later. For right now, you just want to get the ideas on paper, regardless of how silly or unprofitable they might seem later. Ready?

Get out a pen and paper (or your favorite word processor) and just start writing down ideas. Don’t worry about if they’re niches or markets, we’ll sort them out later. For now, just write them down. If you need some ideas to begin, start with

• All the hobbies you’ve had, even if you no longer actively participate in them
• Every job you’ve ever held.
• All the ways you spend your time when you’re not working.
• Everything anyone has ever complimented you on. (i.e. Your writing ability, fashion sense, technical capabilities, etc.)
• Everything you argue about passionately.
• Everything that makes you cry, laugh, or frustrates you so bad you just want to shake someone.

I find it’s helpful to set a timer for this kind of brainstorming. I usually start with five minutes, but if you think you have a lot of ideas, you can add to that. (Though you might be surprised just how long five minutes really is.) The only rule about using a timer is that you have to write until the bell rings. No exceptions, no excuses. If you completely run out of ideas, simply write “I’m out of ideas” until something else occurs to you – and it will, if you just keep writing.

Think Small(er)

If you’re like most people, you’ve probably got some pretty broad topics on your list. Things like “baseball” and “dog training” and “decorating.” While it might seem like a good idea to go after large subjects – more readers, right? – it’s actually better to think much smaller.

While it’s true there are lots of people interested in baseball, there are three problems you’ll face if you try to build a site about such a broad topic.

1. Getting found. Google baseball and see who your competition is going to be. Your average niche blogger just doesn’t have the chops to go up against mlb.com, Wikipedia, and ESPN. Better to aim for a smaller niche where you’ll have a much better shot at landing on the first page of Google.
2. Reaching the right audience. What are surfers who Google baseball looking for? Stats? A catcher’s mitt for junior? Who won the 1963 World Series? It could be any of those things, or none of them. When you aim for a wide topic, you might get more traffic, but most of it won’t be relevant to your site.
3. Attracting buyers. This is closely related to point number two, but it bears repeating. Since the whole idea of building a niche blog is to sell something, you need to attract buyers. The more specific your niche, the more targeted your keywords (more on that later), the closer to buying your visitors will be.

So pull out your list of ideas and narrow them down considerably. Instead of baseball, think baseball equipment, or even baseball shoes. Rather than knitting, think hand-dyed sock yarn.

Show Me the Money

If we were just looking for a hobby site we could stop right here. But we want to make some money, so we need to find out if people (our market) spend money in our niche. Lynn Terry often says there are five areas people will spend money: health, finances, beauty, entertainment, and love. Chances are good your ideas fall into one of those categories, but to find out if people really spend money in your niche, there are a couple of quick and dirty tests you can use.

The first is Google. Type hand-dyed sock yarn into the search bar and see what shows up. At this point we don’t care about the main results, we want to look at the ads. If there are ads in the sidebar or sponsored ads at the top of the page, then people are spending money. Another place to look is Amazon. Again, enter your search term and see what shows up. In this case, I found some sock yarn, some sock yarn meant for dying (in case you’re dying your own), some books about knitting socks, and even one about knitting socks with hand-dyed yarn.

Clearly, people are spending money on hand-dyed sock yarn.

Where Love and Money Intersect

Here’s where we get to the good stuff. At the beginning of this article we talked about there being two schools of thought on niche blogging. One opinion is to build your site around a topic that you love, because you’re going to be spending a lot of time in it. The other opinion is to go where the money is. My opinion is to do both.

Look at all your possible niches and eliminate the ones you’re not truly interested in. Yes, you might have played basketball in college, but if your only thoughts of the game today revolve around the office sweet-sixteen pool, maybe it’s not a good choice for you.

Likewise, cross off the topics that aren’t money makers. No sense spending a lot of time and energy blogging about organic cat shampoo if no one is buying.
What’s left is a list of interesting topics in markets that spend money. You’ll be spending a lot of time researching and writing on your topic, so ask yourself once again if you’re truly interested in the subject matter before taking the plunge.

Next up, we’ll talk about how people will find your site in the wide open wilds of the Internet, so stay tuned!

Get more great self-employment tips by visiting Cindy Bidar.

“In it something is. I will know, I thank for the help in this question.”

I don’t know what the question was, but I’m so happy I was able to help.

“It is time to become reasonable. It is time to come in itself.”

Obviously! I don’t know why more people don’t see that!

“Excuse, that I interfere, but, in my opinion, there is other way of the decision of a question.”

Excuse, that I have no idea, what the hell you’re trying to say, with so many commas.

“A edinburgh tid search charles linskaill buy accutane online uk [link], animal f**k buy accutane online usa [link], indigestion with buy accutane online [link], overdose of buy accutane online usa [link], falls band buy jeffrey campbell shoes online [completely different link], prank call fake prescription buy accutane online uk [link], buy in london england buy accutane uk [link]. acne accutane.”

I hope the guy with the shoes link got a discount for being included as an afterthought with the acne site.

And finally, this poor sap, who seems to know what he’s (she’s?) doing is somewhat less than ethical. I hope he’s well paid.

“Moderators, Please Sorry =)
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At least they’re entertaining, right?

In all seriousness, these comments – if you can call them that – are here for one reason: backlinks. These are the result of those backlinking services you see advertised in places like Digital Point and Black Hat World, and frankly, they’re not worth anything. Imagine how many thousands of these kinds of links have to be generated to get even one that’s approved. And the sites that do approve this garbage? They’re very likely low-quality, here-today-gone-tomorrow autoblogs who’s links are useless in terms of SEO. Don’t waste your time. Seriously.

Want to know how to get backlinks? I’ll give you a hint. Paying someone a few pennies to post “comments” isn’t a good use of your time or money. For a real, sustainable backlink strategy, get a copy of Susanne Myer’s Easy Link Love. She’ll show you real ways to get real links, without spamming blogs and forums, and without leaving your ethics (or those of your staff) at the door.

Get more great self-employment tips by visiting Cindy Bidar.

What about you? How do you keep your posting schedule organized?

Get more great self-employment tips by visiting Cindy Bidar.