If you continue working on a wrong niche you’d end up asking too “Is blogging dead?” (I’ll prove how)
Guess what the #1 reason why blogs fail is? Partially it’s lack of traffic, but majorly it’s because of the blogging niche you choose. Picking the wrong niche for your blog is the reason why you might fail. If you’re planning to start a blog or wondering the reason why you failed, this post is for you.
When you pick the right niche, you can not only monetize it well, but you can also become an industry expert on the niche (this will help you make money off the internet)
The biggest mistake that beginners commit is picking up a niche based on the money they can make and blogging about it. It’s okay to consider the money involved, but making the decision only based on the money is like expecting to succeed just because you exist.
The best way to decide how to pick a blogging niche is to ask yourself simple questions that will give you clarity.
This post is for you if you’re confused about which niche to pursue. With that said, let’s begin.
Table of Contents
The moment of truth – What makes a blog profitable?
To begin doing what’s right, one must know what’s wrong. If you think your blog isn’t doing well & wondering what’s wrong, you’re in the right direction.
You’re not going to make money blogging. Most of the time you will fail.
Don’t choose something that is too narrow and that you can’t talk much about or has little to no search volume.
Since you will be forced to experiment a lot, you will need a lot of topics.
Therefore picking too narrow a niche will put you in a position where you will be left with very little space to talk about – Pick a broad topic. Here’s an illustration that will explain the broad types of blogs.
You’d argue that micro-niche blogs get a ton of traffic and make even more money. But if you do an autopsy, you’d find that the micro niche blog has endless topics to talk about – in most cases micro niche blogs have a small number of evergreen topics.
What I’m going to help you with will let you understand how to pick a niche with evergreen demand.
Speaking of the demand, what actually makes a blog profitable is the user experience. Ask yourself if what you publish is helpful for your audience.
If not, you’re most likely publishing just for the search engines and not for the users. Which is why you’re not succeeding as a blogger.
If users don’t find it useful, why do you think search engines would even bother showing your pages to their users?
What is the process of picking up a profitable niche for blogging?
There’s no one-size-fits-all strategy to pick the best niche. Even the proven niches will require a lot of experimentation. But what I can do is point you in the right direction to think & help you make a decision.
Ask yourself these questions:
- How futuristic the niche is. Is it a bubble? Will it be relevant in 10 years?
- Am I really interested in a topic that seems lucrative to me? Can I write for years to come?
- Am I eligible to understand the audience’s needs? Am I qualified enough to talk about their problems?
- Can I preach what I teach? (Answering this will eliminate 90% of the niches you’ve listed down)
- What’s the impact of the solutions you offer on people’s lives & LTV (Lifetime value)?
- How difficult is it to make decisions for your audience? How much can you help people make decisions? (Like I’m helping you right now)
- What’s the net worth of the whole industry? Is it legal? (Don’t write about explicit content & expect to win)
- How difficult is it to research the various topics in that niche?
- How long can you do this without burning out? (How often would you need a break?)
P.S: Speaking of burning out, I think you should know what it actually means. You burn out while doing something that your brain thinks isn’t fruitful. Ever been burned out playing games? I know people who’ve played Call of Duty, Counter-Strike & Fifa for hours together. What you think is burning out, it’s actually your brain tired of faking to forcefully liking things you do.
Top 3 Blog niche ideas
I’m not a big fan of a huge list of things. I feel it only confuses users even more. Therefore, I’ve shared only the top 3 niches that I think require a lot of quality content and there’s genuinely very less supply.
Note: Please don’t take these niche as it is, the whole point of writing this post is to make you aware that the best niche for blogging is your experience. It’s not crypto, it’s not health & fitness, & it does definitely not travel – it’s your experience, YOU.
However, I feel a strong need to share the niches since I genuinely find these niches highly underserved. You won’t need much experience to write about it so yeah! It’s beginner friendly.
Let’s dive into it.
#1 For Students
No matter what, there will always be students searching the web to find answers to their questions. Growing up without the internet, I understand how scarce the information was. Even the basic information wasn’t available. The only source for genuine information was Wikipedia.
Now, schools have shifted online. Everything is posted online hence even the searches are done online. This creates a huge gap in demand for answers. If you’re a student, you can start a blog around every subject you’re studying at school. Not just the subjects, you should talk about topics that are never taught in school. That’s your job to find what. Observe students, what do they ask for? What do they search for online? Write about that.
Monetization methods
You can run Google ads, in my experience, this niche will always be undersaturated considering the demand. Hence there won’t be any problem or delay in getting your blog approved by Adsense. Affiliates are yet another way you can monetize your blog.
If you’re a student, you don’t have to worry too much about income. These two are enough.
Difficulty Level
Starting a blog in this niche is not at all difficult. All you need is a domain name, web hosting & WordPress. You will need to pay close attention to the pain points of a student in terms of academics & student life. If you’re a student, finding this won’t be a tough nut to crack.
Example blogs
The monthly visitors to these blogs are in the millions. You won’t reach this stage immediately, but these numbers indicate the high demand.
#2 Tools
The internet & No-Code tools have made it very easy to create tools that people search for. You too can create one such (or suite) tool and start blogging around the topic. You will be blown away by the traffic that comes to such tool sites.
I personally know tools that have very little content still make a ton of money. Google Adsense approves such sites without any problems.
Monetization methods
You can run Google Adsense. I’m not a big fan of CPM ad networks, It’s very bad for the users. But if that’s not the case with you, give it a shot.
Native ads from other players who don’t directly compete with you – like McDonald’s & Pepsi have partnered.
Difficulty Level
This requires technical knowledge. Even if you pick a piece of code from marketplaces like code canyon, you’d still need some expertise to run & maintain it. If you have a technical bone, then this niche is evergreen & you can build a legit business out of this.
Example blogs
#3 WFH, DIY & Home Decor
The pandemic has put a dent in our lives. People who work from home find it very difficult to cope up with work. Write about their problems. Work from isn’t going anywhere & it has become the default for several startups. You can talk about several topics that resonate with people who work from home.
This is a very broad niche & has endless traffic from a huge population working from home.
Monetization methods
Google Adsense & Affiliate is relevant in this niche as well. In fact, affiliate commissions will be a major source of income for you.
Difficulty Level
If I were to start a blog around working from home, I’d begin by curating news about working from home. Regional content would get a lot of attention. Meanwhile, I’d watch videos around this topic, and read blogs, forums Facebook grounds & more. This will be my primary source of content ideas.
Social content where people post their problems can also be a great source. However, nothing beats talking to a person directly. Get in touch with people on LinkedIn & Twitter. Chances are they’d be working from home once in a while.
Example blogs
Found a list of 7 amazing blogs that talk about working from home.
Bonus: Government schemes
I didn’t plan to include but I found this at the time of writing & couldn’t resist to include.
Every government has a lot of schemes for all citizens. People have questions, a lot of questions about these schemes. You can find answers to their questions. Trust me, it will be an instant hit. There’s very little resource around such schemes, irrespective of your country.
Monetization methods
Ads seem to be the only way you can monetize, to begin with. You can join networks like Google Adsense, Ezoic, Media.net, and more. As you gain traction, you’d find more monetizing opportunities.
Difficulty Level
The only hiccup would be finding answers to questions people have. I’m sure the official site wouldn’t have answers. You will need to talk to people who’d have answers. Getting in touch with them will be a tough nut to crack but even a few posts would do a lot for your blog.
Example blogs
I couldn’t find any reliable source. Also, since this is subjective to countries, sharing examples wouldn’t do justice.
Frequently asked questions
Do you need a niche for your blog?
Yes, you need a niche for your blog to set expectations for your audience. Your experience is the niche you should have for your blog.
How do I find niche keywords?
Use tools like Ubersuggest, keywords everywhere, Ahrefs & SEMrush to find keywords that your competition is ranking for. This can be a great start for you.
What type of blogs makes the most money?
I’ve identified four types of blogs & have categorized them by:
1. Industry
2. Audience
3. Subject
4. Lifestyle
Which niche is best for beginners?
The best niche for a beginner is to write about something they do every single day. If you use hardware & software every day, you can start a tech blog.
If you’re into health & fitness, you can start a blog around that. The basic idea is to pick a niche that you can get into or already are into every day.
Pros of picking the right niche & cons of picking wrong
I can’t handpick the topics for you, it’s humanly impossible for me to do that. However, you can do that very easily. If you think in terms of pros & cons, you will better understand the importance of having the right blog.
#Pros
1. You can create more content that’s actually helpful
2. You can understand the concerns, frustrations & challenges of your audience better
3. You can find better solutions (physical/digital) for your audience
4. You can find people who’re ahead of you & learn from them. Else, you wouldn’t know who to look for.
#Cons
1. You can’t monetize the blog effectively
2. You can’t establish yourself as a subject matter expert
3. You can’t make a career out of your blog. You will hit the ceiling of success
4. You can’t find a direction to grow
Blogging vs YouTube: Which is more fruitful?
Blogging is more accurate as a quick search can help users with answers to their questions. On the other hand, they’re least likely to prefer watching a video to get answers to their questions.
Check out the result below, this isn’t possible with videos. Video snippets are far from reality.
Mico-niche vs Niche Blog
The problem with a niche blog is that the topics are usually not evergreen (very few are). Unless you pick a micro-niche that’s broad enough, you will have evergreen topics that will forever bring organic traffic from search.
A classic example of a micro-niche blog is a news website. It has a very short span in terms of searchability.
A niche blog is usually something that addresses a lot of questions & most of the time has an evergreen stream of organic traffic if done right.
An example of a niche blog is this blog that addresses a lot of questions from people from all walks of life in the marketing industry.
What to do if your blogging niche is competitive/saturated?
It’s least likely that you’ll find totally untapped niche with a ton of search volume. There’s a blog covering every topic under the sun.
Always remember to blog to help people solve their problems be it in terms of information or DIY steps.
The internet is saturated with blogs talking about “what”, and very few blogs talk about “how”. Since most people pick a niche considering the profitability, they don’t understand what it takes to really understand the problem of the end user.
They don’t (or haven’t) undergone the pain same as the end user which clearly means they’re not qualified to even address the problem, let alone solve it.
Saturation is a product of over-supplying what people want. Don’t supply what people want, supply what they need.
What are some over-saturated blogging niches?
I don’t think any niche is over-saturated. However, there is surely some niche that has very tough competition.
It takes time to rank & make significant money, but if you think you have a better solution (or approach than the existing one) you should give it a shot.
Here are some tough competition niches for blogging:
1. Tech & Crypto
2. Make money online
3. Health & Fitness
How to evaluate if your blogging niche is good or not?
If you’re planning to build a personal brand around the blog you create, you need to consider a niche that you can stick to for years or decades to come.
The only way to evaluate if a niche is good or not is to think in terms of expertise. You will need to have expertise in the topic to consistently create content.
Check out this conversation on Reddit to understand more.
Do domain name extensions matter?
Domain names come with a lot of technicalities. However, to simplify, you shouldn’t worry too much. Google supports & reads well all TLDs (Top-Level Domains).
However, if you choose region-level domains like .in or .es, Google will prefer your domain to rank in specific countries (India & Spain, respectively).
It’s more complicated than this, but this is the baseline.
Always plan ahead. Your pages will be ranking in many countries, so never put a cap on the name of TLDs. There’s a workaround, but it’s too technical for your worry right now.
Try to get a .com domain, don’t try too hard to have keywords in the domain name – keywords are long gone from the radar of ranking factors for almost all search engines.
What’s the cost of starting a blog
There are 3 major expenses you should take care while managing your blog.
#1 Domain name: How would people find your blog? That’s your address on the web. Make sure you have an easy to remember domain name. Don’t be rigid to have keywords in your domain. Building a brand around the domain should be the priority. I use Google domains. It’s reliable & safe.
#2 Web hosting: This is where all your files related to the website will find home. Don’t fall into the trap of buying cheap webhosting. It’s like buying cheap quality building materials for your home. I’d recommend WordPress Hosting plans by Bluehost if you’re just starting out. The most affordable monthly plans costs less than a coffee costs per day.
#3 Content management system: What you use as CMS plays a major role in how you scale your blog. I’ve been using self-hosted wordpress since 2015 & it makes my job so easy. I can automate several tasks using external apps, extend the capacity of my blog using plugins & ensure the security of my blog. You can use any blogging platform depending on your need.
These are absolute necessary expenses. Other expenses may include tools, plugins, custom features, themes & more. These aren’t required right from the beginning.
What & What not to expect from Blogging?
Most people get into blogging assuming it’s a ‘get rich quick’ scheme. But I hate to break it to you that it’s not.
If you’re getting into blogging for a quick buck, please don’t bother. You’ll not only waste time but push others into believing that blogging doesn’t work anymore.
In fact, what actually didn’t work was your execution. You can create a full-time income by blogging, building expertise around topics & network with like-minded people.
However, what you can’t do is get instant money and a ton of traffic by simple copy-paste. Google is a trillion-dollar company, do you really think the company will let copy-paste blogs rank on their search results?
Poor search results damage the image of the search engines, not the pages that show up. Google is getting very particular about this.
Don’t expect any leniency from their side.
TL;DR & Summary
You’re planning to start a blog & don’t know where to start. The first thing you need to get right is nailing the fundamentals, i.e. the blogging niche. Choosing the right niche can make or break your career.
Most people will begin by looking for the most profitable blogging niche – which is highly misleading. If you begin with profitability, you’re most likely to fail. Most blogs that you will find on the web around this topic will give you a list of blogging niches without considering the most important factor – YOU.
Blogging isn’t dead, the game has changed altogether. Everybody is creating a blog that’s profitable only to either fail as a blogger or saturate the niche even further.
Ask 3 simple questions to yourself to make a full-time income by picking a blogging niche without going wrong:
- How much can you understand & how much you can make people understand?
- How deep can you research to find answers for your users?
- How long can you talk about the topic?
If you’re looking forward to winning online, here’s how I can help:
- Sit with you 1-on-1 & create a content marketing strategy for your startup. Hire me for paid consulting.
- Write blogs, social posts, and emails for you. Get in touch here with queries (Please mention you found this email in the newsletter to get noticed quickly)
- Join my tribe on Twitter where I share SEO tips (every single day) & teaser of the next issue of Letters ByDavey.