I hear it all the time. “I am going to start a blog and make tons of money!” Every time I hear or read this comment, I just have to laugh.
Over the years, I have seen a lot of businesses come and go. One of the #1 reasons that I have seen most businesses fail, online or brick and mortar, is because they got into it for the dream of making huge amounts of money.
When you get into an industry solely for the money, you lack the passion to keep that business running through the tough times…specifically the first year. Unless you are in the top ½ of 1 percent of all startup businesses, you are going to spend the first year or two making almost nothing, and in most cases…you are actually going to show a loss!
What happens after that first 1 to 2 years? If you have the passion and drive to keep the business growing, you should thrive. (This, of course, assumes you are making correct business decisions.) The amount of work that it takes to grow a successful business is staggering. The entire first years of a companies life are filled with nothing but work with very little payoff. You have to be ready to work your ass off only to find very little short-term reward. If you stick with your goals, you will see the hard work pay off in the future, but you have to still be there in the future to realize these rewards.
What Do The Successful Businesses Have That Others Don’t?
Passion…This can come in several different forms but the two I have seen that are most successful are the following.
1. Wanting to become a part of something bigger. – Many businesses are started with the dream of becoming part of something bigger. This is the typical employee that is sick and tired of being an employee. They want to make a difference and they are miserable working 9-5. Not all employees are this way, and many cringe at the thought of the responsibility…so they are happy putting in their hours and collecting their paychecks. For some…this is not enough and their mind constantly works at trying to find something they can start that will truly be bigger than them.
2. They have an amazing idea. – At some point in time, this person came up with an amazing idea that would fill a need in the industry. This can even be a product or service that already exists, but this person found a way to do it better or different than the competition. The risk was evaluated and then taken. The underlying theme to this startup business is filling a need…not money. This successful entrepreneur wanted to bring his idea to the world and will fight to keep his idea alive.
As you can see with these two examples, the pushing drive to succeed was not monetary. If you are successful and make smart business decisions…the money comes, but you have to have a passion outside of the cash to make it work.
How Does This Apply To Blogging?
The extremely low cost of entry into the online business market brings a flood of new entrepreneurs ready to make it big. Most of them lack direction or even have any idea of what they really want to start. I would venture to guess that 90% or more are solely in it for the paycheck, and when the paycheck doesn’t come right away…they bail and their website falls off into the web oblivion.
When you go to start a blog as a potential online business, you need to be passionate about your subject outside of its monetary potential. There has to be something that drives you to churn out content when you are seeing little to no return.
Are you willing to write when no one is listening? If you are not…then blogging is probably not for you. The common theme I hear amongst all successful 6 figure bloggers is that they started their online business with the passion of having a place to put down their thoughts. This passion bled into their writing and eventually they grew a large following. Making a large paycheck every month was a by-product of loving their work.
There is a large amount of potential with blogging in today’s world market, and you too can become a successful blogger if you have what it takes to start a business.
Image by: amanky
2 comments
I started blogging purely for the fun of it, and then realized I could make enough to pay my hosting fees. That quickly ballooned to the point where it’s a nice second income. As you menttion, however, it took a lot of hard work, and time.. If you don’t have the passion you’ll quickly flame out!
Peter’s last blog post..Social Media Tip For Bloggers: Link Your Social Media Profiles To Your Blog URL
Your site is doing very well Peter. Keep up the great work!