6 ms·

Ask HN: I recently lost my job, I want to pursue blogging as a career. Thoughts?

7 points by thescribbblr 6y ago

verdverm 6y ago
Do you have a following or technical writing / journalist skills? I hear you'll make peanuts, so do you have writing skills useful to startups / biz that you can freelance with while you build the blogging side up?
- thescribbblr 6y ago
  I used to write about Indian startups two years ago.
  - verdverm 6y ago
    Do you write daily? What brings about this desire and direction for a career change?
    - thescribbblr 6y ago
      No, I stopped writing the blog a long time ago. But, I always wanted to start a blog. Since, this covid and lockdown situation, till I get a job I want to pursue this.
      - verdverm 6y ago
        I also would like to write more but more often than not find myself writing code. Still trying to figure this one out and I think I'm getting closer. If I remind myself that I really like talking about this subject and that I want to share what I know with as many people as possible, so that they might grow on my shoulders, than I can find some energy. "The hardest part is starting." ~ someone notable
        thescribbblr 6y ago
        Yes, starting something is the hardest part. Since, 2 weeks I am procrastinating.
        verdverm 6y ago
        Then you will probably want to find something else to do every day, day after day, for years, yea? If you aren't excited to do that thing every day, why are you doing it?
diablo1 6y ago
Well you won't exactly become Kottke overnight. Blogging requires that you build the habit of blogging. I like to write on an airgapped machine to trial out some posts before they go live to the masses. If my post looks good, then I move it off the airgapped machine to my main device where I upload it to my Ghost instance and then seen by thousands, or even millions if it gets picked up by other bloggers/news outlets who would amplify your message and spread it far and wide. Providing you have monetized it, you can generate revenue, although to really earn properly from it you would need a small staff of writers and master Commission Junction / Amazon Associates and you would need to consistently churn out well written high quality posts and also build your audience organically over time.
- thescribbblr 6y ago
  So it's like monetizing a blog is a hard task?
  - diablo1 6y ago
    It depends on how much you want to earn from it. Most people are happy with Adsense and like their income from that, but to really earn properly you need to have guest writers, paid promotional posts, and be doing affiliate marketing. You also need to be as authentic as possible and not give the impression you are just doing the blog for money (as many sites do). Like anything, if it was easy, everyone would be doing it.
    - thescribbblr 6y ago
      Thank you for the guidance. But is there any live example or a blog link that I should definitely follow before I start blogging. And which topic should I write about. How should I decide this?
      - diablo1 6y ago
        Just as an example: there's a site Tom's Guide that monetizes in an article here: https://www.tomsguide.com/best-picks/best-vpn https://www.tomsguide.com/best-picks/best-vpn The site is huge and they're doing affiliate marketing on multiple pages, not just my example link. Also: The articles are also authoritative, authentic and not mere blogspam. They explain everything in detail and offer insights; the affiliate links are not the sole purpose: they want to write a blogpost too!
rwol 6y ago
What will you blog about? Make sure the audience is big enough that you can make money from it. Too big though and you might get lost in a sea of voices. Quality content and marketing is key. It’s been awhile since I blogged though so someone else might have better advice regarding marketing / social media platforms / SEO rankings.
tdom 6y ago
The truth is, it's hard to find a good loyal audience to monetize. My main blogging revenue is Medium Partner Program. Since beginning of 2020 I made around $500 from something like 5 articles. I don't blog a lot but I have access to pretty popular programming publications on there, allowing me to reach a wider audience. I also made some money from people reaching out to write posts for them. It's not a lot, but considering I only have 1.4k followers and treat my blog as more of a reminder/documentation for myself in the future, it's also not bad. Medium can suck though, as their algorithm decides whether your posts will be shown on the homepage. Personal self hosted blogs on the other hand can be hard to optimise for search engines, which is something medium is great at. Don't try to make blogging your main thing. You will either fail or it will take along time for you to see any decent sums in the first place. Do it on the side, and if it takes off then you can consider doing it full time.
- thescribbblr 6y ago
  Awesome insights and suggestion. Can you share your blog link please ?
  - tdom 6y ago
    You can find my medium blog here: https://medium.com/@td0m https://medium.com/@td0m
    - thescribbblr 6y ago
      Thank you
econcon 6y ago
It's hard to make money blogging. I suggest becoming a YouTuber instead, consuming YouTube content is lot easier. And if you want to make money, I suggest you try e-commerce.

7 points by thescribbblr 6y ago

Do you have a following or technical writing / journalist skills? I hear you'll make peanuts, so do you have writing skills useful to startups / biz that you can freelance with while you build the blogging side up?

thescribbblr 6y ago
I used to write about Indian startups two years ago.
- verdverm 6y ago
  Do you write daily? What brings about this desire and direction for a career change?
  - thescribbblr 6y ago
    No, I stopped writing the blog a long time ago. But, I always wanted to start a blog. Since, this covid and lockdown situation, till I get a job I want to pursue this.
    - verdverm 6y ago
      I also would like to write more but more often than not find myself writing code. Still trying to figure this one out and I think I'm getting closer. If I remind myself that I really like talking about this subject and that I want to share what I know with as many people as possible, so that they might grow on my shoulders, than I can find some energy. "The hardest part is starting." ~ someone notable
      - thescribbblr 6y ago
        Yes, starting something is the hardest part. Since, 2 weeks I am procrastinating.
        verdverm 6y ago
        Then you will probably want to find something else to do every day, day after day, for years, yea? If you aren't excited to do that thing every day, why are you doing it?

diablo1 6y ago

Well you won't exactly become Kottke overnight. Blogging requires that you build the habit of blogging. I like to write on an airgapped machine to trial out some posts before they go live to the masses. If my post looks good, then I move it off the airgapped machine to my main device where I upload it to my Ghost instance and then seen by thousands, or even millions if it gets picked up by other bloggers/news outlets who would amplify your message and spread it far and wide. Providing you have monetized it, you can generate revenue, although to really earn properly from it you would need a small staff of writers and master Commission Junction / Amazon Associates and you would need to consistently churn out well written high quality posts and also build your audience organically over time.

thescribbblr 6y ago
So it's like monetizing a blog is a hard task?
- diablo1 6y ago
  It depends on how much you want to earn from it. Most people are happy with Adsense and like their income from that, but to really earn properly you need to have guest writers, paid promotional posts, and be doing affiliate marketing. You also need to be as authentic as possible and not give the impression you are just doing the blog for money (as many sites do). Like anything, if it was easy, everyone would be doing it.
  - thescribbblr 6y ago
    Thank you for the guidance. But is there any live example or a blog link that I should definitely follow before I start blogging. And which topic should I write about. How should I decide this?
    - diablo1 6y ago
      Just as an example: there's a site Tom's Guide that monetizes in an article here: https://www.tomsguide.com/best-picks/best-vpn https://www.tomsguide.com/best-picks/best-vpn The site is huge and they're doing affiliate marketing on multiple pages, not just my example link. Also: The articles are also authoritative, authentic and not mere blogspam. They explain everything in detail and offer insights; the affiliate links are not the sole purpose: they want to write a blogpost too!

rwol 6y ago

What will you blog about? Make sure the audience is big enough that you can make money from it. Too big though and you might get lost in a sea of voices. Quality content and marketing is key. It’s been awhile since I blogged though so someone else might have better advice regarding marketing / social media platforms / SEO rankings.

tdom 6y ago

The truth is, it's hard to find a good loyal audience to monetize. My main blogging revenue is Medium Partner Program. Since beginning of 2020 I made around $500 from something like 5 articles. I don't blog a lot but I have access to pretty popular programming publications on there, allowing me to reach a wider audience. I also made some money from people reaching out to write posts for them. It's not a lot, but considering I only have 1.4k followers and treat my blog as more of a reminder/documentation for myself in the future, it's also not bad. Medium can suck though, as their algorithm decides whether your posts will be shown on the homepage. Personal self hosted blogs on the other hand can be hard to optimise for search engines, which is something medium is great at. Don't try to make blogging your main thing. You will either fail or it will take along time for you to see any decent sums in the first place. Do it on the side, and if it takes off then you can consider doing it full time.

thescribbblr 6y ago
Awesome insights and suggestion. Can you share your blog link please ?
- tdom 6y ago
  You can find my medium blog here: https://medium.com/@td0m https://medium.com/@td0m
  - thescribbblr 6y ago
    Thank you

econcon 6y ago

It's hard to make money blogging. I suggest becoming a YouTuber instead, consuming YouTube content is lot easier. And if you want to make money, I suggest you try e-commerce.