What to Blog About: 3 Proven Steps to Discover the Right Niche for You
So you want to start a blog, but you’re not sure what to blog about.
Finding your passion does not have to equal pressure. Many of us are so worried about making mistakes, we fail to even start. If that is you, I want you to approach this process differently.
Why not start a practice business? At the end of the day, the most valuable thing you can gain is experience. What’s keeping you from gaining experience? Failure to start.
That being said, I don’t want you to just randomly select any topic to blog about. Let’s find one you can commit to for the next two to five years.
How Do I Figure Out What to Blog About?
If you are struggling with deciding on a blog topic, then I want to introduce you to a simple scoring system. You need an objective way to solve this challenge that removes emotions from the equation. Let’s get started.
Step 1. Brainstorm a list of 3-6 blog topic ideas
The best place to begin is to brainstorm a list of three to six blog niche ideas. To come up with the right ideas, complete the following sentence:
I want to help people… [fill-in-the-blank].
Successful bloggers serve an audience. List out the first three to six ideas that come to mind.
Step 2. Rate each idea on a scale from 1-10 with the following questions
Did you complete the above exercise? If not, go back and do that now. Once you have your list of topics, now you must run them through something we call the Passion Filter Scorecard.
Take each topic idea one at a time and run them through six filtering questions below, answering each question on a scale of 1-10. (Ten is the highest and one is the lowest.)
Once you score all six questions, do the same with the second topic. Repeat with every blog topic idea you listed from step one.
- Do I enjoy learning about this topic? This question will keep you from pursuing a topic just because it’s profitable For example, I might consider stock investing to be a profitable blog topic. Yet, If I’m burned out from learning and researching that topic, it might not be the best niche to pursue.
- Am I passionate about this idea? Every blogger starts in obscurity. The only thing that will pull you through is your passion. If you’re truly passionate about a topic, you’ll have a deep well to draw from when it seems no one is listening.
- Do I have experience or skill with this topic? You do not have to be an expert to start a blog, but you do need to have some experience to draw from. Starting a blog about gardening when you’ve never planted a garden in your life may not be the best idea.
- Does this idea solve a problem? The reason this question is so important is that people consume content and spend money to solve problems. A great example of this is DIY car repair. If you want to fix a broken door handle on your car, you would most likely try to find a YouTube video. Solving problems is how bloggers make money.
- Are other people earning money with this idea? You want to find proof that other people have made money on this topic. If you find lots of proof, score it a ten. No proof gets a one.
- Do you want to serve the people who need this? This final question serves as a clarifying question. Answering this question will help you avoid building a business you didn’t want in the first place. For example, maybe you see a profitable opportunity with beginner DIY car maintenance. But at the same time, you have a stronger desire to work on more complex car repair. Your focus then should be to work with people who have more advanced car repair experience.
Step 3. Tabulate your score to find your winner
After you have given a score of 1-10 to each question with each topic, you’ll need to add up your scores. Your highest possible score is 60. Below is an example of a final scorecard:
- Stock Investing – 36
- Golf Fitness – 24
- DIY Car Repair – 52 (Winner)
- Budget Travel – 30
Final Analysis
Using the above examples, it appears that DIY Car Repair earned the highest score. While there are other factors to consider is deciding what you should blog about, this simple test removes the emotions and gives you an objective view. Use this scoring technique to help you determine what to blog about and start moving forward with your new blog.
