Blogging Mistakes I did in these 7 years

I am Gowardhan Doddi, founder of www.healthydietfordiabetics.com which started a blog and grown to become a Organization now, after several failed attempts to be successful at blogging I could get blogging right. So this idea of bloggingmistakes was born to guide people who are new to blogging and people who have offline business and want to have their presence online.

7 years ago when I was browsing internet I came across few advertisements like ” work from home” and I thought it was a great way to get rich quick, I wanted to be an Entrepreneur and I thought this online world will make my dreams come true, So after searching a lot I have understood blogging is a authentic and genuine way to really make money online.

 

So I thought I will start blogging, I have started reading on internet how to start blogging from expert bloggers like Darren Rowse who blogs at problogger and Amit Agarwal from labnol who has made it a huge success in blogging. They were earning something near to 10-20 lakhs per month.

And I was highly thrilled, lot of money and fame, Then I decided to start a blog, but I have heard that blogging on one specific niche, i.e niche means one specific topic like writing only about mobiles or writing just about bikes or cars. But as I am lacking specific expertise in anything I thought I will write on random topics and still be successful and prove all the expert blogger wrong ?? when we are excited about something we are highly positive and do not think about anything in totality.

So I started www.readitt.in  and started sharing random stuff, used to do everything necessary to increase blog traffic, because more traffic means more money. So I used to post an article everyday, the target was to get approval from google adsense so that google will display their ads on my website and I will get some money as advertising fees. So I have spent 1 year of time ( 3 hours /day ) so approximately 900 hours, but at the end of the year the advertising revenue generated was around ₹15000. Still I was very optimistic because getting a cheque from google was something thrilling. Without realizing the fact that I am using all my energy in wrong direction I continued to work harder only to realize that google advertisement charges have reduced due to lot of blogs being born everyday.

Blogging Mistake #1 : writing on random things. never choose to write on random things choose one specific topic which can solve peoples problems or add values, Your articles should help readers solve their problems, if you can do that you can make your blog successful and earn a reasonable amount of money from it.

Then after learning the lesson#1 I have started careerteacher.in which just focuses on onething, i.e discuss about career options and allows students to see through careers and have an idea of how their life will be if the choose this specific career, I also used to do interviews of people who are in a profession to discuss all pros & cons of that profession.

There was good enthusiasm but I could not consistently work on it, so content generation was slow. and one more thing was traffic was also very less because this niche had high competition, At this point of time I came to know about the importance of SEO and backlinks. I came across many bloggers who were buying backlinks but I did not feet it right to buy backlinks. So it went on and meanwhile seeing some other websites which are not creating much content but were sort of listing websites were successful So I got distracted and started www.guestwriters.in where I started listing writers who are ready to write articles for money.

So at this point of time my focus was distracted on three different blogs , readitt.in , guestwriters.in and careerteacher.in, that meant no quality time and ultimately I was not going anywhere related to blogging.

Blogging Mistake #2 : Not focusing on one thing at a time and getting tempted to get fast success and earn money , I learnt a lesson that we should focus on one-thing at a time and also have a proper revenue model before we choose to blog on it.

As I was working hard till late nights and was sitting a lot with lack of physical activity, My life’s turning point happened, It was shocking for me, My company Doctor declared me diabetic during our annual medical check-up, World was upside down for me. but eventually I started using internet to know about diabetes to make myself healthy and in course of time I could understand diabetes is reversible but I have found a very big gap – there is no Indian website which talks about diabetes in Indian context. then the idea of healthydietfordiabetics was born.

My idea of blogging at healthydietfordiabetics was to keep myself informed about diabetes, so I used to write about diet and how to control diabetes and this is what a succesful blog should do, write about things people are looking for and solving their problems. traffic started flowing and had gained followers on social media and then I started keeping the readers engaged through facebook and our blog, Some amazon affiliate revenue was coming in, I stopped focusing much on google adsense. till this point of time I was not using Email marketing to grow the blog.

after 1.5 years of launch of healthydietfordiabetics I have started using email marketing to create connections with my readers and eventually started connecting with them through whatsapp also.

Ok now I am having readers and followers but then next what? – I dont have any product to sell , because in India till date also there are not many great choices to earn from affiliate commission if you are in health niche and if you are genuine, I strongly believed I should be genuinely helping diabetics and only guide them in the right path even if I don’t get much of monetary benefit.

then the idea of providing diet plan services stuck to my mind, Yes providing services is good way to monetize your blog, I have started providing diet plan services but the orders were less initially and gradually I could understand the importance of marketing including landing pages, videos etc to sell a service or a product and could succeed in my blogging journey.

Most importantly you can earn from a blog if you are able to solve a problem in unique way and build a community around it.

Blogging Mistake #3 : My Latest blog healthy diet for diabetics is a good business model but only draw back I have seen is that 70 % of the diabetics in India are above the age of 45 years and are not internet friendly. So they are afraid to make purchases online.

For me one thing is clear, we keep on making mistakes, but should not repeat same mistake again. that is very important if we want to succeed in business.

I feel so happy to share with you my journey of blogging and its mistakes and one more thing – Blogging is not a get rich over night scheme –

It is just like any other Business, where in you build creidibilty and solve people’s problems money will flow in eventually. Wish you all the best .

Gowardhan Doddi