There are many ways to monetize your blog, but it’s important to remember that not all monetization methods are created equal. In order to make the most money from your blog, you need to focus on creating high-quality content with a well thought keyword strategy that will appeal to a wide audience and is likely to rank well in search engines. By following these tips, you can start generating revenue from your blog almost immediately.
How to shortlist keywords for your blogs
Shortlisting keywords to create high quality content is the very first step that you take in your ranking journey on SERP. A good strategy is to target high – mid volume keywords with low competition to quickly gain visibility on SERP. A great strategy is a little more complex than simply targeting high – mid volume keywords with low competition.
The 20 : 50 : 30 method of keyword shortlisting
The 20:50:30 method of keyword shortlisting means that we shortlist high volume, mid volume and low volume keywords in that respective ratio. The benefit of shortlisting keywords in that manner is that it enables quick rankings on SERP and accelerates your traffic over time.
This is an effective method to help maintain a good CTR (Click Through Rate) of your webpage (blog) as well as consistently drive traffic to your website. Considering you have a low Domain Authority Score, you will naturally first start ranking for the low volume keywords and as your DA increases over time you’ll start ranking for the latter two.
Benefits of 20:50:30 Method
- Semantically written content – Semantic SEO
- Quickly get high rankings for the low volume keywords which results in driving traffic (small volume)
- Opportunity to generate organic backlinks for low volume keywords which helps increase Page and Domain Authority
- Increase in PA and DA results in higher rankings for mid volume keywords which may result in driving more traffic and improve CTR
- A good CTR is a positive signal for the search engines which will help you enter the competition for high volume keywords quickly.
However, in order to rank for the low volume keywords you need to have some Domain Authority (more than the default which is 1) and a decent Page Authority (at least 10)
What is Page and Domain Authority
Domain Authority is a score (1 being worst and 100 being the best) developed by Moz which predicts how likely is your website to rank for keywords on SERP. This isn’t an official metric endorsed by Google however over the years Domain Authority has become a widely accepted metric in the SEO community.
The Domain Authority Score (DA) is based on all the incoming links from external domains on your website.
Page Authority is a score (1 being worst and 100 being the best) developed by Moz which predicts how likely is your website page to rank for keywords on SERP. Unlike DA, page authority is calculated on the basis of all external domains linking to that particular page.
When an external website links to your domain the link juice is automatically spread across all the pages on your website, whereas, when an external website links to your content (a particular blog or a page) then, the link juice flows into that particular page and all connected pages (internally linked to that page).
You should always link to other pages on your website using do-follow!
Here are 10 Useful Tips To Improve Your Domain Authority (DA)
There isn’t any way to figure out how much link juice was received in absolute numbers nor is there any way to distribute the received link juice in absolute numbers. However, you can somewhat control the flow of link juice with a well though internal linking strategy.
Increase Keyword Rankings on SERP by strategically distributing Page Authority
In order to rank higher on SERP for certain pages, a well planned internal linking strategy is a must! Let’s understand this with an example and we will use an absolute number for better clarity. Assume you have a website with 100 pages (including the home page)
Scenario 1 – You’ve received a backlink to your domain (home page) and the link juice is 100. As we discussed earlier, when you receive a backlink to your domain, the link juice is transferred equally amongst all the pages (including home page).
Value of Link Juice – 100
Value each page received – 1
Since the value of the link juice was 100 and you have 100 pages in total each page received 1/100th of the value which is 1
Scenario 2 – You’ve received a backlink to your content (a particular blog page), the link juice is 100 and you have 2 internal links placed in that article/blog, then, the value is equally distributed between the blog that received the link + 2 other internally linked pages + your home page (by default) which is a total of 4 pages.
Value of Link Juice – 100
Value each page received – 25
However, as we learned above, any link juice that the domain receives is automatically transferred to all pages on a website, hence
Value of Link Juice to the Domain – 25
Value each page received – 0.25
Hence the actual link juice received by the page or blog that attracted the backlink in the first place is 25.25%
Why should you focus on building Page Authority more than Domain Authority
In Scenario 1, the link juice was equally distributed which would result in a slight over all increase for all the keywords ranking on SERP, whereas, in scenario 2 we experience a major boost in keyword rankings for that particular page as well as a slight improvement for all the other ranking keywords for the website.
By building a strong page authority you increase your ranking for that page which has a positive impact on all the keywords you have targeted for that page. The Page Authority is a part of Domain Authority which means any links that you receive for a page, some of the authority is automatically transferred to the domain.
Think back to the 20:50:30 method! If you have managed to organically generate backlinks for that piece of content, then, all the keywords within are getting a ranking boost on SERP. This means more traffic to your website and higher visibility for some really competitive keywords on SERP.
Generating organic backlinks isn’t easy and not in your control however, the 20:50:30 method can help you create a few backlinks for yourself.
The 20:50:30 method makes generating backlinks super easy
Since we aren’t focusing on just one or two keywords but multiple keywords (high, mid and low volume) to rank for, we are presented with several opportunities to build some quality backlinks. But first, let’s go ahead with the basics.
Blog commenting and forum posting
These are known as low hanging fruits in the SEO community. Generating backlinks from them isn’t difficult and is literally as it sounds, you comment on blogs and post on forums. The value of link juice received from this method is less as compared to guest posting.
There is also a possibility that the URL you submit on these forums are de-hyperlinked in which case there isn’t a flow of authority at all however, if your content is helpful and you are able to drive people to your content from these comments and forums then you might have a good shot at generating some social signals.
Social Signals are backlinks from social media
Social Media is a great way to get exposure and generate backlinks in bulk. You can either directly post your URL on social media or enable social sharing options for your visitors to share your content on their timeline. This ensures that your content is regularly being circulated on social networks which ensures a constant flow of traffic to your website.
Make sure you’re following the right topics, people and hashtags. Connecting with others in your niche is important as you can learn various new techniques and strategies to further your own growth. This can lead to exciting collaboration opportunities in the future and make your brand presence stronger.
Outreaching for backlinks can help
Since your content has covered various aspects of your primary topic using the 20:50:30 technique it presents a great opportunity for you to ask for backlinks. Generally, since most of the big wigs (high domain authority websites) do not optimize for low volume keywords, you have a great opportunity to pitch your content as a resource that can add value to their current traffic.
Even if they don’t linkback to your content but rather quote it and linkback to your domain, you still gain a valuable backlink from them. A low volume keyword today can become a mid to high volume keyword tomorrow and that’s why you should include low traffic volume content in your blogs.
Topical Authority, Domain Authority, Page Authority, Semantic SEO and many more initially started out as low volume keywords a few years back. Today, they all fall under either mid volume or high volume keywords!
Monetize your website from Day 1
As a content creator your aim is to generate revenue or traffic depending on what are your goals. For most, it’s generating revenue from their content (blogs).
It is rather difficult to monetize your website with Google Adsense, Ezoic or Mediavine as they all have certain conditions which needs to be met. As a beginner, you face multiple monetization challenges as you’re either rejected because
- You don’t have sufficient content on your website or low value content.
- Your website isn’t old enough (generally min requirement is 6 months) OR
- You DO NOT have sufficient traffic on your website.
These are the 3 primary reasons why platforms such as Google Adsense, Ezoic or Mediavine along with many others reject your application as a publisher on their platform. However, thankfully there are several other platforms who aren’t as stringent and offer a good CPM/RPM
The only one which I would like to recommend is PropellerAds
PropellerAds is an Ad Platform which is easy to integrate, offers competitive CPM rates and has a 5 minute long approval process with a 99.99% approval rate.
They also have a multi-tag option which combines OnClick (Popunder) + Push Notifications + Native Banner + In-Page Push ad formats into a single line of code which is easy to implement and boosts your earning.
Unlike other ad platforms you DO NOT need to place the ad code snippet on every page or use a plugin (if you’re using WordPress) to rotate and auto implement ads. Just place the code in your website header and all 4 types of ads under the Multi-Tag are activated.
It’s that simple! And is a great option to ensure you always get paid until you get accepted into Google Adsense or any other major ad networks.
Conclusion
This strategy will require a lot of time in planning and research as you’re targeting low volume keywords and collating information on these keywords takes time. However, all that effort will eventually get rewarded and the content will become a backlink magnet to grow your traffic. At the end of the day your website will have several massive 3,000 words (or more) piece of content which will present with an opportunity to show more ads and generate more revenue. I hope this helps someone!
How To Create a Niche Website That Ranks and Monetize Quickly
