Blog to Build: How to Turn Your Blog into a Business
The 6 Steps I Used to Turn My Small Personal Blog into a Career
Blogs are powerful things! You can look up the stats and learn that businesses with blogs see on average 500% more web traffic than business websites without blogs. You can research and learn how SEO keywords help your page rank at the top of the Google search results. But, blogs also have a secret superpower. They give us a voice out in the world and a way to uncover our own personal passions. I’m sharing how my small personal blog allowed me to hone in on my talents and launch a full-time career that pays!
Step 1: Why I Started My Personal Blog
I started a small personal blog called Design Dudes back in 2017. I had just moved to San Antonio, and I was taking some time to explore my interests and new city. So, my blog tended to focus on three content pillars: mid-century modern design, things to do around San Antonio, and my own personal journey. Just three years later, the world changed in 2020 with a global pandemic that shut down everything. At the start of 2020, I was no longer at my traditional 9 to 5 job. With endless free time, I dove back into my personal blog to discover what I truly wanted to do. In the summer of 2020, exactly three years after launching my personal blog, I launched my own copywriting and content creation business.
Step 2: Deciding How to Leverage My Blog, Interests, and Audience
After starting your personal blog, discovering your interests, and building an audience around them, it’s time to decide how to leverage what you’ve created. For me, this was the first real step in defining my new career. One option is to use the blog itself to earn income. Design Dudes has over 10,000 followers on Instagram and receives thousands of website views every month. With more focus, one business model could be to leverage and grow the audience to make income from product partnerships, affiliate marketing, and general “influencing.” Another option is to look at why people are coming to your blog and add a product or service. People often asked me for mid-century design tips and where to find quality vintage pieces. I also considered adding a product shop and offering mid-century design consultations. For me, neither of these two options really hit the root of what I wanted to do: share passions and stories. Through my blog, I had the opportunity to connect with local San Antonio business owners as well as national interior designers, architects, and mid-century enthusiasts. Most of these contacts knew the importance of creating blogs and content to promote their businesses, but they didn’t have the time. And, there it was! I would offer copywriting and content creation services.
Step 3: Turning My Blog into a Business
During the three years of my little blog’s prime, I wrote dozens of blog posts about design and travel and partnered with over 200 local and national brands for influencer endorsements. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I was practicing and learning the skill of copywriting and content creation! I already learned SEO techniques for getting your blog posts discovered online, and I knew how to write a compelling advertisement that felt natural and catchy. Now, it was time to define those skills. In my case, turning my blog into a business first meant creating a list of services and setting up a new website, which brings us here to Drew Henry Writes.
Step 4: Using My Blog to Build Credibility
Starting a new business can be scary, especially a business like copywriting and content creation, where your success really depends on past experience and merit. No one wants to hire a writer if they don’t have the samples to back themselves up. Unlike other new copywriters who have to build a portfolio from scratch and often write samples based on fictional companies, I already had an entire portfolio of ad copy for national brand partnerships, blogs with a defined voice, and photos that went viral on Instagram. When I thought I was just exploring my interests, I was actually building a complete portfolio I could use to create credibility in my new career.
Step 5: Taking Action to Get the Word Out and Get Clients
The next step may be the hardest one yet. Now that you have decided on your business model and leveraged your blog to launch a new product or service, you have to get the word out. The first way to do so is obvious – post about it on your blog! An initial post is a great way to start the buzz and plant the seed, but this is only the beginning. Most bloggers stop here and wait for leads to roll in, and when they don’t come, they get discouraged. Here is my biggest tip: you have to do so much more than a single post to get the word out about your new business!
The best way to take action is by sending a personal email, text, DM, or phone call to everyone you know. And, I mean everyone! Let’s break down these steps a little further.
First, build your website and upload your portfolio, services page, or product page. You need to have a place to funnel your contacts to more information about your new business.
Then, set up an email service platform like MailChimp or Flodesk. You don’t have to create a campaign to send yet, but make a landing page where people can subscribe for future updates. This will be a lifesaver later!
Next, create message templates to announce your new business and invite your contacts to check it out, subscribe, and reconnect. Make sure to leave room to personalize as nothing should be a mass email in this early stage!
Finally, break out your little black book and personally contact everyone you have ever met.
Here is something you need to remember. It is not spammy to reach out to your contacts about your new business if you do it in an authentic and informative way! When reaching out, make sure to approach it as a reconnection. People will be interested in your new venture, and this is where you will find your first clients and customers!
Step 6: Create Value and Maintain Relationships
Finally, remember always to value yourself and maintain professional relationships. In the field of blogging and copywriting, I have heard horror stories of new writers selling thousand-word articles for just $30! Do not let your work be undervalued because it will take so much longer to build value later. Maintain your relationships, follow up, treat your clients like superstars, and showcase why you are the most unique and best choice for the job.
