It hurts me to write this.
For years, I’ve been “the traffic guy.” Not
only because I’m good at getting it, but
because it’s the question on the top of
every blogger’s mind:
“How do I get more traffic to my blog?”
To some degree, this entire site is an answer
to that question. You’ll learn more about
getting blog traffic here than maybe
anywhere else on the web.
But there’s one giant problem…
It’s the wrong question.
And I’ve known it for years.
And I’ve said nothing.
Not because I’m an asshole (well, maybe).
No, the real reason is I felt like we were
serving the needs of the market. People
wanted to know how to get more traffic, so
we created courses teaching them how.
But Then I Noticed Something Horrifying…
A large percentage of our students couldn’t
significantly increase their traffic, no
matter how hard they tried.
And the worst part:
It wasn’t their fault.
They were doing all the homework. They
were applying our techniques.
Except none of it was working. Not for the
vast majority of them, anyway.
Why?
At first, I thought it was because we
sucked. Maybe our techniques didn’t work,
maybe the homework was too difficult,
maybe we were just lousy teachers.
But then I noticed something…
A small percentage of students who initially
struggled would all of a sudden take off
like a rocket. For six months, they worked
their butts off and got nowhere, and then
BOOM, they would get so much traffic they
could quit their jobs and become full-time
bloggers.
So, I started investigating. What were
these students doing differently than all
the others?
Did they work harder? Were they better
writers? Were they just smarter? Did they
have powerful connections?
Turns out, the answer was none of the
above.
The only commonality between all of our
success stories is they changed the question
they were asking. Instead of asking how to
get more traffic, they asked a different,
much less obvious question.
And it changed everything.
The Single Most Important Question for
Beginning Bloggers
Ready to hear the question?
Here it is:
“Is my blog capable of getting traffic?”
I know, it probably doesn’t make any sense.
Is it capable? Of course it’s capable! Every
blog is capable of getting more traffic.
Right?
Actually…
it turns out the answer is no. People think
you can build a popular blog about
anything, but you can’t.
Of course, that statement isn’t surprising in
and of itself. It’s logical that some really
bizarre topics like square tomatoes or
diamond drill bits could never support a
popular blog.
But the reality is worse. Far worse.
The Brutal Truth about Building a Popular
Blog
After working with thousands of students, I
can confidently say there are only a few
hundred topics where blogging really works.
For instance, ever noticed how many
parenting blogs there are?
Or marketing blogs?
Or social media blogs?
There’s a reason why. Blogging works really
well for those types of topics.
But there aren’t any popular blogs about
retirement, weddings, or becoming a better
real estate agent.
And here’s the real shocker…
There never will be.
Yes, there are millions of people interested
in those topics. Yes, it seems like you
should be able to build a blog around them.
But you can’t.
Doesn’t matter how hard you work. Doesn’t
matter how smart you are. Doesn’t matter
how many connections you have.
It’s impossible.
In fact, it’s impossible to build a popular
blog around 99% of our passions.
Let me explain why…
The Seven Tests Every Blog Must Pass
For months, I researched what blogs succeed
and fail, and I found seven criteria or
“tests” every blog passes before it becomes
popular.
And here’s the thing:
To have a viable blog, you need to pass all
seven tests. If you can’t, your blog will
never succeed, no matter how hard you try.
On a more positive note, passing all seven
of these tests practically guarantees you
can build a popular blog. All that’s left is
doing the work to make it happen.
Ready to find out what the tests are?
Here you go:
Size. The vast majority of popular blogs
have a total market size of at least 5
million people. And that’s a minimum. Most
top 100 blogs have a total market size of
200 million or more.
To be clear, that’s not how many readers
they have. That’s how many readers they
could have if everyone with an interest in
the topic read their blog.
Age. The vast majority of blog readers are
between the ages of 30 and 55. If you’re
targeting an audience younger or older than
that window, such as teenagers or baby
boomers, it’s almost impossible to build a
popular blog, simply because these people
don’t like reading blogs. Not yet, anyway.
Longevity. Because blogs publish content on
an ongoing basis, you need an audience that
has an ongoing interest. Ideally, it’s a topic
like personal finance or social media that
changes all the time, and so people want to
read about it forever. What you don’t want
is a topic like wedding planning or
pregnancy, because people are only
interested in those subjects for a few
months.
Language. In general, blogging as we know
it is confined to the English language. Yes,
it’s totally possible to build a popular blog
in Japanese or Spanish, but the traffic
techniques are totally different, and it’s
much, much more difficult. In my opinion,
it’s far more efficient to use other more
traditional methods to build the audience,
such as advertising.
Network. For a blog to really take off, you
need an audience who is networked with
each other through social media. Moms talk
with each other on Facebook, foodies hang
out on Pinterest, bloggers and journalists
are big on Twitter. As a result, they are
easy to reach. If your audience isn’t
hanging out on a particular social media
platform, on the other hand, it’s almost
impossible to get any traffic.
Influencer. If a blog topic is viable, you
pretty much always find influencers who
have already built up their own audiences in
the space. Sometimes they are bloggers,
sometimes they are podcasters, sometimes
they are best-selling authors. The key
point: with a little research, you can easily
find 5-10 influencers or “thought leaders”
already dominating the space. If you can’t
find any, there’s always a reason why, and
it’s never good.
Desirability. Last but certainly not least,
you need to like the audience. Surprisingly,
this is the number one reason a blog stalls
out following a period of rapid growth.
After attracting a small audience, the
blogger discovers they can’t stand them, and
they stop writing because it’s not fun
anymore. The moral of the story: make sure
you like the people you are trying to
attract because you’ll be hanging out with
them for years.
Are You Depressed Yet?
Chances are, your blog fails at least one of
these tests.
And you know what that means, right?
It’s curtains. Goodbye, dear one, we’ll
remember you fondly forever.
At least as far as getting a bunch of free
traffic is concerned.
You can absolutely continue writing, but
it’s never going to attract a lot of readers
without spending a fortune on advertising,
and I’m guessing that’s not your cup of tea.
The Good News…
You can always launch a new blog. If you
choose a viable topic, you might even be a
little stunned by how quickly it grows.
Because you see, it’s easy to grow a blog
that passes the above tests.
This blog got 4,379 visitors on the very first
day I opened it. Granted, some of that was
due to the promotion strategy I used, but a
big part of it was I chose the right topic.
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