When I first started blogging 10 years ago, I struggled with the same question as all new bloggers: "Should I focus on writing photography tutorials, or share my travel experiences and equipment reviews at the same time?"
I remember that at two o'clock in the morning that day, I was refreshing the cases of various successful bloggers on the computer screen, and found an interesting phenomenon - those bloggers with five-figure monthly incomes all had clear positioning labels in the upper left corner of their websites.
Here are some examples:
- Blog: MOZ
- Niche: SEO
- Blog: Dailyblogtips
- Niche: Blogging
- Blog: Labnol
- Niche: Technology
- Blog: SidelinePlay
- Niche: Internet Marketing, Blogging, and Entrepreneurship
Yes, there is some overlap between certain areas, but it is important to stay consistent. Don't talk about finance one day and pet care tomorrow.
The most important questions you should ask yourself before starting a blog are:
- What will my blog topic be? (i.e. what will I write about?)
When I talk to new bloggers about their businesses, I often hear things like:
“I’m interested in lifestyle, fashion, photography, travel, and health — all these topics I want to write about on my blog. I think this will become the USP (unique selling point) of my blog because I will cover all these topics in one place, which will attract more readers.”
Before answering this question in detail, let me clarify something:
- This is the wrong approach when you are planning to make money from blogging .
If you plan to start a personal blog where you write about many different topics, then this is fine, as making money is not your primary reason for blogging. If you blog because you enjoy writing and want to write about a variety of topics, and any consideration of making money from your blog is secondary, then go for it and write whatever you want.
However, if you are looking to start a blog to earn income, then a multi-topic/multi-niche blog is not a good idea.
My first experiment
At that time, I stubbornly believed that diversification was the way out. Under the domain name "Digital Life", I updated photography tips, coffee tasting, and outdoor equipment reviews at the same time. The first three months were indeed lively, and readers left comments saying "the content is very rich", but the conversion rate dumbfounded me: the ad click rate for photography articles was 3%, and that for coffee articles was only 0.2%, and the reader retention rate was declining by 5% every week.
Until one day I received a private message from a reader: "I follow you to learn composition, but recently there are always coffee machine ads on the homepage. Can you set up category filters?" It was then that I realized the seriousness of the problem.
Lessons from blood and tears: three fatal wounds
Reader stickiness trap
Imagine going to a barbershop and finding out that Tony also runs a pet grooming business. My fitness readers are as confused as vegetarians walking into a steakhouse when they see a baking tutorial suddenly appear on the homepage. Here’s a real case: After food blogger @Anna’s Table tried to add parenting content, her subscriptions plummeted by 42% in 30 days.
The invisible ceiling
Last year, when I was helping a friend optimize his travel blog, I found that a site focusing on "island travel" reached the first page of Google in just 6 months, while another site covering "global travel + hotel management + photography skills" was still on the third page after 9 months of optimization for the same keywords. Google's algorithm is getting smarter and it is more willing to recommend "experts" in a certain field.
The harsh reality
When I approached advertisers with the data from the two test sites, the CPM (cost per thousand impressions) for the site focusing on "macro photography" was $18, while the CPM for the comprehensive site was only $4.5. What's even more heartbreaking is that the camera brand clearly stated: "We only need accurate traffic. 50 people who really want to buy a camera are worth ten times more than 5,000 people who just look at it."
The solution: My transformation plan
After six months of losses, I made three key adjustments:
1. Create a content matrix
- The main site "Light and Shadow Catcher" focuses on photography teaching
- The sub-site "Coffee Research Institute" is operated independently
- Travel content moved to Medium column
2. Traffic funnel design
At the end of the photography tutorial, I set an Easter egg: "Follow my coffee research institute to unlock the photographer's private coffee bean collection." As a result, 30% of photography readers were converted into coffee station subscribers, and the reverse diversion effect was 5 times higher than that of mixed writing.
3. Keyword layering strategy
Focus on long-tail keywords: The conversion rate of "How to take photos of the stars with an iPhone" is 230% higher than that of "Mobile photography skills". Using Ahrefs tools to monitor, it is found that the advertising bids for precise long-tail keywords are lower.
Tip: If you are just starting out, don’t create multiple blogs. First, create a blog on a specific topic/niche, and only when that blog is well established and brings you a lot of traffic, you should create a second blog.
If you’re confused about how to choose topics you can write about regularly and consistently, here’s a very simple method:
- Get out a notebook and paper and create columns for topics you want to write about. For example, dog care, baby care, Facebook tips, photography, etc.
- Once you have created your columns, write down 20 post ideas for each topic. As you write down your post ideas, think about what you want to write in these posts.
This process alone will help you remove 2-3 topics from your list.
- Now, start writing a blog for two weeks on the topics that are left on your list. After two weeks, you will be able to determine which topics you are best at and therefore which theme you should use.
If you don’t have a blog yet, read my guide on how to start a blog and launch your blog today.
A practical guide for beginners
If you are struggling to choose a theme, try my 21-day test:
Brainstorming Phase (Days 1-3)
Listing all the areas of interest, I wrote about 12 topics that year, ranging from drone aerial photography to hand-brew coffee equipment reviews.
Content Stress Testing (Days 4-14)
I wrote three drafts on different topics every day. By the 10th day, I felt that I had more ideas when writing photography tutorials, while coffee articles required a lot of research.
Data Verification (Day 15-21)
Publish the test article to an open platform such as Medium and monitor it with Google Analytics:
- The average reading time for photography is 4 minutes and 32 seconds
- Coffee category only 1 minute 17 seconds
- The bounce rate of travel category is as high as 82%
This method saved me at least half a year of trial and error. Now my photography website generates a stable advertising income of $2,000 per month, and the coffee website, as a sideline, can also bring in an additional income of about $500.
Common Misunderstandings Warning
I have received a lot of inquiries recently and found that newcomers often step into these pitfalls:
- "Build a comprehensive website first and then segment it" → The transformation cost is extremely high after the traffic is dispersed
- "Solve it with a category directory" → Search engines will still judge the site as mixed in topics
- "Multiple subdomains are enough" → The operating cost is more than 3 times that of a single site
I just helped a mother and baby blogger split her site last week, and her lesson was very typical:
The original monthly advertising income of the comprehensive site was 800. After splitting out the independent supplementary food evaluation site, it reached 800 in two months . After splitting out the independent supplementary food evaluation site, it reached 1200 in two months. As the content of the main site was more focused, the income increased to $1100.
Let's say you're a company that develops cameras and you have a limited advertising budget. You're working on your advertising plan and there are two blogs you're considering advertising on:
- Blog #1: This blog receives 10,000 page views per month, and all traffic to this blog is related to photography and camera-related topics.
- Blog #2: This blog gets 50,000 page views per month and traffic from a variety of topics including photography, dog care, baby care, blogging tips , fitness, makeup, and many other things.
Which of these two blogs is best for promoting your product, cameras? Probably Blog 1, because you will get a better return on investment (ROI) on your advertising budget. Why? Because you will get targeted traffic from Blog 1 , while Blog 2 may send traffic that has nothing to do with my product.
Now that you understand what kind of blog you need to attract more traffic and therefore create more income, let me quickly address how to choose a theme.
Final Advice
If you’re determined to make money blogging, remember this formula:
Accurate positioning × continuous cultivation × time compounding = profit potential
There is still a note on my desk that I wrote when I transformed in 2019: "Instead of being an encyclopedia-style grocery store, it is better to become a specialty store in a certain field." Now every time I look up and see this sentence, I will be grateful for the painful but correct decision I made.
To be fair, some things are hard. First, you have to become an expert so you can write in that field. This can take some research and learning when you start your online business. Coming up with lots of different subtopics for a field can also be time-consuming.
Another challenge is that you have to choose your niche carefully, which requires some time doing market research to make sure it is profitable. Since you are doing this for money and as a hobby (I guess), your keywords have to be money-related.
If you still have any questions about the niche, feel free to ask through the comments section below.
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