Since all 4 readers that remained at RamblingFever Money seemed to follow me over here, and then some, the blogger in me feels the need to be more specific and tell everybody exactly what I plan to do. If you didn’t get a clue from the title of this post, niche websites is my plan to start out. I have other passive income aspirations as well, but I already have the resources and ability to start building niche sites. This may or may not excite you. When I first heard about niche sites by reading about other bloggers dabbling with them, I shrugged off the idea. I barely knew how to build a blog, let alone a focused website on a particular niche. Over time, the idea has intrigued me more and more. The thought of spending the time to build out a site and then just let it sit and make money for me is pretty exciting.
So Why Niche Sites Instead of a Blog?
A niche site is generally very focused on a specific keyword and set of related long-tail keywords. A blog usually is not. Almost all of the traffic you can expect to get on a niche site comes from search engines. Blogs get a lot of search engine traffic as well, but they are more focused on building communities and getting repeat traffic from like-minded bloggers. As proven with my 3-week experiment of not posting on RamblingFever Money, traffic basically disappears on a blog if you stop posting. I was averaging nearly 200 page views per day right before I quit. At the end of 3 weeks, my page views dropped to about 25 per day.
Here is what I am getting at. A blog can hardly be considered a form of passive income. Especially in my case where I was spending a ton of time, as much as possible for me, and earning almost no money from it. Passive income can be created with a blog, just not if you did it the dumb way like me! I want to create truly passive income, so I have decided to take a stab at the niche site scene.
Creating a niche site is not too much different than creating a blog. Basically, you pick a topic, create a site and post content to it. It could be a micro niche site, consisting of only 4 or 5 pages of content. Or, it could be a very large niche site with up to 100 or even more pages of content. It all depends on the topic you choose and how much you do with it. The idea with a niche site is that search engines will bring you traffic and then the traffic will bring you income. The income could be in one or more of several forms. It could come from advertising, affiliate links or even a product that you create yourself (such as an eBook).
This was a very basic, or dumbed down, explanation of what a niche site is. Hence, sticking with the theme for Dumb Passive Income. Speaking of dumb…
The First Dumb Thing I’ve Done in My New Niche Site Adventure
I started this blog! That’s right. It may have been dumb for me to start this blog. Why? Because I’m finding myself spending more time on this and less time on building the niche sites. I’ve already purchased two domain names for niche sites and got WordPress loaded onto them. That’s it. I haven’t created any content for either site yet. But, by screwing around on this blog, I am learning a thing or two about WordPress. I also have a growing list of more domains that I want to purchase that I think are great ideas for niche sites. I promised myself that I wouldn’t buy any more until I at least get these first two sites complete.
I need to start writing content for those sites, but want to show anybody who is interested exactly how and why I got motivated to build these niche sites. The best way to do that will be to write a post filled with links to where I learned about niche sites. As it turns out, there is a whole community of people on the internet that are doing this same thing. Some probably build their sites behind the scenes and collect their riches. But I’ve found several who blog about what they are doing and share their information with the world. That is my plan as well, and in my next post I will show you where and from whom I got some of my influence.
Until then, remember that there are several dumb ways to create passive income online, but only one site that is blogging about it! Dumb Passive Income… dot com.
-Matt
Matthew Allen
Matt – marry me!!! Well the sentiment is real.LOL
I’m standing in my kitchen – baking cherry buns for a fund raiser and read this ………… and the sun came out and the angels started singing.
Cos I have a niche – in fact probably more than one (not related to Mummy Baking BTW)
So looking forward to following you in your adventure – and I will just be a few steps behind testing and measuring.
Ta Muchly as they say here
HaHa! Sorry Elaine, I am spoken for as far as the marriage thing! I will be happy to “partner” with you though in an online sort of way (sharing thoughts, ideas, etc.).
When you say you have a niche, do you mean a niche website? Or you have a niche and you might be interested in starting a website about it?
Glad you are following along. My very first niche site is taking form as I have been working on it for most of this week. Looking forward to posting about my progress.
When I started blogging I had the misconception I could make some passive income. But obviously I know now, it’s not that simple at all. Building niche sites is a much better avenue, if you’re looking to create some passive income online.
I am definitely learning things the dumb… Er, the hard way Carrie. I spent so much time on my old blog with very little monetary return. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed every minute of it and I learned a ton. For that type of blog though you need to very much be active (not passive) in order to grow and create income. You know what I mean, I’m sure.
Giving this niche site thing a try. See how that goes. I’m already getting way more search traffic on my first incomplete niche site than I am total on this blog and my old blog put together!
Thanks for checking out my new blog and commenting Carrie! Looking forward to hearing more from you on the Free Financial Advisor podcast. And congratulations on your recent debt freedom! Great job.
Matt….Look forward to following you on your new site! 🙂
One of the main reasons many people choose to look for a passive income opportunity is that it will potentially continue to pay dividends long after the initial work on a project or Web site is done.