Why a Blog is the Best Business to Start
If you’re someone who skims articles, this is one you won’t want to miss. Take 10 minutes to read the whole thing because we will be covering why a blog is the best business to start if you have the entrepreneurial itch. Here are the 4 major points I’ll explore deeper in today’s post:
- Time Flexibility
- Limitless Income
- Tax Incentives
- Low Start Up Cost
Coming up this fall in October of 2017, I will be at the 3 year mark since starting my first self-hosted WordPress blog. It’s been an incredible 2.5 years so far and I’ve achieved more than I ever thought I would when I first started out.
In fact, the other day I found an old spreadsheet I had made that listed several goals for myself over the next 5 years. I wrote down how many website visitors per month, email subscribers, social media followers, and income I wanted to have by the end of year.
One that stuck out to me was social media followers. I gave myself 4 years to reach 20,000 on my Instagram account and instead it took me less than 2 years to hit 28,000 for one account and 33,000 total when you combine both accounts that link to GolfPracticeGuides.com.
I created blog #2, Under30wealth.com, in August of 2015 on my birthday and blog number #3, AskNickFoy.com, is more recent having created it in May 2016.
My first blog, GolfPracticeGuides.com, as mentioned will turn 3 years old and it has been my most successful thus far in addition to being the oldest. I wrote an article recapping my tips to building a 5 figure per year blog that you should take a second to check out.
My goal is to get all 3 blogs producing good income so that someday I’ll be earning 6 figures or more of income but also diversified income in case one blog has a down month or two the other blogs pick up the slack.
Resource: Join my FREE 7 day Launch Your Blog course for beginners to get a blog up and running the right way.
Why I Love Blogging as a Business
Reason #1: Time Flexibility
These first 2.5 years have taught me a lot about running a business and I think my favorite part about it is the flexibility.
With a 9-5 job, you are expected to show up everyday from Monday through Friday and if you’re missing, you have a boss lurking who will surely not be happy.
As a blogger, you get to set your own hours which is great if you feel like sleeping in one day or feel like working out at the gym mid day.
For example, when I lived in Miami, Fl for two summers there were days I chose to go to the beach spontaneously. I put off work until the evening so that I could enjoy the beautiful sunshine and weather at South Beach.
The flip side of having flexible hours is having the discipline to work hard on your own schedule. There are many distractions that can interfere and make you less productive so you must learn how to turn off those distractions and put in focused work time.
Many people getting started as rookie bloggers think that blogging will be an easy way to make money. This is far from the truth however because in reality blogging takes lots of work and lots of hours. There are days you end up working 12-14 hours and nights you work late until 2 or 3 am. So you must be passionate about your blog or else you’ll burn out once you realize the amount of work it takes.
Blogging as a Business #2: Limitless Income Opportunity
With a job you have set hours and usually can’t work overtime, which means your income is capped. With blogging I can spend as many hours working as I want, which means I can get more work volume done each week and grow my income exponentially. There is no limit to my income as a blogger because the internet has billions of daily users which means I’m connected to the world 24/7.
Speaking of being connected 24/7, blogging is amazing for generating passive income. Your business is turned on 24/7 as mentioned since it’s connected to the internet and therefore you’ll earn money while you sleep.
I’ve woken up several times in the middle of the night to see that I have PayPal notifications on my lock screen of people who purchased product while I was sleeping.
Blogging as a Business #3: Tax Incentives
When you take blogging seriously and make it become a business rather than just a hobby, the government is going to give you tax benefits that ordinary people don’t get access to.
As a business owner, you get to write off many different types of expenses you incur as business expenses. This reduces your taxable income, keeping more money in your pocket to invest back into your business.
A few tax incentives I enjoy as a business owner include:
- Car mileage write-offs
- Business travel expenses (plane tickets, ubers, etc.)
- Rent write-offs (home office business expense)
- Utilities write-offs (home office business expense)
- Business meals
An employee on the other hand, doesn’t get to write off their housing, car, and food expenses against their W2 income in most cases. Tax treatment is a key difference between business owner and employee.
Blogging as a Business #4: Low Cost to Start
Finally, the part of blogging as a business that you’ll find most attractive is the low start up cost.
For less than $100/year you can run your blog, which also means that it doesn’t take long to break even and start earning a profit.
The beginner blogger expenses will typically include the basics:
That’s it. You’re all set for just $100 in start up costs and then $60 annually after that. As you get more experienced, you’ll start adding in additional expenses like an email service provider to run your auto-responder newsletter and build your email list.
I recommend ConvertKit as the best email service provider, and you can get started with them for under $30/month. That’s just $1/day for ConvertKit to manage your email subscribers for you, saving you loads of time and energy.
Starting an online business as a blogger is a much cheaper route compared to traditional brick and mortar business models where you need thousands of dollars to start up.
With blogging, you spend $100 or less per year to run your blog and if the business side fails, you’re not out much money. It’s low cost, low risk and if you work hard, you’re almost guaranteed to make your money back.
I turned a profit on GolfPracticeGuides.com in the first 6 months and had built it to a 5 figure business in under 2 years time. To build a profitable online business, you have to first get started. Sitting and dreaming won’t get it done my friend.
Best Resources for Starting Your Blog
Here are several resources I highly urge you to read to help you succeed in starting your profitable blog or online business. Make sure to pin them to Pinterest for later reading.
- How to Start a WordPress Blog in 20 Minutes
- The Step by Step Tutorial to Mastering WordPress as a Beginner
- How I Built a 5 Figure Per Year Online Business
- 5 Ways to Earn $500 per Month Online
- 7 Day Blogging Course (Free)
- Profitable Pinterest Traffic Course by Nick Foy
- Melyssa Griffins Pinterest Course for Beginners
Nick, What Tools Do You Use in Your Biz?
- Bluehost – a self-hosted website service provider that makes your website professional and gives you advanced features that free website providers can’t offer
- Namecheap – who I purchase my website domains from for $10/year
- ConvertKit – my email service provider that manages my email list and subscriber newsletters
- OptinMonster – the email capture form service that creates high converting opt in forms for building my email list
- Clickfunnels – the company I use to build high converting sales pages, landing pages, and opt-in pages for growing my email list and revenue
If you want step by step lessons, worksheets, and videos on how to build a money making blog from scratch in 30 days or less, then you may want to check out my eCourse – Profitable Blogger.
It comes with everything you need to get started and teaches you not only how to start your blog but also how to drive massive amounts of traffic to it and converting these website visitors into email subscribers or customers so you can start making money quickly form your blog. Plus lots more. Get started today!
Click here to learn more about Profitable Blogger
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