Blogging

How I Turned My Blog into a Profitable Business – Part 2

If you’ve read the part 1, then it must be exciting for you to read the next part.

You know they say, in order to get started, all you need is to START IT. So, I did make a start,  years back.

I’m glad that I did.

blog as profitable business

As explained in the previous part that I came to know a bit about niche blogging in 2012. Later on, what happened with my blogging career is written below:

Year: 2013

I had my first niche blog which started making some money for me. Although, my sports blog back in 2010 was also a niche blog but I’ve explained that what were the issues, so I don’t really consider it a niche blog because it was a seasonal niche and haven’t offered much monetization opportunities.

Back to the point.

The year 2013, the ‘blogging tips’ niche blog started working for me. The pace of growth wasn’t the greatest, but it was certainly positive. The readers were loving it. I was building an email list and visitors were turning into the subscribers. As I said, there wasn’t much pace in the progress, but certainly it was getting traction.

So the year ended.

Year: 2014

I had great plans for that blog. In Feb. 2014, I was approached by an affiliate manager of a company from the United States, he wanted to buy my blog. We discussed the matters for quite some time and, later on, I sold that blog.

I was understanding the niche blogging at that time — which means I started realizing that I’ve done some mistakes in the past — meaning I should have done better with my blogging tips blogs…

See, the best part of the growth is that you realize what you’ve done wrong in the past and you don’t want to repeat that. 

So, (at that point) I’m without a blog. No more affiliate earning at this point.

Things then started a bit difficult for me. So, I started looking for some freelance writing gigs.

But, in order to do that, I had to make the quality my utmost priority in order to impress the prospects and turn them into the regular customers. I was passionately reading blogs like QuickSprout, Hubspot, and Copyblogger in order to improve my writing. These blogs have helped me in improving my writing.

In May 2014, I did another thing.

When I wasn’t working on a new blog, I felt the need of my personal blog. So, somehow I managed to start running my personal blog on my domain www.hassaankhan.com.

Now, you’ll get to know about the power of building a personal brand.

In actual, I began with a new struggle. I was getting serious about freelance writing stuff and trying to get clients. In fact, I came across a few opportunities and worked for a number of clients… but they were not permanent.

They kept on coming and going. I was doing a back and forth run.  

What I didn’t stop was TRYING.

I was seeking for writing gigs and at the same time, I was learning to write better.

The year ended with nothing good at my side. So, I embraced the fact and started looking ahead.

There were many hopes for 2015.

Here comes the new year.

I knew that it’s been 4 years and I’m nowhere in the online business world.

Year: 2015

I was struggling. I had no regular client whatsoever. In freelancing world, a regular client shows two things:

1. Good Reputation

2. More Clients

So, I was looking for both. Then, I got a Facebook invite for a freelance seminar hosted by Mr. Kamran Shafi, who is a web designer and a freelancer. I went to Lahore to attend a seminar. He discussed a few things on freelancing. The best thing I found out of the seminar was to ‘take freelancing as a lifestyle‘ — It means to take it as a business. The real serious business.

That day, I realized that freelancing isn’t an ordinary thing. So, I started introducing myself as a freelance writer. It worked.

The same month I was approached by a businessman who was an internet entrepreneur and he liked my blog posts on the personal blog. We discussed the content strategy’s importance over the phone and Gtalk… and later on, he was impressed with me.

He wanted me to work for him. I agreed. We started working.

After some time, I added a ‘hire me‘ page on my blog. Plus, I added the ‘hire me‘ call-to-action button on the menu bar of my blog. That change went CRAZY. I started getting inquiries after a few days. The companies started approaching me for their content.

The best thing was people were contacting me through my contact form (on my blog)… which means they’ve seen my work, it doesn’t matter how they landed on my blog, after all, they had seen the work, they were convinced, and wanted to talk to me.

I was stunned —and, thinking— what the hell is happening…

Although, I started getting more social. I focused on the communication aspects of the social media. The relation building has been one of the major reasons for my freelance career success.

Every month I was stumbling upon the new writing gigs and opportunities. I started forwarding the inquiries to other friends (content writers)…

Literally, I wasn’t able to deliver the content. The demand was more than I could ever handle.

This has been the story of pretty much the 10 months of the year 2015.

Then, I made a DECISION.

One of the biggest decisions of my life…

The story doesn’t end here…

The next (and the last) part of the series will reveal that what I did in November and December of 2015.

In part 1 and part 2, I’ve shown you the pathway of my struggle. In the beginning, I was broke, empty pocket, and desperate.

What did I not stop?

I didn’t stop LOOKING and HOPING.

I kept on working. I kept on trying.

You know, one of my favorite leadership and philanthropist personalities is Imran Khan. He is a cricketer-turned-politician. He made the first cancer hospital in Pakistan which provides cancer medication to the needy and deserving people on the minimal charges. He did that because his mother died of cancer. He always says, “You only lose when you think you’ve lost.

I don’t like to QUIT either.

The hardest thing is that people didn’t believe in me. My parents supported me throughout the journey.

I’m thankful to them. I’ll always be.  

People literally want you to do what they think you should do.

I did struggle from 2010 to 2015. It took me 5 years to put my name out there.

Now companies want me and I don’t have time.

Things are CRAZY…

Now, I’ve decided something…

I made DECISIONS in the past and I will keep on doing that.

The part 3 (and the last one) will show you exactly what’s going to happen in 2016 and how I am going to pursue.

Hope it will give you ENCOURAGEMENT and POWER to move forward and stay positive.

The purpose of sharing the whole story and future mission is that someone might take a POSITIVE GESTURE out of it and start making an effort to make a difference…that’s the GOAL.

I’ll see you in part 3.

(How I Turned My Blog into a Full-time LivingPart 1)

(How I Turned My Blog into a Profitable BusinessPart 2)

(How I Turned My Profitable Business into a Personal BrandPart 3)

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5 Comments

  1. Hello Hassaan,

    The hard worker beats the talented but lazy person. Learning on your own and applying it, its the best education I must say.

    And defintitely the support from home dips the crucial part in the success. When your parents and family members believe in you, you do all your best to not let them down, no matter you’re a beginner into something.

    Everyone who are famous now started back with zero skills and zero fame.

    So, believe and continuous working on your passions will take you somewhere one day. The key is in NOT QUITTING.

    And I wish you best of the best!!

    ~ Adeel

    1. Thank you so much Adeel Sahab for your time. I’m glad you read the post and wrote the valuable comment.

      I agree with you. It all starts from zero. I know I would have done a lot better if I would have some guideline back in 2010-11, but I don’t regret because FAILURES teach the lesson that SUCCESS can’t.

  2. Hassaan,

    Inspirational story! Your tone has changed significantly from the last part and by the end of the post I am happy for you. You seem to pretty much go at it alone for years and learning from all the blunders, that’s amazing.

    I’ve started blogging about a year ago and already learned a lot of the struggles you face building your site up. I’ve made a lot of mistakes along the way as well and wasn’t so happy about it, but what you wrote made me realise it’s normal and part of the process.

    I especially the part where you say “the best part of the growth is that you realise what you’ve done wrong in the past and you don’t want to repeat that.”

    Thanks for sharing, I’ll be back for part 3. 🙂

    Cheers,
    Anh

    P.S. I keep getting a time-out when I try to submit my comment to your blog, you may want to check it out.

    1. Hey, Anh!
      Thanks for coming back. I’m glad you read the part-2.

      It’s true. It’s totally fine to make mistakes. The realization (of mistakes) is something I call it the outcome. Once you do the mistake and fix it, you won’t do it again, in fact, you’d end up learning so many lessons along with it.

      Thanks for reading the part-2. I’m glad you came back.

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