Blogging as a side hustle in Singapore - my personal experience

So after a full year of work, side projects, growing a family etc. the blog is now seeing a new post. After an auto renewal of Wix.com (along with a Google Workspace account) which I'm unlikely to get a refund for.. Here I am trying to make my money's worth!

Originally, I thought with AI it would be super easy to throw content together and get stuff done. SEO, organic traffic, referral links, and BOOM. Money rolling into the bank account. Boy was I wrong. Ideas come and go. You need to sit down, get focused, and organize thoughts. And photos. Lots of high quality, well framed shots, to keep your viewers interested.

Here are the biggest mistakes to avoid when it comes to starting your own blog.

1. Save your money (literally).

Start writing, get traffic, get money, then work backwards. In my case, I plonked a fair penny to securing a website, workspace account etc. to do things 'the proper way'. With my long list of sponsors (i.e. zero) and the huge number of ad slots (zero), it's easy to work out my ROI.

Fantastic ROI!

What you can probably avoid:

1. Domain

2. Workspace accounts (Google suite)

3. Setting up a business entity

Keep things free if possible. Everything can be done for free. Do you really need that swanky blog name you've been thinking of for the past few months? Could you live with a wix.com domain?

I got mine from Godaddy.com and it wasn't too bad for 3 years.

What else. Wix, business email plans below:

I was avoiding adding these all up. $438.36. Yikes

I'll skip the business entity costs because it varies depending on what you're setting up.

As you can see, you can avoid a lot of costs. For $438, if this was plonked into advertising, at ~US$1 CPM you can reach 438,000 impressions.

2. Post on a schedule

Keeping up with a regular blog posting schedule is super important.

Staying consistent helps you keep the writing muscle going, and also builds an audience to come back for more. Apparently, regular updates are great for your SEO because search engines love new stuff.

Having a set schedule also makes it easier to plan and organize your posts, so you can cover lots of different topics and keep everyone interested.

It also keeps your blog nice and dust free, unlike this one.

3. Find topics people are interested in

When I was about to cancel my subscription (i.e., give up), I saw that some folks were actually organically coming to read about cleaning their Breville Barista Express. That honestly surprised me because I never thought in a million years that my writing would be appreciated by some random strangers looking to descale their espresso machine.

Organic Traffic! A high bounce rate is good, right? (yes I am fun at parties)

Google Trends is probably a good place to start. Since my visitors mostly come from Australia (for now), perhaps writing about some hot topics might get some traffic in.

Astro Bot. Wow. Superstitous bunch.

4. Write what you like

If you're writing for others, you will get bored and eventually give up. I have a lot of ideas for this blog and hopefully you will also like what I produce.

Conclusion

Don't spend money first. Write, get views, then spend money accordingly. Goodbye.