So you’ve decided to dive headfirst into the online marketing world, and you’ve started a blog or website. Congrats! Now it’s time to get to work. How are you going to make this venture profitable?

There are four steps you need to take in order to build a profitable online marketing business.

Step one: Determine your target audience.

The first step in the online marketing process is pretty straight forward. You need to figure out who exactly your target audience is going to be. There are a few ways to go about this but let’s say you’ve decided to start a travel blog. You are probably going to end up with a few thousand viewers annually at the very least. That’s a good start. But the question now is, how are you going to attract and retain these subscribers?

Your first instinct might be to focus on the largest possible audience and try to grow your blog to the maximum extent possible. But that’s not necessarily the wisest of moves. Sometimes it’s best to choose a niche and target a smaller, but more specific audience. For example, if you’re passionate about dog walking, and you know there are a lot of dog owners out there who are also looking for a service, why not focus on that market to the fullest extent? You can use a tool like HubSpot to create targeted landing pages for your niche audience. The advantage of having multiple targeted landing pages is that you can test various sales funnels and see which one works best for your unique offering. Once you’ve determined your target audience, it’s time to move on to the next step.

Step two: Craft a marketing plan.

The second step in the process is to craft a marketing plan. The purpose of this plan is to lay out how you intend on attracting and retaining your target audience. This could include things like;

• Creating compelling content that will engage and inspire your audience
• Using highly targeted marketing strategies to reach out to your ideal buyer
• Pricing your product or service correctly so that it’s accessible to all
• Tracking the success of your marketing efforts so that you can continually refine your strategy

Your plan should include;

• An actionable marketing schedule (this can be something as simple as once a week blog posts or regular podcast episodes)
• A budget for the year (this can be based on your income or expenses)
• A clear objective for the year (be specific here)
• A list of at least three specific metrics that you’ll use to track your progress (e.g., daily visits, social media engagement, email subscribers)
• If you’re a business, include the business’ website URL

Once you’ve crafted a plan, its time to move on to the next step. But don’t be afraid to re-visit your plan from time to time and see if it’s still valid.

Step three: Research the competition.

The third step in the process is to research the competition. You’ll want to know everything there is to know about your competitors. This includes;

• Their pricing
• Their product or service
• The strategy they’re using to gain traction
• What marketing tactics they’re using
• Their social media handles and websites
• Demographics (e.g., age, gender)
• Annual revenue
• Customers (e.g., how many, where do they come from)
• What do they use to measure success

You can use several tools to uncover all this information. Depending on how much data you have available, you can choose from;

• Web searches (e.g., Google Trends)
• Social media (e.g., Twitter)
• Press releases (e.g., PR Newswire)
• Reverse engineering (e.g., Hootsuite’s Keyword Explorer)
• Offline surveys (e.g., SurveyMonkey)

Having a clear picture of your competition will give you a good idea of how to position yourself in the marketplace. It can also help you discover new opportunities and potential customers that you may have otherwise missed out on. Keep in mind though, that your competitors may have the same objective as you do. Which is to succeed as a business.

Step four: Monetise your content.

The fourth step in the process is to monetise your content. Now, you don’t need to rush into this step. In fact, you can take your time with it. But in order to build a profitable online marketing business you need to do this. The purpose of this step is to generate revenue streams from your content so that you can continue to grow your business. Which brings us to the question; how are you going to do this?

There are several options. You could sell and display ads on your site. You could affiliate products and earn a commission whenever someone buys a product that’s promoted on your site. Or, you could sell and display ads on your site, and then take a cut when a user clicks on a promoted link or buys a product that’s been featured on your site. Each of these options is completely legitimate, and they all have their pluses and minuses. But, the most important thing to keep in mind is that you are building a business, and this is what you need to focus on.

Ultimately, you need to look at what’s right for your specific situation. What’s the most cost-effective way to generate revenue? What’s the easiest way to generate leads? Take some time to think about all this, and then you’ll be able to answer these questions and continue to grow your business.