Hello, Welcome to the 11th Interview in BloggingRay Interview Series (BRIS).
Today I am interviewing Amit Garg.
He is running successful blog bloggingbeats.com
He is monetizing this blog with affiliate marketing.
You can find insane blogging and affiliate marketing tips from this interview.
Interview of Amit Garg from BloggingBeats
Without any delay, let jump into the interview.
Q1. Hey Amit, Can you introduce yourself to my community?
First of all, Thank you so much Venkat for inviting me to your blog.
Hey guys, my name is Amit Garg — founder of BloggingBeats.com where you will find very detailed and well-researched content around blogging, SEO, and affiliate marketing.
Q2. Can you share your educational background?
To make a career in the computer field, in 2006 I started doing a 3 years diploma in computer science. Later I joined computer engineering and received a graduate degree in 2012.
Talking about my schooling, it was mostly in Hindi medium from the Haryana board.
Q3. Who inspired you to start blogging?
Anil Agarwal who runs a renowned blog “BloggersPassion” inspired me to start my blogging journey.
Q4. What are the reasons behind the selection of Blogging Beats name?
Like someone enjoys listening to the beats of music, to become a successful blogger one has to enjoy the process of blogging.
This was just a random thought as I had no idea back then about domain names and their importance.
Q5. What is your daily routine? Can you share some productivity tips?
Well, I have a simple lifestyle. I usually wake up at 6.30 in the morning and get ready by 10 am.
After that, I keep working till 10 pm while giving time to my family and enjoying my meals in between.
Here are some productivity hacks our readers may find helpful:
- Design a proper content strategy
- Plan your week in advance
- Start early
- Turn off app notifications from your phone
Q6. Which hosting do you recommend for beginners? And why?
Pricing matters a lot for beginners but you can not choose a web hosting solely based on the pricing, right?
So far, I have been using Bluehost on my blog and found it a decent choice for beginners as it offers great features and performance and is available at a fair price.
Apart from Bluehost, I have hands-on Hostinger also. They are doing a tremendous job in terms of features and pricing. So, if someone has a very limited budget, they can go with Hostinger.
Q7. What are your thoughts on Blogging vs YouTube?
Both are amazing in their own way and you can select one (or both) based on your interests.
I just want to say don’t run into a rat race.
If you have passion for writing, start blogging.
If you love making videos, you can start a YouTube channel but don’t get into videos because others are doing it.
Here I simply mean, do what you’re passionate about and do it with full dedication.
Q8. Why did you turn a blogger from a software engineering job?
Actually, I did not choose to blog, Blogging chose me.
I left my software development job to start my own footwear manufacturing business. But due to some circumstances, I had to close that business.
After winding up the manufacturing process, I started freelancing and eventually my first blog.
Q9. Can you share some email marketing tips?
Email marketing is one of the most cost-effective marketing strategies and if you know how to do it right, you can achieve much better results.
Here are some of the email marketing tips you may find helpful;
- Write attention-grabbing subject lines
- Personalize your emails
- Keep them short and well-structured, and use more visuals (if possible)
- Use CTAs that fit naturally
- Make your preview text compelling
- Send one or two follow-up emails, but don’t overdo it
- Make sure your emails are mobile-friendly
Q10. What are your black Friday promotion strategies?
Nothing special.
I have a couple of posts on Black Friday. I just try to keep them up to date and maintain their rankings near Black Friday and Cyber Monday week.
Q11. How to promote affiliate products on Facebook?
If you want to do it organically then Facebook groups can be a good option. But for good results, you will have to build a strong community first.
Alternatively, you may experiment with Facebook ads.
Q12. What are your thoughts on my blog Blogging Ray? Can you share some suggestions?
Venkat, you’re doing a great job at Blogging Ray. I have read a few recent posts of yours where you shared great insights into the blogging journey of some known bloggers.
My only suggestion to everyone is to put content on your blog in a systematic way.
Q13. Can you share some tips to get affiliate sales?
Finding the right products to promote is very crucial to get started with affiliate marketing. For this, you can do competitive research. Simply, list down 4-5 popular blogs in your niche and then find out the products they are promoting.
Once you have a list ready, do some keyword research on these products and then produce some quality content (informational and commercial) around those products.
Just keep in mind, there’s no shortcut to making money. You will have to continuously learn and try new things.
Q14. Can you share some tips to network with other bloggers?
Networking is one of the key factors for success in blogging.
Blog commenting is a great way to show your presence to fellow bloggers. This not only helps in networking but also in building backlinks.
Interview posts, roundup posts, and guest posts also work very well.
In addition to that, you can start following them on Social media platforms where you can like, share, and comment on their posts to get noticed.
Last but not the least, you may attend offline events to network with other bloggers.
Q15. Google Adsense vs Affiliate Marketing. What are your thoughts on it?
Both are good. Google AdSense is the most popular advertisement network while affiliate marketing is one of the best and legit ways to make money online.
You can choose one based on the niche of your website. If your site receives millions of monthly traffic then you can expect a decent ROI via Google AdSense but if you have limited traffic then depending on ads may not get you the desired results.
On the contrary, if you have a website where you promote genuine affiliate products and are able to drive a small but targeted audience, you can generate a huge amount of revenue in affiliate sales.
Q16. You are producing articles regularly? What are the tips to produce content like you?
Yes, I love copywriting and try to write 1000 words every day.
It is said that practice makes a man or woman perfect and it’s 100% true. When I look at my first few posts and the recent ones, I can see there is a massive improvement and I feel more confident about my writing skills.
So, to refine your writing skills you should practice daily writing.
I use Google docs with integrated Grammarly to proofread my text.
This is the approach I follow to produce content on my blog. If you like my content you may utilize the same;
- Find out one primary keyword and a few secondary keywords
- Explore the top results on Google SERP for that particular keyword
- Make an outline covering all the aspects related to the topic
- Start your post with a question or some storytelling
- Write your post in-depth while adding relevant proofs and images
- Add a FAQ section where you can also target long-tail keywords
- End with a brief conclusion
Proven Tips: Once you are done with removing all errors by Grammarly, turn it off temporarily and you may see more corrections need to be done by Google Docs itself. Get rid of them to produce a better copy.
Finally, read it out loud. It will help you know about the flow of your post, and make the relevant changes if needed.
So, this is how you can write user-friendly content that leads to better engagement and conversions.
Q17. How much time does it take you to make the first affiliate sale from your blog? What strategies did you follow to generate the first sale?
You know the first step is always the hardest.
I think it took me around 6 months to get the first affiliate sale from my blog and since then my blog has grown a lot in terms of content, traffic, and of course sales.
The strategy is quite simple. Pick the right products, write valuable content around those products, drive targeted traffic and you will definitely get the results.
Q18. Where to contact you?
Anyone interested in getting in touch with me can drop me a mail at amit@bloggingbeats.com.
Moreover, I have a presence on all major social media platforms.
Facebook: amitggargg | Twitter: bloggingbeats
LinkedIn: bloggingbeats |Instagram: amitggarg
Conclusion
I hope this interview of Amit Garg from BloggingBeats will help you.
If you have questions let me know in the comments.
If you found this interview helpful share it to your social media.
Thank you.
