Posted 5/30/08

Guest Post written by Michael "Cuzzy" C. of the sports/Raptors/money making blog, Cuzoogle.com!


25 Traits of Successful Sports Bloggers: Part 1

The goal of the list is to help you understand how to shape your sports blogging experience towards becoming more successful online and in the sports blogging niche. I hope you are able to find characteristics that you might be lacking or may need to improve on. If not then you are probably one of the successful ones already.

Nobody is perfect, but successful sports bloggers really do a fabulous job at effectively mastering the majority of the 25 traits that are listed.

The cool thing about this list is that though sports bloggers may have an edge against you with certain traits, you can always work to improve and get stronger. Let me know what you think below and add any that I may have missed. These traits are not sports blogging specific so don't worry if you are not in the sports game, they work for whatever you blog about.

1) Hard-working - Though it looks like an easy path to become a successful sports blogger, it does take some hard work as anyone who has a blog knows. If you cannot put in hard work towards becoming successful online, it would probably be best to not work at all. It takes a lot time to educate yourself about a certain topic and to constantly think of new ideas as article topics.

Successful sports bloggers are usually passionate and willing to work hard on a daily basis in order to improve and stay successful! It is like building a championship team, it does not happen over night. In sports blogging, you must produce new, quality content to keep your reader's satisfied. The content cannot be filled with bogus information either, meaning you have got to be willing to actually do some hard work and get your hands dirty.

2) Persistent - Successful sports bloggers never shy away or back down in the face of failure. They realize that if they want to be successful they must never back down and be around for the long-term. If you look at some of the best sports blogs out there, they have been around for years. Sports bloggers that may not be persistent, usually back down and end up not being very successful.

The hype and fun that initially comes with the creation of a blog can definitely keep you motivated for a couple of months, but if you're going to back down and stop being persistent, you probably don't want to be successful in the first place.

3) Educated - It is important to stay educated in the niche that you are blogging about. Nobody wants to really hear or read what amateurs are going to write on their sports blogs. So that means you have to watch sports. Rough life eh? If you are a sports blogger chances are you watch a good amount of sports so this part is easy. If you follow one team, read everything there is about that team. Sure there might be the odd visit from a hardcore sports fan but most people are looking for good, quality content. Posting a recap of a game won't cut it but if you add your own spin or opinion, then it could catch fire.

As a sports blogger, it is extremely important to keep yourself educated by reading other successful sports blogs and understanding what can be done to improve your efforts. It is of course obvious that you should never copy other's work but I always find reading other sports blogs will stir up several ideas in my head.

4) Strategic - Not all sports bloggers have a good online strategy that works. Successful sports bloggers understand how to plan for success. This is key for when something goes wrong, or their business model is not well accepted by their readers. Then they will re-evaluate and plan out a new strategy.

Strategy is a factor in virtually every part of a sports blogger's online experience. You have to plan out promotion, goals, building traffic, and keeping visitors coming back for more. While many successful sports bloggers make blogging strategy look like Ray Allen shooting a free throw, there is a lot that is being done behind the scenes that may not be written about.


5) Disciplined - It can be difficult to stay disciplined for anyone, even the successful sports bloggers. What separates the successful sports bloggers from the unsuccessful, is the fact that successful sports bloggers force themselves to stay disciplined with posting, thinking of new post ideas, and doing work to improve their online status. Some days or weeks can seem like a struggle but you have to fight through. When seasons end, it can be the hardest but that is when you have to think outside of the box for ideas. Discipline can be tough for anyone, though there are activities like getting into a posting routine that can improve your discipline.

6) Intelligent - Do you want to read a blog post by someone that is less intelligent than you? Probably not although I would guess a lot of you don't really think about that. Most people follow sports bloggers to learn something about a sport, team, player or hot button topic. If you are not as intelligent as another sports blogger, who do you think is going to get the majority of traffic and keep their visitors around? Yep you guessed it. Intelligence is a big key as a sports blogger. We are not born with blogging knowledge (Wow can you imagine?) or experience but we can all educate ourselves by reading other sports blogs and staying subscribed to them.

7) Social - If you are not networking with other sports bloggers (WTF? You better be.), it is time to start. Networking with other sports bloggers can include things like doing a guest post (just like I am doing), running a contest with other sports bloggers or a mutual exchange of links for your blogroll.

Everyone involved in the business world networks offline, online, and know how to network very successfully. You do not really want to network with another sports blog that has significantly lower traffic than yours or a poorer online image although there are always exceptions to this.

If you have not started networking with other sports bloggers, send several blogs (preferably ones that are bigger than yours) a message asking if they would like to network with you. It is amazing how friendly the blog community is if you just ask. Everyone used to be small and I find even the big dogs don't mind helping out where possible. You can do things like put up each other's 125 x 125 advertisements, comment on each other's blogs and advertise using Entrecard.

8) Understanding - Successful sports bloggers are usually understanding of what most of us want to see and how they can help out their readers. As a sports blogger myself, I try to be understanding of my reader's needs and interests by interacting with them in the comments section of each post and answer all e-mails that come my way. If you are not understanding of what readers want, you don't allow yourself to have a friendly online image that helps form a strong community.

9) Creative - This is my favorite trait of a successful sports blogger, one that I really try to zero in on. If you do the same thing as everybody else online, it is going to be extremely difficult to succeed. Right now the sports blogging niche is so overcrowded and over populated that it is very tough to get inside position under the boards. The good news is there are so many teams and so many players that it is possible to carve out your own little area.

The key to online success is being creative. Most sports bloggers that are successful right now did something completely new and innovative that most others had not thought of at the time. We all read Dead Spin and think wow, that is such a simple concept for a blog, why did I not think of that. Many people are reading that blog hoping to do the exact same thing as Dead Spin and make the same amount of money. Good luck to you if that is your goal right out of the shoot.

The fact is, most do not realize that it is much more difficult when you follow suit. The term been there done that comes to mind. Now there are many sports bloggers making a name for themselves, don't get me wrong but you need to stand out a bit. When you can be creative and be the first of your kind in an untapped niche, then you will be able to be as successful as the lucky bastards at Dead Spin.

10) Flexible - Being flexible plays a huge part in being a successful sports blogger. Anyone who works in sports or watches a lot of sports knows the strain it can put on the people in our lives. Most successful sports bloggers understand when it is time to call it quits and spend time with their family or dabble in other hobbies.

It is important to not get addicted to sports blogging to keep other areas of life in perspective. When money starts to roll in and the traffic jumps, the temptation can be to sit there for several hours working on the blog. I am not saying that is a bad thing but too much of any one thing can really throw other areas of life out of sorts. Too much sports blogging is not good and can actually get people a little overstressed. On the flip-side of that, too many outside activities can make it difficult to get back into the sports blogging routine. It is all about balance. So go and watch the game and take a break.

11) Consistent - Consistency is a key attribute to online success. Successful sports bloggers stay consistent with posting, marketing, and maintenance of their blog. Being consistent with posting frequency plays a huge role in gaining the trust of RSS subscribers and getting more visitors to subscribe. Staying consistent with all of your online efforts will play a huge role in the success of your sports blog. If you know that you can stay consistent with quality content, I can tell you with confidence that you will make money eventually and be successful. Like many things staying consistent is much easier said than done, though with proper discipline, we all have it in us to do it.

12) Confident - I have yet to come across a successful sports blogger that has low levels of confidence. Just like the athletes we watch, showing confidence is everything when going into battle. Confidence is displayed in your writing tone, through the quality of your content, and through activities such as guest posting on other sports blogs.

Most other sports bloggers that are in the business to be successful are never stressed about asking someone to guest post or posting links to their posts in forums. This is why it is great to ask other sports bloggers for help or even trading links. I have never felt like someone was turning me down because I was the competition. It is not like we are in law school or fighting for a Wii on Boxing Day. If you are lacking in confidence, you better do yourself a huge favor by boosting it up. Now drop and give me 20.

This concludes Part 1 of 25 Traits of successful sports bloggers. Look for the part 2 soon!

Make sure you check out other posts from Cuzzy like his ongoing "Rolling a Blog Joint..." and his "10 Reasons Why I hope the Spurs are Done."


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