Over the years, I’ve had several friends faced with the same dilemma. Working with them, I was able to help them identify a topic and now they are all running profitable blogs.

One of my friends is a dental student, and was trying to find a topic he could blog about. He really likes baseball and cars. He was leaning towards blogging about cars until I sat down with him in a brainstorming session.

By brainstorming we found the perfect niche for him focused around his interest and specialized knowledge. It was writing about the topic of dentistry. Being a student the topic is fresh in his head and he can add a unique twist to his blog based on his current experiences in dental school.

You can do the same, but it is important you find a topic you can stick with. The number one reason bloggers fail is topic selection.

When you create a blog you’ll want to have a topic you love. Not just some everyday topic but a topic you are really passionate about. It’s that simple, and that’s the key to all successful blogs.

Remember your not just blogging about your topic. Your building friends on social networks, joining groups and engaging yourself in the topic all over the web. If it’s a topic you don’t like then everything from writing to building relationships will seem hard.

To provide a huge boost to ensure success, try to select a topic around your hobbies, interests, and particular experiences. Everyone has some passion or hobbies that can be used to build a blog to earn money online.

Here are some questions to ask in helping you find a topic:

• What sports do you like?
• What non-work related area do people ask you about at work?
• When just surfing the internet for pleasure, what sites do you visit?
• What job related skills do you have? Any specialized skills?
• Do you have kids? What experiences do you have?
• At a party if you have to speak with a person what topic would you prefer?
• What type of books do you like to read?
• Do you have firsthand experience with health or medical conditions ?
• If you asked your best friend, what would he or she say you are most knowledgeable about?
• What is your favorite hobby?
• If you retired today what would you do all day?
• What volunteer activity would you do if you had all the time in the world?
• Are you knowledgeable or experienced with finance, home improvement, travel, relationships, photography, cars, or anything in your daily life?

It’s that simple. Just sit down and brainstorm and find that one area you are super passionate about. That will be the first step for you starting a successful blog that can make online income.

Actually it didn’t take rocket science to find this niche …it is a pretty common one. It is also a highly competitive niche, which is why I wanted to show it to you. This post will show you proof if you work hard to build your site into an authority you can definitely change your life financially.

The niche is teeth whitening. From some quick Google searches you can see it is highly competitive.

Take a look at a few of the top keywords.

Teeth Whitening:
Searches Per Month: 830,000
Phrase Match Competing Pages: 3.6 million

Teeth Bleaching
Searches Per Month: 60,500
Phrase Match Competing Pages: 231,000

Home Teeth Whitening:
Searches Per Month: 49,500
Phrase Match Competing Pages: 197,000

Whiten Teeth:
Searches Per Month: 135,000
Phrase Match Competing Pages: 326,000

While this niche is competitive one of its nice aspects is there are lots of high paying monetization options. Affiliate programs, CPA offers, and Ad Sense to name a few. It could even be expanded into a lead generation business delivering local leads to Cosmetic Dentist.

Another nice aspect of the niche is there are plenty of long tail (less competitive) keywords to write about. The content options are endless and it could even be expand into other cosmetic dentistry topics.

The biggest disadvantage to the niche is it is highly competitive. Most of you are probably thinking this niche is way to competitive. I am not going to argue that, it is competitive. But the site www.teethwhiteningreviews.com is proof that with a unique site and hard work you can create a true authority that “shows you the money” even in a highly competitive niche.

My guess is due to the niche being very competitive, teethwhiteningreviews.com started out focusing on the less competitive long tail keywords. The primary focus was probably on the keyword teeth whitening reviews. But the site has built itself into an authority which is reaping huge benefits in Google.

As of today it ranks #2 in Google for the term teeth whitening. Remember that keyword had 3.6 million competing pages. The site also ranks for many other terms such as online teeth whitening, teeth whitening products, and teeth whitening reviews.

A good lesson to learn from this site is that it has done a good job differentiating itself from the competition. It has some excellent reviews about teeth whitening. But more importantly it has created unique value with its whitening simulator. This adds tons of value to the site, further differentiating it in the niche and has driven tons of sites to link to it.

Side Note: If you get one lesson out of this post it is to differentiate your blog from the competition. Your content will be one aspect of that, but adding tools to your blog like the “whitening simulator” is another excellent way to differentiate your blog. Tools are also known to be tasty link bait.

Ok now to the number. So how does this site make six figures a year? Well looking at the site it is monetizing via Adsense and teeth whitening affiliate programs.

According to trafficestimate.com the monthly traffic to the site is 110,700 and the site’s Alexa rank is 111,171.

Looking at the site I would say most of the revenue is generated from Adsense. The cost to bid for a keyword in the teeth whitening niche via Adwords is about $5 to $7 per click for positions 1 – 3. This means via Adsense the site at the very lowest should be able to average .50 cents per click.

Based on the ad placements and relevance on the site I would estimate the Adsense ads are achieving an average of 20% click through.

At 110,700 visits a 20% click though on Adsense would result in 22,140 clicks a month. Averaging.50 cents for each click would puts yearly Adsene income at $132,840. This site also has many affiliate offers nicely intertwined in the content which I am sure are bringing in some additional coin.

So there you have it. If you are looking for a nice example of a site that is pulling in six figures a year, take your notepad out and review the strategy at www.teethwhiteningreviews.com.

By firing up your favorite blogging software and a little good old hard work you too can finding yourself dominating a niche and make money online!