You've heard the come-ons from dozens of sales sites: "Make Money Online NOW", "The Easy Way to Riches", "Work From Home And Make Big Bucks!", and thought, yeah, right.

But what if I told you that yes, indeed, you can make a very comfortable income, in just a couple of hours a day, from your cozy home office? (Wearing anything you like.) Further, what if I told you that some of the biggest companies in the world are slavering at the mouth to have you do just that? Career bloggers are in great demand.

What's a career blogger?

A career blogger is a person who is hired to blog (write a Web log) for a company, on a contract, usually for three to six month periods. A career blogger can also be a blogging entrepreneur, someone who sets up a number of blogs and monetizes them in various ways. In this article, we discuss becoming a blogger-for-hire, a blogging mercenary, if you will.

You can become a career blogger

I started working as a career blogger around a year ago. Businesses have realized the benefits of a blog: great content for their sites, wonderful customer relationship benefits, plus taking charge of their reputation management online.

How to get started as a career blogger

The first step in your career blogging venture is to create a blog. This "starter" blog will act as your blogging resume, or portfolio. You can set up your blog in a couple of minutes at Blogger.com at http://www.blogger.com/start

Do a little planning first. Decide what your blog's topic will be. As a career blogger, you'll be blogging for businesses as a blogger-for-hire, so if you have business smarts, your blog is the place to show it. If you're a marketer, for example, your blog's topic could be in the area of marketing, sales, branding -- any topic that you feel comfortable writing about every week.

On the other hand, if your marketing job bores you silly, choose an area about which you'd like to know more. Perhaps you're interested in investments, or in real estate. Both areas have companies which want and need bloggers, so choose one of those topics -- your blog will be interesting to your readers, because you're learning about your topic, and your enthusiasm for it will shine through.

Choosing a name for your blog

You can choose a name for your blog in various ways:

* For branding purposes (a name you choose because you intend it to represent your business, and will promote it heavily). Companies like Yahoo!, Nike, and Google all chose their names so they could build a recognizable brand).

* To get found more easily (by using keywords)

* To raise your profile online (by using your own name)

Get hired!

You've got your blog, now you need a blogging job. How will you find one? Via your blog, of course. All blog platforms create an About, or Profile page. Just reveal your availability on the page.

Don't want to wait for them to hire you? Type "blogger job" into Google's search query box, without the quotes. You'll find dozens of jobs. You can also explore job-search venues like Monster.com at http://www.monster.com/

Good luck. You'll find career blogging great fun, satisfying and lucrative. Get started career blogging now. Many bloggers start off moonlighting their blogging, before they go full-time, and you can too.

Not too many weeks from now, you'll be thinking: "Make Money Online NOW", "The Easy Way to Riches", "Work From Home And Make Big Bucks!": OH YEAH!

Copyright 2006 Angela Booth