Blogger Confessions #17: Alexander from DayTradingz.com
Happy Saturday and welcome to the 17th episode of the 'Blogger Confessions' interview series on the blog. Today, I'm bringing in Alexander from DayTradingz.com to talk about blogging and how they've managed to keep everything straight as a personal finance blogger.
Alexander, take it away.
Blogger Confessions with Alexander from DayTradingz.com
1: In at least 100 words, describe the target audience of your blog.
The world of speculative investment is colorful and glittering. Promising advertising is displayed in every corner of the Internet. We should all see how easy it is to get rich overnight. Guaranteed and of course without any risks.
I have been a day trader for many years and can tell you from my personal experience that the real world beyond advertising looks completely different.
The purpose of my blog is sensitizing beginners for all challenges associated with day trading. Also, I review financial products and services on a regular basis. I evaluate these objectively based on many years of experience.
And even if the name of my website doesn't imply it, I like to write about other areas of personal finance such as banking, retirement and general topics around money. A suitable slogan would probably be "daytradingz.com - where speculative investments meet smart money."
2: What makes your blog different from other blogs in the PF blogosphere?
Many personal finance bloggers avoid writing about speculative investments. But even those risky investments are about managing personal finances, saving money and making more out of your money.
From my point of view, the desires for financial independence are especially reflected in speculative investments. For these reasons, I am of the opinion that education work is urgently needed, especially in this segment of personal finance.
Based on many years of experience and thanks to the numerous feedbacks I have received, I know what goes through the minds of my readers and what is of particular interest to them.
In addition to an objective way of writing, it is particularly crucial for me to sensitize my readers to the risks and challenges associated with speculation. The fact that many short-term investors fail is mostly due:
- Undercapitalization,
- Incorrect assumptions regarding time requirements,
- poor preparation,
- impatience,
- impulsive action and unfortunately,
- also at the good faith on the part of investors.
Greed can make you blind sometimes, and I want to help investors with my blog to be better prepared, make the right decisions and protect their own money adequately.
3: What’s the thing that you’ve struggled with the most since starting your blog?
Those are actually the technical aspects around the blog. I've always been interested in technology. And still, every change is associated with new challenges.
For example, it was clear to me right from the start that I wanted to have my own hosted website and use Wordpress as my content management system. Within a week I had installed a Wordpress theme and a few plugins.
The first article went online, and already after a short time, I noticed that I would like to change a few things. And so all those challenges began, which reached their peak with the move of my site to a new web hoster about a month ago.
Usability, web design and website speed became more and more essential for me over time. That's why I regularly changed the Wordpress themes and plugins I used, reworked the web design, switched the entire website to HTTPS and changed the hosting provider.
I am delighted with the way it is now. And I also get positive feedback from my readers regarding the fast loading times and the new web design.
4: Do you publish your net worth on your blog? Why or why not?
To be honest, I am very skeptical about publishing my own financial figures on the Internet. What do we really know about the truth of financial information posted by other people? Nothing! We don't know whether these are real or fake. And that raises the question of the added value of such a publication.
As for me personally, only I know my own finances (well, and the tax office). And that's the way it should stay. That's why I decided not to publish any concrete information about my own financial situation.
5: Have you monetized your blog (ads, affiliate marketing, etc)? Why or why not?
Almost every week I receive requests from advertisers who want to advertise on my site. However, I almost always reject them. Well over 90% of my site is completely free of advertisements. My readers should be able to enjoy the content on my website without interrupting the reading flow.
To be honest, even on my website, it doesn't work without advertising. If a product really convinces me and offers a real added value, then I also integrate an advertising banner for it at a suitable point on my site.
Thereby, I follow my own strict guidelines.
For example, it is always a precondition that there is a free test version or at least an excellent money-back guarantee provided by the vendor for the products I promote. This way I remain true to my principles and my motivation to found the blog.
6: Would you rather be loved, hated or controversial? Explain, please!
We are all looking for confirmation in life. But if someone only praises you and praises you, it is a good feeling at first, but loses credibility over time.
Imagine someone is cooking for you, but you don't like the food. Nevertheless, you say: That's the tastiest food in the whole world. That's very nice and saves the night, but it doesn't work permanently.
At the latest after the second time, it is time to talk about it. Transferred to my blog, this means that I am pleased about both positive feedback and constructive criticism.
And yes, there is also something better than continual nagging. From my point of view, controversial discussions bring the most significant added value for all participants in the long run.
7: Who would you be horrified to know read your blog?
I stand by what I do and also friends and colleagues know about my hobby. Maybe I would be shocked if a celebrity with millions of followers would confess to reading my blog.
But then I would be more kind of positive horrified.
8: What’s your most favorite, least favorite and most embarrassing post on your blog?
My very comprehensive online guides such as "How to Build a Day Trading Computer (Even on a Tight Budget)," which sometimes have a word length of up to 10,000 words per article, are very popular with my readers. However, even here the differences between the posts are enormous.
My most favorite blog post
The unbeaten leader on my website for a long time is The Best Stock Screener (50+ Reviewed But Only a Few Are Good. Stock screeners, stock scanners and charting tools are not only very popular for day traders, but also for long-term investors. To provide a really comprehensive insight into the world of stock screening tools, I have analyzed, categorized and evaluated more than 50 tools throughout more than 2 months. And so I am more than happy that the article is so well received by my readers:
My least favorite blog post
My least favorite post can be found here. Many readers have clicked on the article and also a Facebook campaign has shown that there is great interest in the topic and the post is often shared.
But unfortunately, my readers only stay on this page for a very short time.
However, I would like my visitors to be very satisfied with the content. And so I set myself the goal of creating the most comprehensive contribution ever made on this topic. After many weeks of research and countless cinematic evenings in front of the TV, the time had come. On 8 October 2018, the article "The Best Stock Market, Finance and Wall Street Movies Of All Time" went online.
My most embarrassing post
Here we come to a point where I have to be very self-critical. Why? Because at the moment my article Day Trading for Beginners (The 9 Best Kept Secrets Revealed) is the most embarrassing one.
It is a post from my early days after the founding of the blog. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to update it yet. By no means should it remain that way.
In the future, I would like to guide my readers even better towards the topic and making the content more compelling.
By this way, I am pleased to get feedback from my readers about this article from time to time. I take the comments and suggestions very seriously and have been working for some time on an entirely new version of the article.
According to current planning, the new version will go online in November 2018 and will develop into an interactive, extremely informative contribution. My goal in this article is to answer all of my readers' questions about day trading in detail. In the time to come, it is intended to be the most widely recognized free online guide about day trading.
9: Explain your writing process
I would like to describe my writing process as structured and agile at the same time. As soon as a concrete idea manifests itself, there is no more holding. I set everything in motion to publish the best possible contribution as quickly as possible.
In the first weeks and months that my blog was online, I spent days thinking about whether my idea was really such a great one and whether the intended article would be well received by the readers. Over time, a look at the visitor statistics made it clear to me that I had to say goodbye to this approach. Too often I was wrong with my assessment.
In the end, I can feel an endless amount of enthusiasm for a contribution. Yet whether my readers think the same is an entirely different story.
That's why I've decided to simply put my ideas into action. With success. During the last year, my visitor numbers have more than doubled.
And there is an agile part as well. For some posts, there will probably never be a final version. I regularly edit my detailed online guides, add new information or optimize the form of presentation.
There is one thing I would like to ask you, dear readers, for your opinion at this point. I live in Germany and initially write my texts in German. Then I translate them into English and have them proofread by a native speaker before publication.
Unfortunately, this leads to the fact that the time span between idea and publication is enormous in some cases. What do you prefer?
- Several quickly published contributions that are technically clean, but contain a linguistic error of a "non-native speaker" here and there
- Less content, but proofread by a native speaker, which will be published with a corresponding delay.
I would be glad if you would leave a comment at the end of this article. Thank you very much for your support. By the way, the article you are reading here has been published before proofreading.
10: What is your favorite blog in the PF blogosphere (other than your own!)?
There are many wonderful personal finance blogs in this world. I don't follow a particular personal finance blog but instead look for contributions to topics that currently fascinate me.
The good thing is that there is a website where I can find the latest posts from many personal finance blogs. The name of the site is RockstarFinance.com.
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