How To Start A Blog {Going Beyond Startup For Beginners}

What is a blog?

A blog is a website that publishes regularly updated content.

Each piece of published content is listed in reverse chronological order, which means, the last article posted is shown first.

As a beginning blogger, some common questions you might have are:

I’m assuming you want to start a blog to make money.

If that’s so, this post is for you. You will learn how to start a self-hosted blog, not a free blog.

Self-hosted means, you purchase a domain name and pay for your own hosting in order to create a website.

Every blog needs a website.

So you’re gonna have to build a website or have one created for you if you want to start a blog.

But, before you start building your website you need to

Choose a Niche

A niche is the topic area that you’ll be blogging about.

Whatever ideas you come up with and decide to blog about, that is your niche.

For example food, games, phones, etc.

How to choose a niche

There are a number of different ways to come up with blog niche ideas.

You will hear things like, go with your passion, interest/hobby, skill, or market demand.

I recommend incorporating two or more if you plan to make money from your blog.

Let’s take a closer look at the benefits of choosing a niche based on the following:

Skills/Experience: If you choose a skill/experienced base niche, you’d be sharing about something that you’re good at and have experience in.

You can use your past/previous work or life experiences to help someone.

The more you know about what you’re doing, the better you’ll be able to help your audience and the more you’ll look like an authority in your niche.

Passion/Interest: Choosing a niche that you’re passionate about will keep you from getting bored easily or running out of ideas to blog about.

Because you’re so passionate about it you’ll be more excited to share. So be sure to figure out what you enjoy doing and what gets you excited.

Also, think about what you’re interested in learning about. You can blog about what you’re learning.

Market Demand: It would be unprofitable if you choose a niche no one is interested in.

Find a need and fill it.

Make sure your niche has people who are ready to spend money. If there’s no demand for your niche, you’re not going to make money blogging.

You can research your topic and check out the competition to get an idea of whether or not your desired niche is in demand.

My advice is to choose a niche that has a market demand + any one of the others.

If you want to learn more about how to choose a niche check out the articles below.

How To Choose A Profitable Niche In 2022

How to Find Your Business Niche by Business News Daily

How To Choose A Niche For Your Blog In 2022 by BloggingWizard

Now, let’s look at

How To Create a website?

The easiest and fastest way to create a website is to use website builders.

Website building platforms will allow you to create a website in minutes using drag and drop features.

They are the way to go if you want to start a blog fast.

With website builders, you don’t have to know how to code and you do not need any special tech skills or experience.

Let’s dive into the steps of creating a website using a website-building platform.

Steps to create a website

Your first step to building a self-hosted website is to

Choose a Domain Name

A domain name is the name people will use to find your business online.

Having a domain name gives you ownership of the website.

It is how you will be recognized and found by humans and search engines.

It is also the first piece of your brand.

Below is a screenshot of a domain example and definition by Moz.

There are many different domain extensions. Domain extensions are referred to as top-level domain or TLD for short.

For example, .com, .org, .edu, .gov, .info, etc.

.com domains are the most popular.

Best Tips for Choosing a Domain

You can purchase a domain separate from hosting, however, it will be cheaper if you get one with the hosting company you’ll choose.

Most hosting companies offer a free domain for the first year when you purchase hosting from them.

That’s the route I took.

If you’d rather get a domain separate from your hosting, you can.

There are domain registrars where you can get a domain at a reasonable price.

Godaddy is one of the most popular.

You can use the tool below to check if your domain name is available.

Now, let’s get a domain and purchase hosting.

Purchase Hosting

You’re probably wondering, what is hosting?

Hosting is a web/network of servers that keeps your website files/data safe and accessible on the internet.

Web hosting companies provide storage space for websites on one or more servers on the internet.

They take care of all the technical stuff and ensure that when visitors click a URL on your site the content of that URL is visible.

So, in short, web hosting is what allows your website to be visible online.

Watch the short video below to get a better understanding, if you don’t understand.

There are many types of hosting to choose from (shared, dedicated, VPS hosting, etc.).

For a detailed guide on web hosting providers and the different types of hosting read this guide.

Shared hosting is the best choice for beginners and it’s the most popular.

It’s also the cheapest.

What this means, is that you share a server and its resources with other websites.

There are many different hosting companies.

But, they pretty much all offer the same hosting services with a few differences.

One of their main difference is their pricing.

I’ll list a few of the preferred choices below.

Bluehost

Bluehost is perhaps the most popular web hosting company for bloggers. Their yearly plans start at $2.75 per month.

Hostgator

Hostgator is one of the best and most popular hosting companies around. They have yearly plans starting from as low as $2.75 per month.

Hostinger

Hostinger is the cheapest hosting provider on the market today, with their yearly plans starting as low as $1.39 per month.

Namecheap

Namecheap is the second cheapest hosting company, their yearly hosting plans start at $1.88 per month.

Beginners Tip: Never choose the plan that allows you to have just 1 website. The price difference may only be a couple of cents to a dollar more for unlimited websites.

Hostinger and Namecheap are the most affordable hosting companies.

While Hostgator and Bluehost are the most popular choices for beginners.

I’m going to skip the parts that walk you through the steps of purchasing web hosting because the hosting companies do an excellent job of that once you click their get started button.

This guide covers web hosting in greater detail, as well as other hosting companies and also Amazon web service (AWS), Google Cloud hosting, and Yahoo web hosting.

Important Note: If you already have a domain name hosted with another company and you want to switch, you’ll have to point your domain to your new hosting.

This is done by using a DNS system (domain name server). Your hosting provider will give you anywhere between 2-4 nameservers.

You would then input the nameservers into your domain registrar’s custom nameserver fields 1 & 2. Once that’s done, you’re all set.

Just give it anywhere between a couple of minutes-hours for it to take effect.

After you’ve purchased your hosting it’s time to

Install WordPress

So, what is WordPress?

WordPress is a blogging platform that allows website users to store online entries or blog posts.

It is a content management system or CMS for short. This organizes web content such as pictures, videos, text, etc for your site.

Sam Smith says “I know I’m not the only one”, neither is WordPress the only CMS, but

Some other common CMS’ are Joomla, Drupal, and Ghost.

However, right now, I don’t know anything about them except for their names, so I can’t tell you anything about them.

I personally use WordPress and so that’s what I’ll focus on.

I currently use Hostgator hosting company but WordPress features are the same on all hosting companies.

To install WordPress, log in to your Hostgator or your hosting provider’s Cpanel.

Cpanel is the control center/panel of your hosting account.

Click sign in, to go to your Cpanel dashboard.

In the dashboard select install WordPress.

Click the install drop-down button and select quick install.

Click the drop-down menu and choose the domain name that you want to install WordPress on.

Next, set up your admin account details.

Select the theme you want or you can skip this step until after you’ve installed WordPress.

Next, enter the email address you want your log-in details to be sent to, and then hit install.

That’s it, WordPress is installed.

Now let’s

Customize WordPress

I’ll walk you through the steps of configuring your most important WordPress settings.

Your WordPress dashboard homepage will look like the image below.

Click the screen options tab to open its settings, then check or uncheck whatever you want to show on your dashboard.

Now, let’s configure the WordPress settings.

Click on the settings tab, it will take you to the general settings.

The first thing you should do is make sure the WordPress and site addresses are the same.

Next, select general and enter the name of your site and tagline.

Check ‘anyone can register’ and set ‘new user role’ to ‘subscriber’.

Then set your preferred language. Save changes to apply settings.

Every time you make a change always remember to click save changes.

Next, select the writing tab and set your default post category to blog.

This will ensure that whenever you create a new post it will automatically be added to the ‘blog category’ if you didn’t specify where it should go.

If you don’t set this, each new post you create will automatically go under uncategorized.

Next, click the reading tab and select the page you want as your homepage. You can choose either a static page or your blog page.

Next, decide how many posts you want to be shown on your blog pages. Also, if you want full text or excerpt (a few sentences).

Be sure to leave search engine visibility unchecked so search engines can index your site.

Remember to click save changes every time you change a setting.

Next, move on to the discussion settings.

The discussion area is where you set commenting preferences. Just read them carefully and select the best options for you.

Next, move on to permalinks settings.

Permalink means a permanent link. They are website URLs that should not be changed.

Permalinks contain your domain name + a slug at the end.

You should avoid having numbers or special characters in your slug. Try to make your slugs keyword-focused.

Be sure to check ‘post name’. This will keep your website URL’s structure neat and organized.

Finally, select your privacy policy page.

All websites must have a privacy policy. You can create one yourself or use a privacy policy generator to populate one for you.

With your WordPress settings out the way, it’s time to move on to your

Website Design

Your blog is your new baby, so now you have to beautify it.

The design of your website includes its theme, logo, colors, typography, plugins, etc.

Themes

A theme is a folder containing templates, images, and stylesheets to make your website beautiful.

Consider the theme as your website’s clothing.

To access the theme area, click on the ‘Appearance’ tab in your WordPress dashboard.

By default when you install your blogging platform (WordPress), you’ll have access to a few free themes in the dashboard that you can activate and use.

There are many free blog and e-commerce WordPress themes in the WordPress library of free themes.

Scan through them and select the one that best suits your website’s purpose.

You can also purchase a premium theme from a place like Envato Markets, then upload, install, and activate it.

I personally use Generatepress, it’s easy to use, and fast. Plus their customer support staff is amazing.

Once you’ve installed your theme, it’s time to customize it.

The customizing of your theme includes your layout, colors, logo, images, fonts, etc.

Every theme is different and each has its own different look, however, the customizer dashboard is the same for all.

Your site identity area is where you’ll add your site title, tagline, logo, and site icon.

You would have already accessed this when you did the general WordPress settings. Skip this part if you’ve already set it.

The name of the site will show up if you don’t have a logo.

Logo and Site Icon

Your logo should have a transparent background so that it can naturally blend in with any background color you choose.

I left mine white because my background color is white.

The site icon is what will appear in the browser bar next to your post or page name.

Site Layout

The site layout section allows you to choose how you want each section of your website to be displayed.

Here you decide if and where you want sidebars, widgets, etc.

Colors

Your site color section lets you set the colors for each part of your site.

If you have a premium theme, you can set the colors you want to be used on your site.

Some free themes come with color limitations. Some don’t give you the option of picking your own colors; you’ll have to choose one of theirs.

Typography

The typography section is where you’ll set the font style and size.

You can set your H1 color, size, and style. It can be different from the rest of your content.

Beginners Tip: Aim for a theme that has a simple design, is responsive, SEO friendly, and has great customer support. Themes give trouble sometimes and you’ll need support to quickly correct them.

Now we’ll take a quick look at

How To Create Menus, Categories, and Tags

Your menu is the navigation area of your website.

The menu gives your site’s visitors access to other parts of your site.

Whichever theme you install will come with some menu navigation areas. You can add, delete, or edit the menus you want.

There are two ways to access your menu area when you want to create or edit it.

Select create a new menu, add the name (main menu, footer menu, etc) and then click create menu.

Click the drop-down arrow if you want to edit a menu.

Once you’ve created your menu you can add pages, categories, links, etc.

To access the categories area click post and then select categories.

After adding your categories you can then add them to the menu.

To add categories or pages to the menu click the dropdown arrow and check the ones that you want.

Once done click add to menu, then select save menu.

The last thing you’ll want to do is decide where you want the menu to appear. That is in the footer, header, etc.

Here is a great post by Wpbeginner, that shows you in greater detail how to add menus and categories to your site.

Next, we’ll take a look at some

Essential Website Pages

Every website has pages. Some have one page, while others have multiple pages.

Pages are static.

Before you add pages to your blog, you need to decide on the purpose of your blog. Is it for fun or for business?

Knowing this will help you to determine which pages to create for your site.

For example, if you’re blogging for business then you’ll need a service/product page, whereas if you’re blogging for fun you wouldn’t need that page.

Ok, with that out of the way, below are some must-have pages every site needs.

1. Homepage:

This is the main page of your blog or your blog’s landing page. It is the first page your visitors will land on when they type in your domain name.

That page should tell what your site is about and help visitors easily navigate to other sections of your site.

2. Contact Page:

This page should have your contact information so that visitors or customers can get in touch with you.

3. About Page:

Your about page should tell your visitors who you are, your purpose, the mission, and the vision of your website.

4. Blog Archive:

This contains all the posts on your blog, it has the last post listed first. You should try not to let your archive page show more than 10 posts per page.

This is only if your website has a blog. Not all websites have a blog section.

5. Policy Page:

This page should let the users know why their personal information is collected, who has access to it, and what it’s used for.

On your privacy policy page, you can also have your disclaimer, terms and condition, and disclosure.

Disclaimer

Your disclaimer protects you from lawsuits by letting the user know not to rely on information posted on your site.

In other words, let the reader know while you provide the information, results aren’t guaranteed.

Terms and Condition

Your terms section lets your users know what to expect from your site, and what rights and restrictions they have.

It protects you from liability and protects your work as well.

Disclosure

The disclosure lets your readers know how you make money from your site. If you’re an affiliate, partners require that you have an affiliate disclosure on your site.

Your disclosure can also go within each post that has affiliate links or in the sidebar.

Next, are your

Plugins

Plugins are used to enhance the functionality and beauty of your site.

Installing a plugin is the same process as installing a theme.

Premium themes often come with certain specific plugins to make them functional.

There are many different types of plugins that you can use to give your site extra functionality.

However, the most important plugins you will need are

Page builder

This allows you to easily build web pages by simply dragging and dropping elements where you want them.

Examples are, Elementor and WPBakery.

Backups

This will allow you to backup your site files and data so you can retrieve them in the event something goes wrong with your site.

For example, UpdraftPlus.

Security

Security plugins like Jetpack and Antispam Bee will protect your site from hackers and spam attacks.

Caching

Caching plugins store data for later use.

This helps to speed up your website.

An example of a caching plugin is the W3 Total Cache.

SEO

These plugins help you to optimize your content for search engines so you can rank on Google.

Examples are Yoast and Rank Math.

Site Kit

This is a Google software that connects your website to Google’s webmaster services so you can get valuable insights.

More on that in the website tracking section further down.

Image optimizer

This allows you to compress your high-quality images and make them smaller without changing their resolution.

Compressing your images helps your site to load faster.

Examples are Nitropack and Smush.

We are finally at the end of the create a website section.

How To Create A Website Key Take-Aways

If you followed along and created your website, CONGRATULATIONS!

That was a lot, wasn’t it?

Take a few minutes break and let it all sink in, then move on to

Email Marketing

Email Marketing is using emails to directly connect with your audience on a 1-to-1 basis and build a relationship with them.

It is also used to share information/updates, and promote your products/services.

After creating a website you need to have a landing page that will attract and engage your audience and prompt them to take an action.

However, a landing page must be connected to an email service provider (ESP) in order to capture a visitor’s email address.

Once you’ve obtained their email addresses you can use email marketing to connect with them.

Email marketing highlights

1. Email service provider (ESP)

2. Landing pages

3. Lead magnets

4. Opt-in/web forms

5. Welcome emails and newsletters

What Is An ESP?

ESPs provide an online business with tools and services to capture and store subscriber information, as well as manage email communications.

ESPs are also referred to as email marketing tools or platforms and email marketing software.

They manage all email marketing campaigns for the business.

Landing pages, lead magnets, and sign-up forms are essential parts of a blog or business.

Whenever you see a landing page or form requesting contact information it is always connected to an ESP.

Some of the best email marketing service providers are:

1. Getresponse

2. Mailerlite

3. Constant Contact

4. Moosend

5. Convertkit

6. Aweber

To learn more about the different types of email marketing software read this guide.

So

What Is A Landing Page?

A landing page is the homepage of your website.

It is the main page a visitor lands on when they click on a link to your site. That means any page can be considered your landing page.

However, in digital marketing, it refers to a page that is designed for a visitor to take a specific action.

Such action would convert that visitor into a subscriber or a customer.

A landing page will not work if it does not have a web form that is connected to an email marketing platform.

For example

When you click the ad link above, you’re directed to the site in the image below. That is a landing page.

If you look carefully at the highlighted sections in the image above, you’ll notice that the purpose is to get you to take an action.

Every marketing landing page has a web/opt-in form.

All web forms have one or more data input fields, a call to action (CTA), and a lead magnet (freebie) connected to them.

The CTA is the message that tells the reader exactly what action to take (start your free trial).

CTAs are hyperlinks. They can be a button, image, or text link.

Remember, all web forms are connected to an email service provider/email marketing software.

Now, let’s look at

Why A Landing Page Is Important

A landing page has one intended purpose, that is, to get a visitor to take an action. Every link on that page will direct visitors to complete that action.

There are no distractions such as ads, images, banners, videos, or posts to take your attention away from the goal of the page.

Landing pages keep the readers focused on taking the specified action.

All landing pages are not the same, but they all have the same goal; that is, to convert a lead (visitor) into a subscriber (customer).

The goal is to get the reader’s email address.

But

Getting their email address is not easy unless you give them a good reason to hand it over or offer them something of value in return.

And that’s where a lead magnet comes in.

What A Lead Magnet Is

A lead magnet is something that you give away for FREE in exchange for an email address.

You’ve come across a few of those, haven’t you?

With your lead magnet, you give away something that will benefit the visitor if you want their email address.

Anything can be offered as a lead magnet, as long as it brings value to or benefits the lead.

In digital marketing, the most common

Types of lead magnets are:

• Checklists

• Toolkits

• Ebooks

• Discounts & Coupons

• Free Trials & Samples

• Free Consultations

• Webinars

Take a look at the landing page example below and see if you can identify the type of lead magnet that is being offered.

Did you notice that their lead magnet is a free trial? You get an A++ if you did.

In fact, they have two lead magnets on their page, a demo request, and a free trial.

And in order for you to access them, you have to submit your email address.

This brings us to web/opt-in forms.

What Is An Opt-In Form?

An opt-in form is a form that is used to collect information.

It is also referred to as a web form or sign-up form. The names are used interchangeably.

These forms can have more than one field to enter information.

It all depends on the purpose of your form.

However, the most effective forms have one or two form fields (name and email address).

The more information a form requires, the less inclined people are to sign-up.

Example of a two-field web form.

Web/opt-in forms differ in text and style from site to site, but remember, all have the same purpose.

There are many places on a website where you can put a web form.

Some common places to put a web form are:

• Sidebar

• Above the fold on a homepage

• In the body of a post

• As a ribbon at the top of a website

• On the about page

• In the footer

• An exit-intent

• A page takeover

Most websites have a web form in multiple places.

The most common areas are above the fold on the homepage and in the sidebar.

The key to winning with your subscribe form is to offer a great lead magnet.

To do this you must know and understand the needs of your target audience.

While capturing a visitor’s email address is important, it is even more important that you connect with them and make them feel welcomed.

This brings us to

Welcome Emails & Newsletters

After someone signs up for your free offer or subscribes to your list, you should send them a welcome email.

The email lets them know that you are a real person, you value them giving you their email address, and you have their best interest at heart.

You can personalize the message by adding their names and what they’re interested in if it was made known on the signup form.

Let them know how often they’ll hear from you and what to expect.

With a good email marketing tool, you can segment and personalize your audience.

List Segmentation

List segmentation is when you separate your subscribers into different groups/ categories based on their interests.

Create specific content for each segment.

Segmenting your list ensures that you are sending the right message to the right person at the right time.

When this is done there is a greater email open rate.

Once your list is separated, you can automate your emails.

Automation

Email automation allows you to send specific emails at specific times to specific people.

With automation, you don’t have to keep creating emails every time. You can create a workflow using an automation tool to set triggers and it will do the work for you.

Email automation is the perfect way to interact with your audience, get to know them, and build lasting relationships with them.

Email Marketing Key Take-Aways

1. Email marketing is very important for an online business.

2. Every website needs a landing page.

3. All landing pages have a web form connected to a lead magnet.

4. A lead magnet is always connected to an ESP.

5. Some of the best ESPs are

• Getresponse
• Constant Contact
• Mailerlite
• Moosend
• Convertkit
• Aweber

6. Welcome emails and newsletters help you build relationships with your audience.

That wraps up this section.

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