Hey there!
Thank you for landing on this page.
If you are going to start a blog today, this is the first place that you should start with.
Why you should start from here?
In this page, I am going to provide you a Step-By-Step guide in starting a blog.
At the end of this page, you will learn to build a blog where:
- Contents can be easily managed via WordPress.
- Professionally designed blog without having any web design knowledge.
- Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Social Media such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn ready.
Ready? Here we go!
Note: Some of the links below are affiliate links where I will gain some commission for referring you to the product.
Chapter 1 – Fundamental Of A Blog
What do you know about blogging and starting a blog?
Many bloggers step off on the wrong foot by blogging on blogging platform such as Blogger (formerly known as Blogspot), WordPress.com, Tumblr and etc because they are completely FREE.
What’s wrong with that?
You don’t get to have full control of your blog where you only get to create content and publish them.
Customizing, designing, and enhancing your blog is a nightmare.
The reason I am so sure about this is because I was one of them but not anymore because I had successfully migrated my blog to my own web hosting with proper domain name.
So, don’t repeat my mistake and if you are starting a brand new blog today, do it the right way.
Here are some useful articles that you might want to check out:
- What is a blog and what do you know about blogging
- Why I don’t blog on Blogger or WordPress.com
- 7 reasons why I think WordPress is Awesome
Chapter 2 – Find the right niche
Another common mistake by most bloggers is they build a personal blog that talks about everything under the sky.
If you are blogging in that way, you are only out there to gain friends because people who followed your blog want to know what you are doing as a friend.
However, if you have a blog that only write about specific niche, the outcome will be different.
People who followed your blog see you as a domain expert of the niche that you are writing about.
Just like this blog, you are seeing me as a domain expert in Blogging and people who followed me wanted to learn more about blogging skills.
If I were to sell you anything that can improve your blogging skills, chances that you will buy from me is higher than any blogger that blogs randomly.
I had written a piece of article on how to find your niche where you should get some idea in defining the niche for your next successful blog
Chapter 3 – Get your Web Hosting & Domain Name
A lot of starters confused between web hosting and domain name.
Here is a simple scenario that explains them:
A web hosting is like your home while a domain name is like your street address. You web hosting contains all the files, images and contents and the domain name is what I need to know in order to reach your web hosting. Just like using your street address to guide someone to your home.
So, web hosting and domain name are two different things and you need both of them first before you can build your blog.
How to pick a good domain name?
I had purchased over 21 domain names in the past and here are my lessons learned where I think it can guide you into choosing the right domain name.
As for web hosting, I personally had been using Hostgator as part of my web hosting provider (and they sell domain name as well).
The main reason I choose to use them is because they had been more than a decade in the web hosting business and the support had been great with the service of live chat, ticketing, large knowledge-based, email and even direct phone call support.
I can’t say they are the best in the world because there are better ones such as WP Engine that is more expensive than standard Hostgator package but provide way better WordPress hosting.
Hence for a starter with limited startup budget, a regular web hosting should be sufficient.
So, if you still don’t have a web hosting or planning to switch to a better one, click here to get one.
Chapter 4 – Install WordPress & A WordPress Theme
As mentioned in the introduction, I will be guiding to build a blog on top of the WordPress CMS.
If you signed up with the Hostgator web hosting above, you will be able to follow exactly what I had written in this post ‘How to install a WordPress blog in just minutes‘.
And if you are not, you should also be able to catch the idea on how to install the WordPress CMS into your web hosting (Unless you use a really bad one that doesn’t comes with CPanel, DirectAdmin and etc.).
Once you had your WordPress installed, you should be able to preview your blog with the default first post “Hello World”.
The next thing that you need is to install a WordPress theme to make your blog looks outstanding.
I recommended the Genesis Framework and its’ Child Themes.
The reason why I love this theme so much is because it helps me to build a professional blog WITHOUT even need to know any Web Design skills.
I’m serious and I even drafted a detailed post on how you can also do it as a proof to my word.
At the end of this chapter, your blog should look as great as any professional blog out there.
Chapter 5 – Configure Your WordPress Blog
In this chapter, I am going to talk a little about a module in WordPress called ‘Plugin’.
The WordPress plugin is an item that can be installed into your WordPress blog for certain enhancement.
Since this is an Open Source Software, you will find tons of plugins from Free to Paid for you to install.
Hence, this will take a lot of time for you to search and identify the necessary plugins for your blog.
As a result, I had listed the necessary plugins that you should have at the beginning of your blog.
1. Google Analytics.
Google Analytics is a free solution from Google where you can use it to track the traffic of your blog. You will need this plugin in order to benchmark your blogging performance. Find out how to install and use here.
2. Google WebMaster Tool.
Everyone uses Google today to search for useful stuff. As a result, in order for your blog to be listed on Google, you need to first submit your blog to the Google WebMaster Tool. This is also a free tool provided by Google to track your blog’s performance on Google Search. Find out how to install and use here.
3. Anti Spammer Tool.
When you blog starts to get popular, spammers will start to target you and annoy you by leaving irrelevant comments on your blog. There are two types of spammers where one is a robot and another one is human. I had covered two plugins on how to battle these two types of spammer in this post.
4. Related Post Plugin.
The related post plugin is a plugin that display a list of related post from your blog at the end of a blog post. Why this plugin is important? This is because you can keep your readers stick to your blog after finishing your blog post by reading another one. Find out how to install and use here.
5. Contact Form.
Publishing your email on your blog is sure one way for your readers to contact you but definitely not the best way. So, the best way is to create a form on a page and ask your reader to drop their name, email, subject and message that they want to tell you. It sounds like a lot of HTML work but not really when you are using WordPress. So, find out how to install and use the contact form plugin here.
6. Speed Up Your Blog.
The speed of your blog is extremely important. Research shows that most visitors will not wait for more than 5 seconds for a blog to load. On top of that, the Google Search engine gives you a better SEO score for having a fast loading blog because it gives user a good user experience. Hence, you really need to consider having a fast loading blog and you can learn how to install the W3 Total Cache and use it here.
7. Social Media Button.
There is no doubt that everyone uses Social Media today. When I say social media here, I refer to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and etc. So, having the ability to display a simple share button around your blog post simplifies your reader’s intention to share your stories to the social media. If you are not thinking of investing into such plugin, you can find out how to do it for free here. However, if you like to have an elegant looking social media buttons, you can get the one I am using here.
Chapter 6 – Build Contents and Generate Traffic
At the end of chapter 5, you should have your blog completely setup.
You next task is to build quality and useful content, generate traffic and finally profit!
Writing great contents, generating web traffic and monetizing a blog are all part of what will be covered in my blog.
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About the Author: Alan Tay is the owner and founder of Blogging Fever.
