How to Start a Blog: A Beginner's Guide

Start a Blog on WordPress Using Bluehost

How to Start A Blog: A Beginner’s Guide

Why Start a Blog?

There are many reasons to start blogging! Here are just a few of them:

As a form of self-expression
Have a source of side-income that is a low investment with a potential for high return (There are many bloggers who are making anywhere from $1000/month to being millionaires from blogging from affiliate marketing, displaying ads, promoting their own products and services, sponsored ads, and more – and you can start for as little as $3/month)
Drive traffic to your website or business
To help others
Establish authority
Build community and support
You love writing
You want to inspire others
You want to make a difference and leave lasting impression.

Okay, so now maybe you are a bit interested in starting a blog but are unsure about what it entails to get started. Here are my tips to setting up a strong foundation for your blogging journey.

1. Choose Your Blog Niche

Before you start your blog, it’s important to get an idea of what niche you want to belong to: What sort of blog do you want to create?

There are many different blog niches out there:

Art & Design Blog
Personal Growth Blog
Food Blog
Lifestyle Blog
Outdoors Blog
Interior Design Blog
And so much more!

Choose a blog niche you know you want to write about. You do not necessarily need to be an expert in that field – Maybe you’re a beginning hobbyist – That is completely fine and normal!

Have some experience in your niche so that you can bring your own insights to your readers, but most importantly – Have a love and interest in the niche that you plan on focusing on.

*Tip: There are some niches that are harder to break into compared to other niches, especially when it comes to bringing in organic traffic from Google. Examples include Fitness, Food, and Personal Finance Blogs.

Don’t let this bring you down though. Try to specify your niche a little further (What kind of Food blog will you create?).

Another way is to promote your blog through means such as Pinterest! Pinterest has the potential of bringing in as much traffic as Google can depending on your niche.

2. Brainstorm some Domain Names

Get creative!

My domain name is my actual name because aside from being a blogger, I am a painter and writer, and it’s customary to have my name as my website name. You can try this too if you want your name to be known as your brand.

If you want to create a more business-like website, I recommend creating a business name for your blog. Have it relate to your niche and make it a name that is fairly memorable.

Consider making your domain name flexible because you may slightly alter your niche in the future or even branch out.

3. What is the Best Website-Building Platform for Bloggers?

I do not recommend website-building platforms like WIX, Weebly, Blogger, etc for blogging. It’s harder to monetize your site and have full freedom and capabilities to truly grow your blog.

I first started out blogging with Squarespace, but soon had to make the switch to WordPress so that I could really put my website first. Squarespace makes blogging effortlessly easy, but there is a point when you may hit a wall you can’t overcome until you truly have full ownership and control over your site.

You can read more about my reasons for switching from Squarespace to WordPress here, but the main reason I switched was because my website speed had become so slow with all the blog posts I was publishing (I had 40 to 50 blog posts on my blog). I was in-fact ranking in the bottom 20th percentile for speed. (And yes, I was compressing my images)

I wanted to get premium hosting in the future for my website, but with Squarespace you are stuck with their hosting capabilities – So I took the leap and made the switch to WordPress and am 100% glad I did!

For this reason, if you are planning on starting a blog, I highly recommend using WordPress.

WordPress is free; However, you do need to pay for hosting, which costs as little as $3.95/month with Bluehost. I personally use the Plus plan ($5.95/month) for more unlimited options

Here are just a few reasons why Bluehost is so awesome

It’s super affordable: Plans start for as low as $3.95/month (Squarespace and other drag-and-drop website builders are usually around $12/month)
It comes with a FREE SSL Certificate: It’s important for your website to have an SSL certificate so that Chrome doesn’t block your site as potentially unsafe for your potential visitors.
1 FREE Domain Registration
1-Click easy WordPress installation
Site Backup is available
24/7 Support via Chat, Email, Phone, and Tutorials (If there’s a problem, they will resolve it for you)
30 Day Money Back Guarantee

4. Set up WordPress Self-Hosting with Bluehost

The great thing about starting up a WordPress with Bluehost is that it just takes 5 minutes! They make setup and installation so quick – Installation is a simple one-click process. Here is a run-down of how to set up your Bluehost account.

When you go to BLUEHOST’S HOMEPAGE, you’ll see this page:

Click the green Get Started Now button

Next, Let’s pick a plan

If you’re just starting out, you may want to go with the BASIC $3.95/month plan.

If you’re super excited about starting your blogging journey and want to go all the way, the $5.95/month plan may be the best fit for you. Either way, all the plans are super affordable! (I am currently using their PLUS plan)

Next, Let’s set up your Domain Name

The only thing you have to look out for is that your domain name isn’t already taken.

*Tip: Try sticking to a .com domain, as they are the easiest to remember.

Next, fill in your account information and go over your Bluehost package extras.

The extras you can choose to activate for your site are Codeguard Basic and Bluehost SEO Tools Start. They are optional and you don’t need to activate them.

Codeguard Basic offers daily backups for your site automatically. I know when I first started up my site on WordPress I accidentally crashed it and this made it so easy to restore my site to the day before. There are also free plugins available for backing up your site – so don’t fret if you can’t afford it!

There are also many free plugins for SEO that you can use on WordPress such as All in One SEO and Yoast SEO. I personally use Yoast SEO.

Finish completing your purchase and create a password for your account.

After this, you should be all signed up for Bluehost. Log in to your Bluehost account and you can start installing WordPress!

Feel free to choose a free theme – You can change this later as your site is not live yet (Any visitors will be seeing a “Coming Soon” page).

Next, go to your Bluehost Dashboard and navigate towards the sidebar. Click My Sites. Then Log in to WordPress. You will find yourself on the WordPress dashboard where you can start working on building your site.

4. Start Building Your Website and Blog

BASIC THINGS TO WORK ON:

Appearance > Theme > Choose a free theme or install one that you have purchased

I highly recommend purchasing a premium theme (See my blog post on a collection of WordPress Blog Themes to choose from). Find a theme that you know you will stick with for a long time, and that sometimes means it’s going to be an investment, but it will be worth it. Themes oftentimes comes with instructions on how to set it up, and this will provide an easy way to set up your site step-by-step.

Appearance > Customize > Customize your new theme (If you purchased one, make sure to follow the instructions they provide you. Following these instructions will make the process so much easier!)

Page > Add New: Create any new pages you will need (Usually themes will come with a Home and Blog Page Template you can use, but you may want to create an About Me or Contact page.)

Posts > Add New: Create blog posts this way. I recommend having 10-20 blog posts up on your site before you launch.

Settings > General, Reading, Writing, Discussion (Edit Settings according to your needs)

Plugins > Install New (Plugins your theme needs, YeostSEO, Jetpack, WP Super Cache, etc)

4. Launch Your Site

When your website is ready to go live, navigate to your WordPress Dashboard. In the sidebar (WordPress Control Panel), find Bluehost, then “Launch” site to go live!

You website is now live to the world!

If you have any problems with this, I recommend chatting with Bluehost support and they will help you launch your site easily.

Tips for New Bloggers

Here are just a few tips for new bloggers starting out their blogging journey:

Create amazing, in-depth content for your readers. Creating short, but many blog posts isn’t the way you want to go (Especially if you want to receive traffic from Google). I make sure to write at least 1000 words in each blog post. Most of my blog posts probably are around 1500-2500 words long. Google favors longer blog posts for their rankings, as this provides readers with more quality content so they stick around on your page longer.
Write at least 30 blog posts. The more blog posts you have, the better.
It takes time to build traffic. It takes around 6 months for Google to rank a new site. While you wait for that traffic to start climbing from Google, focus on building traffic through other means (Like Pinterest). Most bloggers quit after just a couple months of not seeing traffic – Don’t do this! It is completely normal to at first have nothing. Wait 6 months after you publish a post and you will see the traffic come.
Blogging is a lot of work – Just like any job. But it’s fun to write about what you love, it’s amazing how much help you can provide others, and you have so much freedom to be able to work for yourself and be able to see the return of what you have worked so hard on. It will be worth it!
Don’t give up.
Refine. Refine. Refine: Try new things. Research. And experiment. There is no one answer on how to blog successfully – That is the whole beauty of this journey. Anyone can make it.

I think the #1 reason people try blogging and quit is because they aren’t earning money quickly. I implore you to get that expectation out of your head. Blogging isn’t a hack to get-rich-quick, but if you are patient – Your blog can become like a sort of “Internet Real Estate” and it will grow with time.

The main reason I wrote this blog post is because I want people to find a different way of living: To stop trading time for money – Because there are much more important things we need to be spending our time here on Earth on than worrying about having enough money to live.

And I believe that finding different streams of Passive Income is key to achieving this way of living.

I hope this blog post was able to inspire you to perhaps give blogging a try.

If you enjoyed this blog post, please give this blog post a like, comment, or share down below. I truly appreciate all of my readers.

I hope you have a wonderful day xx

Blogging Tips

How to Start a Blog: A Beginner’s Guide