Are you aware that it’s possible to make a sustainable income by blogging?
Yes, there are indeed a lot of bloggers who are making more than 10K or even 100K every month just from their blog.
But before you make 100K or 10K or even a single penny, you need to start your blog.
Starting a blog, it’s becoming easier than ever before. The massive development in technology, especially WordPress, have made blogging much more comfortable.
Everyone can start a blog after reading this guide. You don’t need any technical or programming knowledge for this.
Who Am I to teach you to start a blog
Hey there, My name is Sridhar Namboodiri, and I am a final year Engineering student who wishes to never enter into that 9-5 job working for others instead do what I enjoy the most and travel the world with financial freedom.
But to achieve that I need to start making passive income online. Last four years I spent all my free time learning about Internet marketing, blogging, making money online, etc
Update: Bluehost is providing a special discount! You can now set up your blog for as low as $3.95/month; You also get a FREE Domain name!
After a lot of unsuccessful blogs and attempts, I figured out a way to make the blog successful.
Later, I started HustleRiser.com to help others build a profitable side hustle by starting their blog and make money blogging.
Before You Start Blogging.
There is an important message you need to learn! You cannot make money just by starting a blog.
The money comes only when you give value to others from your blog.
Stuart Walker (The Founder of NicheHacks.com) explained brilliantly in his Insider Program about the most essential skill for any marketer or blogger, The GVTO skill.
G – Giving
V – Value
T – To
O – Others
If your blog has to be successful, then you should provide high-quality content which contains a lot of value to your readers.
By providing values, you can build a long term relationship with your customers and potentially sell your products or affiliate products to make more money.
“You can get everything in life you want if you will just help enough other people get what they want.”
by Zig Ziglar.
The quote from Zig Ziglar says it all. If you learn the skill of GVTO, then you will be able to make money in any situation.
Start a Blog in 6 simple steps
Warning – This guide is going to be epic and long. I recommend you to bookmark this page for later use.
So the following will be a step by step guide on starting your dream blog. Here are the steps involved in this guide
So let’s create your new blog…
What You’ll Learn:
- Step 1: Choose a Niche for Your Blog
- Step 2: Brainstorm Domain Name
- Step 3: Choose your Hosting for Your Blog
- Step 4: Choose the Right Theme for Your Blog
- Step 5: Install All the Necessary Plugins You Need
Step 1: Choose a Niche for Your Blog
Choosing the right niche is one of the most important factors for your blog. By the way, if you don’t know what a niche is.
A niche is the blog topic that you blog about.
If you end up choosing the wrong niche, then you lose passion and interest in the long term and eventually, your blog will collapse.
When I first decided to start a blog, I started a Movie reviews and Celebrity gossip blog, which was a massive fail because I was not interested in the subject.
I just started a blog about films only because I thought it would be easy to make the content go viral and I could make quick money from AdSense.
Please don’t make the mistake I did and don’t waste your precious time. Instead, follow the guide below and select the niche that perfectly fit for you.
Here are some of the top guide from top bloggers to help you to select a niche
Step 2: Brainstorm Domain Name
The domain name is one of the most critical factors for the success of your blog. It’s vital as your blog will be known by this name.
Though on the other hand your domain is simply a name and it’s not going to make or break your blog.
What values you provide to your customer decides the success of your blog. So don’t spend weeks or months on choosing a domain as it’s life or death.
But it’s wise to follow specific rules for choosing a right domain name. And they are
- Go for a branded domain rather than a keyword domain.
- Make it simple, easy to remember and memorable
- I always recommend you to go for the dot com domain where possible
- The domain should match the name of your website
- Avoid trademarks or existing brands in your domain name
These are some of the basic rules I follow when selecting a domain name if you want to know more about domains, please read the related articles below and come back to get an in-depth knowledge.
Related Posts:
- How to select a Perfect Domain Name for Your Blog That You Can Be Proud of?
- 13 Strategies to Use If Your Domain Name Isn’t Available
Step 3: Setup Hosting & Install WordPress
Once you are ready with your available domain name, it’s now time to set up hosting for your blog.
The only web hosting company I suggest for beginners is Bluehost here’s why
Update: Bluehost is providing a special discount! By clicking the link here You can now set up your blog for as low as $3.95/month, You also get a FREE Domain name!
- Bluehost is designed especially for WordPress, so it works very well with them.
- 1 Click WordPress installs
- It provides you 24/7 support
- You get a free SSL Certificate
Click on Get Started to purchase web hosting for as low as $3.95/month
I suggest you choose the basic plan as it would be enough for most of the bloggers.
Enter the domain you would like to get for free with the hosting. I hope you have already ready with the domain name, as mentioned in step 2.
If you are not ready with the domain, then you can scroll your mouse to the exit, then a popup will appear asking you to choose the domain later. By this, you can continue with the guide and select your domain later.
You will then be taken to the account creation page. Please fill all the details carefully.
Then scroll down to below where you will see the package information.
It’s a place where you should specify the length of the plan. I recommend you to choose three years as it gives the best value for money. If you are on a tight budget, you could go for one year.
Just remember that it’s risk-free as Bluehost offers 30 days money back guarantee If you decide to cancel for any reason in the first 30 days, you get a full money back.
After you have selected your package, scroll down to the package extras.
Uncheck all the boxes as you do not need them except domain privacy protection as its essential.
Finally, you can now add your credit card details and check the Bluehost’s Terms of Service and Cancellation Policy and hit the green submit button.
Congratulations! Now you have your hosting setup!!
Install WordPress
Watch the video I found on Youtube below to know how to install WordPress on Bluehost.
Step 4: Choose the Right Theme for Your Blog
Thanks to WordPress for building such a platform where beginners can create awesome looking websites without any web design, coding, or any programming skills.
And you don’t need to hire anyone to design or code for you either.
WordPress has 1000’s of free themes and paid themes. As a blogger, I would always suggest you go for premium themes as it gives you more features, security, and it’s more customizable.
Personally, I had a bad experience with free themes so I won’t recommend them.
But if you are on a tight budget, then you can start with free themes and later change it into a premium theme.
Here is the list of top themes that could work for you
Astra Theme – This is the theme I use now, and it’s my most recommended and favorite theme in the market.
StudioPress Themes – StudioPress is one of the top theme creators in the market. They have a lot of themes to choose from.
Step 5: Install All the Necessary Plugins You Need
There’s literally a WordPress Plugin for everything
There are a lot of free and premium plugins to choose from…
For most of the tasks, the free theme would work fine, but for certain tasks, I recommend to use the premium plugins.
Here is the list of plugins I use and recommend you to install
- Yoast SEO – It helps you improve your website SEO. The basic version would work fine for most bloggers.
- Contact Form 7 – It helps you to create a simple contact form for your users to contact you.
- W3 Total Cache – It helps you increase the speed of the website by clearing the cache regularly and keeps it running fast and smoothly. (Update – I have changed from Total Cache to a Swift Performance premium to improve more speed)
- Elementor – Its a drag and drop page builder plugin that helps you to customize your website in a way you want.
- Akismet – It’s the no.1 plugin for spam protection.
These are the plugin I have used and tested, and that helps me build my blog.
Congratulations! You now know everything you need to know for starting a successful blog.
But remember just knowing how to start a blog doesn’t make anything. You need to take action.
Finally, please leave a comment below about how this guide helped you.
Also, we are happy to answer any questions in the comments below.
