How To Start A Blog THE RIGHT WAY
Starting a blog as something of a side-project for your existing business is all well and good. But what if you want to build a blog that becomes a successful business in its own right? What are the first steps on the road to becoming the next blogging superstar?
Just to get one thing out of the way first – building and running a successful blog isn’t easy. Nor is it the kind of thing you can devote just a small portion of your time to and expect things to work in your favour. If you want to make even a basic living out of your blog, you need to be ready and willing to commit to it.
Still, even the most extraordinary blogs in the world had to start out with the most basic fundamentals. So with this in mind, we’ll be taking a look at the bare-bones basics of starting a new blog. In terms of subject matter, content and general strategy, this is all up to you. But as far as the fundamental framework of your blog goes, these are the five boxes you’ll need to take to get things off the ground:
(We’ll also assume you’ll be using a platform like WordPress…which comes highly recommended)
1. Domain and Hosting
First up, you’re going to need a domain that reflects your blog/business and a dependable hosting package. The domain you choose will play an important role in your wider branding efforts and should therefore be chosen extremely carefully. Rather than being too clever, go for something that’s clear, concise, memorable and indicative of whatever it is you do. As for hosting, try to remember that if things go well, your blog will eventually need to deal with huge influxes of traffic and consistently enormous engagement. Long story short – don’t cut corners on hosting quality.
2. Theme
You also need to think carefully about the overall theme for your blog. It needs to be something that reflects both your voice and your area of expertise. Will you be blogging in a playful and light-hearted tone? Or do you intend to be more formal and serious? In addition, to what extent will your blog be built around visuals, video content and other mixed media?
3. Make It Unique
Generic blogs that look the same as everyone else’s are never particularly appealing. Given that you will have chosen some kind of semi-generic theme for the basic framework of your blog, it’s now up to you to make it unique. There are thousands of options available in terms of modifications – colours fonts, layouts, widgets, unique imagery and so on. All of which should be taken full advantage of to create a unique and memorable UX.
4. Plugins
The plugins you choose are what will take the functionality and general appeal of your blog to the next level. It’s entirely up to you as to how complex or otherwise you go with plugins, but you’ll definitely need to include things like social media buttons, analytics, basic SEO plugins and so on. Take your time, read up on recommendations from other bloggers and add only those you know to be of value and relevance.
5. Promote Your Blog
Last but not least, in the early days in particular you cannot expect your target audience to simply stumble over your blog by accident. Instead, you need to make it impossible for them to miss it. As your blog is essentially your business, you need to market and promote it with the same ferocity and consistency you would any other business venture. Using social media, SEO, PPC and as many offline marketing channels as necessary, market the living daylights out of your blog until traffic begins coming your way of its own accord.