The Complete Guide On How To Start Blogging in 2019

Pat on your back if you are curious to know “How to start a blog.”

By showing interest to read this article, you have proved that you are serious about blogging and working hard to learn the methods to start a blog.

Your question might be how to start a blog for free or start it using paid services. Whatever your question is, you are going to get the answer after going through this article.

I got the idea to write this article after getting inspiration from the people like YOU.

People who want to start a blog but don’t know from where to start.

So this article is going to show the exact direction which I used to build this successful blog. The direction which you can replicate to build a blog much bigger than my blog.

Read this ultimate guide on how to start blogging and see where you are today to take actions.

Whether you are looking to start a new blog or looking forward to reinventing your blog, this article will give you step by step approach to start your blogging career.

Do we really need a blog?

This is a very common question when we start our online blogging career.

As per my experience, I can say that blogging has become one of the integral parts to boost online business in any industry.

It’s like a channel to make relation all over the world and boost your online presence.

When I started my blog in 2011, I didn’t know anything about blogging and how to make money online. As a VLSI verification engineer, it was little tough for me to switch the field.

But once I started reading more about blogs, things became more clear.

Now, this blog is one of the top blogs in India and getting tons of awesome readers every month, awesome and enthusiastic readers like YOU.

Chances are, you landed on this blog either by searching “how to start blogging” “how to start a blog” or your friend recommended this article to you.

But the point is, you are reading this article now.

This blog has gained such authority in the industry that I can teach people by sitting at home now.

With this blog, my life has become more enjoyable, and I have ‘money + time’ freedom now.

So do you still have any excuse to not start a blog today?

What are the benefits of a blog?

We always look for the benefits.

Either it’s a college for our education, our first job or a new product we recently bought, we always try to understand about the benefits first.

So here are the benefits of blogging.

It’s the strongest tool to boost your online presence.
It helps you to understand more about your passion/interest.
You make money by utilizing your skills.
You build your online identity and trust.
You become an authority in your industry.
You make strong relations with your customers.
You help the world by writing articles on your blog.
You educate people about your products/services.
People become your loyal readers which give you a strong recognition worldwide.
You become more confident.
You have money freedom.
You have time freedom.

And hundreds of more benefits when you become a blogger.

Here is Complete Guide On How To Start Blogging

Here we are going to read about each and every step which is necessary to build a blog.

I have personally gone through each step to build this blog a brand, so I am not going to write anything without my personal experience.

Check each and every point very carefully and help yourself to become a next good blogger.

Let’s read it.

#1. Identify your interest

I get many calls in a day.

Everyone asking the same set of questions.

They are confused about starting a blog and banging their head against walls to find a right mentor.

According to them, blogging is just a method to make hell lots of money which they can do only with the help of right mentors.

The very first question they ask is, “what should I write?”

And I always reply first thing first.

I.e., the very first thing you will have to find is your knowledge, passion, interest or enthusiasm about any topic.

This topic could be a programming language which you are already using in your company, this could be specific job category (like marketing, HR manager, etc.) or this could be your passion for iPhone.

At whatever stage you are in your life, we all have some special skill sets and passions which derive us.

Ask yourself these questions:

Can I write about my topic without getting bored?
Do I have enough passion about my topic?
Do I have enough knowledge about my topic?
Where I want to see 5 years down the line?
Will my blog’s tone be powerful enough to captivate my audience?
Is there any audience for my topic?
Can I write for 6 months without worrying about income from my blog?
Am I ready to learn too many new things?

Once you have crisp and clear answers to these questions, you are good to go.

#2. Domain Name For Your Blog

A domain name is the name of your website.

e.g Google.com, Yahoo.com, MSN.com, WikiPedia.com or any name of a website are called domain names.

So once you have decided your topic for the blogging, the very next thing is a domain name.

Companies like GoDaddy, NameCheap, BigRock are one of the top domain provider companies in the world.

So you’ll have to open any of the websites listed above to find the perfect domain name for your business.

Here is the example of Godaddy.com

I searched for the domains name MyBestOnlineBusiness.com, and luckily it was available.

After finding a suitable domain name for your business, you can proceed with the registration process on the site and make the payment via your Debit/Credit card.

Few things to keep in mind before buying domain names:

Try Short Name: Short names are easy to remember and recommend. So when your friend asks for the name of your website, it will be easy for you to tell the names as well as easy for him to remember.
Never Buy Digits In Domain Name: Always avoid to buy domain name having digits in the URL. e.g top10things.com, tip2top.com, 10tricks.com. They always confuse people because most of the time they’ll forget it was a digit or written in words.
Always Prefer Dot Com: Dot com domains are best because this is an international identity. ICANN (domain provider) has differentiated the domains names as per the country like .in for India, .co.uk for UK, .au for Australia, .pk for Pakistan and so on. Such domain names are good of your targeting one country only. So having a .com identity is always the best option.
Try To Avoid Adjacently Double/Triple Letters: Domains like BestTricks.com, BadAssStore.com are always confusing because we forget to add those repeating letters.
Find A Domain Related To Your Industry Only: Having a domain name DogTips.com would be a silly idea if you are going to start a blog for iPhone. Your blog’s name must be a targeted name for your business. Like I have bloggingcage.com where I am teaching blogging, I have androidrooting.com where we teach rooting and technobol.com where we share tech tips. So decide your domain name very carefully.

#3. Hosting For Your Blog

You have selected your domain name.

Now the question is – Where are you going to save your data online?

Your blog will have some texts, images, videos and many other things. Where are you going to store all those things on the internet?

Here comes the role of hosting.

A hosting is an online server which helps you to store your data.

So your domain name will be the name of your website, and all the data of that website will be stored on the server (called as hosting).

As the data is a very crucial thing for your blog so you must select the hosting company very carefully.

I personally recommend A2 Hosting.

Here are the hosting options they have.

As a newbie, you need SHARED HOSTING.

Shared hosting has same servers shared with many users so this hosting comes at a very cheaper price as compared to other hosting options.

Click on Compare Plans button.

On the next window, select SWIFT plan.

Few things to keep in mind before buying hosting

Space: Your web hosting company must be offering unlimited space.
Unlimited Domain Names: Like Hatchling Plan of HostGator allows you to make one website on their hosting only. That’s why I have suggested BABY Plan above because it allows you to create unlimited websites on your server. So always go for the hosting providing unlimited domains.
Support: This is very crucial. Your hosting company must have a 24×7 support system. In the case of any problem, you can contact them anytime and get your problem solved.
Bandwidth: This is a little technical term. In short, your bandwidth decides the amount of traffic (number of visitors) your website can handle. So always go for unlimited bandwidth.
Easiness To Manage: Various companies offer different types of admin dashboards to manage the hosting. I would recommend going for cPanel because this is one of the easiest dashboards to manage to host.

Here are the steps to buy a hosting plan.

Step 1: Click on this link to activate discount.

Step 2: Click on get started button on the site.

Step 3: Select SWIFT plan as you can host the unlimited number of sites, as well as you will get FREE SSL certificate and SSD hard disk.

Step 4: Select option “I will use my existing domain and update my nameservers” if you have already bought a domain.

Step 5: Select for 12 months.

Step 6: Add your personal information and credit card information and submit.

Congrats!! You have bought your hosting.

#4. Content Management System

This is the system which will help you to add the content on your blog.

I am using WordPress for this blog which is one of the top content management systems is the world having over 60 million websites in the world running on it.

This is as simple as working with Microsoft Word.

They have given an awesome visual editor which you can use to do various activities like bold, italic, underline, hyperlink, colour, font, font size etc.

Here is how it looks like:

Using this editor, you can play with your content and represent it as per your site’s requirement.

WordPress gives you the freedom to install plugins which will enhance your blog’s functionality. In my recent article, I talked about all the plugins I am using on this blog. You can check that article and install the required plugins on your blog as well.

Why Only WordPress?

This is the most used CMS in the world for blogging.
This is an open source platform where you can develop anything you want.
You can install the new design with just a single click.
Management of this platform is very easy.
Many hosting providers gives one-click installation of WordPress from the admin dashboard.
This gives you the freedom to enhance easily with the help of plugins.
In the case of any issue, you can get help from thousands of WordPress user in the community.

And there are other tons of advantages which you’ll come to know after using this CMS.

You can read my guide on how to install WordPress for further learning.

After installing WordPress and setting up all the things check the plugins which I am using on my blog and learn how to install plugins here.

#5. Grab All Social Media Identities

All big companies have integrated social media into their business.

They are launching their products exclusively on social media sites and interacting with their customers directly.

So the very first task after buying a domain, hosting and setting WordPress is grabbing all your social media identities.

You can check the availability of your business by going to namecheckr.com.

Here it is showing availability of my username bloggingcage on various social media sites.

#6. Find a Perfect Theme

WordPress has hell lots of themes.

You can pick the theme as per your blog’s category and install it easily.

You can check the guide to install a WordPress theme here.

I personally recommend Genesis, MyThemeShop, and ThemeForest for finding a perfect theme for your blog. On ThemeForest, you can select the theme from various categories like creative, blog, retail, entertainment, technology, real estate, education and other categories.

Few things to keep in mind before buying WordPress theme

Make sure that you are buying unlimited sites license.
The theme must be easy to manage.
The theme must have compatible with the latest version of WordPress.
The theme must be responsive (capable of changing layout on a mobile device).
Theme must suit your blog’s category.

#7. Start Writing

Yeah.. Start writing from today itself.

Your blog is nothing without you. All you’ll have to do to make it a blog is start writing today.

No matter how well you are in English, no matter how much knowledge do you have about your subject, and no matter how do you feel about your writing, your blog will grow only and only when you’ll start writing.

With time you’ll start getting writing ideas, and your readers will start enjoying/reading what you say.

But the first thing is WRITING.

Take help from your friends, read more about your subject, pay attention to the newspaper and start collecting the fresh ideas about your subject.

You are just one step away to open the door of blogging for you.

ACT NOW.

The post The Complete Guide On How To Start Blogging in 2019 appeared first on Blogging Cage.

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