Well, You want to create a blog or website to make money. To start a blog at the first thing you need to buy a domain name and hosting. For that, HostGator is the best choice in price and quality.
I will tell you 2 facts before starting:
- If you just make a blog, the way is very easy
- But for a successful blog, it’s not easy
- After Success, You can start making money
You might be interested in becoming a blogger after visiting a number of big blog sites then being amazed by them.
Or because you hear that blogs can make money.
Whichever the reason, this is the right guide for you.
I will not only teach you how to create a new account on Blogger / Blogspot and how to install WordPress.
If that’s all, it’s 5 minutes too.
I will teach you more importantly …
… that is how to create a blog that has a high chance of success.
After reading this article, you will be able to create a cool, interesting blog that is not inferior to those of the best bloggers in the world.
Please take a glass of tea or coffee, we will start immediately.
… before we begin, one more thing:
Almost all new bloggers ultimately fail after the first 1-3 months … only a few can succeed.
Why?
Because they make blogs carelessly.
Because of this: the topic is mixed, the content is not quality, the promotion is unclear. It’s all messy.
Then because the blog kept quiet, they finally got bored.
Blogging: “Failure to plan means planning for failure”
This is not trying to frighten …
… this really happens often.
Blog planning is extraordinarily important, so you don’t waste time, money and energy. Later you can monetize your blog and register it as a business so you might want to check out the best LLC Services from here.
Therefore, before we go into how to create a blog, we will first discuss the preparation.
1. Determine the main topic of the blog
You might think this stage is trivial … just choose a topic. When in fact this stage is the most important in preparation.
Let me tell you one fact:
Every day there are 2.73 Million new content published blogs from around the world.
More than 70% of these blogs only get less than 5,000 visitors per month or about 150 per day.
Isn’t it sad?
I wonder what is the cause?
Here are the roots:
- The topic of the blog is unclear, messy
- The topic is not interesting to many people
- The topics they chose were not interested so the contents of the blog were also of no quality
Look …
Suppose you only had time to read 5 websites per day.
Will you open a website that has quality, interesting, and useful content for you … or a website that only contains original articles?
Must be the first. Yes, right?
So you MUST be able to create better blog content than other blogs.
That is the key.
Well, to be able to make good content, then you must choose a topic that interests you and is considered interesting by many people.
If you choose a topic that you don’t understand, the consequences are:
- Making content feels heavy
- Content that has been created is not quality
- You will get bored quickly
Let’s just use logic. If we are not interested and do not know anything about a topic, is it possible we can teach the topic to others and make them interested?
Very difficult … especially for beginners.
Which topics can make money?
Based on a survey that I did some time ago, most of the readers of this article apparently wanted to get income from blogs.
Yes, blogs can indeed be a source of income.
But there is one legendary myth that states that only blogs on certain topics can earn money.
That’s a big mistake.
All topics can produce.
Provided that the content you create is able to attract the interest of many people. Any topic can be made into a blog for income. Even blogs that have funny contents.
Here’s a story from personal experience:
7-8 years ago I tried to make a blog on the topic of Insurance because he said this topic can get a lot of money from advertising.
Even though I’m not at all interested in Insurance.
As a result … the content that I make is very low quality. Every time you write content, it feels stressful. Finally, the blog is abandoned without getting any visitors at all.
So, don’t choose topics that don’t interest you.
2. Choose the blog platform that is right for you
One of the toughest processes in starting a blog is that we’ve gone through.
Now we get to the easier one.
Today’s technology is sophisticated. By using a blogging platform, you can write on a blog like writing in Microsoft Word.
Here are the 3 most popular choices:
- Blogspot – hosted
- WordPress.com – hosted
- WordPress.org – self-hosted
There are still dozens of other blogging platforms, but I will not complicate your choice by discussing the less popular ones.
Pay attention to these 2 terms: hosted and self-hosted.
What is that?
Hosted means your blog is ‘hitching a ride’ on their website. So you won’t have a pure website of your own, and your blog address is like this: my blog.blogspot.com
Self-hosted the opposite.
You create your own website with a platform called WordPress. The website will be 100% yours, but you have to pay for the domain name and hosting.
Choose a hosted platform (WordPress.com or Blogger) if you:
- Don’t want to go out for a fee (though not much)
- limited features
- a display that is also limited
- name your website like this: namawebsite.blogspot.com
- your website to be deleted at any time (if you break the rules)
Instead, choose the self-hosted platform (WordPress.org) if you:
- Cost around $30 per year (for domains and hosting)
- have a website that is 100% yours
- able to change the look freely
- able to add whatever features you need
- make a blog that looks more credible
You can actually save using WordPress coupon which you can easily grab through tech blogs and website builder review sites like Websiteadvisor.
3. Specify the domain name
Domain names will always be attached to your blog.
Although it can still be replaced, it will be troublesome and if it is wrong it can be fatal. Therefore you should carefully determine the domain name at the beginning.
Here are 7 things you should pay attention to:
- Adjust the topic of the blog
- Avoid names that are similar to popular websites
- Easy to write, remember and say
- As much as possible use .com
- Avoid dashes (-) and numbers
- Don’t use other people’s brands
4. Install a self-hosted blog with the WordPress platform
Now we enter the WordPress Guide to create a blog.
In this article, I will use NameCheap(For domain), HostGator, and WordPress (self-hosted) as examples. You can use hosting services and other domains because it’s not much different.
Please go to the following guide to learn how to create a blog:
Please go to HostGator then click the yellow “get started now” button, you will be directed to the package options.
I suggest choosing the cheapest package for beginners. So, choose a Hatchling Plan.
Select the duration according to your needs, then click the button to continue.
Next, you will choose a domain …
If you don’t have a domain, you can also register at HostGator.
Meanwhile, if you already have a domain, at the very top, enter the domain name you want or select the “I Already Own This Domain” tab.
Continue to the bottom, at number 3 enter your personal data and select a payment method, credit card or PayPal.
Then uncheck number 4 for the service you don’t want.
If you have a coupon, enter it at number 5.
HostGator usually provides a different coupon every month, it helps you look for discount coupons first on Google with the keyword “HostGator coupon code”.
Often the discount is up to 50%.
Check the Terms of Service agreement and click the Checkout Now button to continue payment.
1. Step Direct the domain to host
This is only if you do not buy a domain directly at the hosting place!
After buying hosting, you will get 2 or more nameservers via email. For example 3323.hostgator.com.
Write down this nameserver.
Login to your domain registrar, in this example I use NameCheap. Then click the domain name that you want to change
- Click Domain Name Server Setup (if you use another domain service, the name can usually be DNS or Nameservers)
- Enter the name server that you get from hosting
- Click Save.
2. Installing WordPress in 60 seconds
If you buy from HostGator according to the guidelines written above, follow the instructions below:
After purchasing hosting from HostGator, you will be sent an email in the form of a link to your CPanel address and username and password.
Open http://namawebsite.com/cpanel in your browser
(Change this website name according to the domain you bought)
Enter the username and password provided, please change the password to your taste. Or leave it, as long as you can remember.
Then you will arrive at this page:
It seems complicated because of the many buttons and images, but don’t worry.
Installing WordPress is just 2 clicks away!
- First, click the button that I gave in the yellow image above … you will enter this page:
- Enter your new blog data, then click Install Now.
FINISHED!
After that, you will be given a link to your WordPress installation Dashboard along with the username and password.
Congratulations, you have successfully installed WordPress!
5. Understanding WordPress after installation
After the installation process above, you might feel confused about where to go to publish new content.
Here are some instructions for learning WordPress.
A. Enter the WordPress dashboard
A dashboard is a place where an admin manages his WordPress blog.
To enter the Dashboard, this is the default address:
http://namablog.com/wp-admin/
Enter the username and password that you registered earlier.
In this Dashboard, you can change blog settings, change appearance, add plugins, moderate comments, and more.
B. Change the name of the blog, language & other settings
To change the name and tagline of the blog, you can go to Settings> General.
Other settings such as permalink and number of posts on the homepage can also be found in Settings.
C. Change the WordPress theme
New blog owners usually want to immediately change the look of their blogs to suit their tastes. Fortunately, WordPress has thousands of themes ready to use.
Its location in Appearance> Themes.
To add a new theme, click the Add New button above. Then to upload a new theme, click Upload Theme above. you can also check some WordPress website templates.
D. Add a WordPress plugin
Plugins are one of the reasons we choose WordPress.
With the help of plugins, you can add features as you want without the need to understand programming.
To see the plugins installed, click Plugins> Installed Plugins. Meanwhile, to add a new plugin click Plugins> Add New.
If you want to upload the plugin, click Upload Plugin.
Some plugins that you should install and activate:
- Yoast SEO: simplifies SEO matters
- UpdraftPlus: back up your blog data automatically
- Akismet: filter spam comments
- iThemes Security: increase security
The rest is as needed.
You can directly search and install these plugins from the WordPress dashboard.
E. Create a new post
Now it’s time to create content for your blog.
First, go to Posts> All Posts from the left sidebar.
You will find a post titled “Hello World!”, Delete the post because it is just an example.
Then click the Add New button above to create a new article.
Here is the description of the picture above according to the number:
- Write the title of your article here
- Button to add images or videos to your post
- Set formats such as bold, italic, list & numbering, read more, and others
- The place to write the body of your article
- Put each different topic in one category to be neater
- When the post is ready to be published, click Publish
It’s done! What is next?
Congratulations, you have successfully created a blog with WordPress (or other platforms). At this point you already know how to:
- Determine the main topic of the blog
- Determine the right blogging platform
- Choose a domain & hosting service provider
- Choose a domain name
- Blog installation
- Set WordPress to taste
- Publish new content for blogs
- But your trip isn’t finished yet.
Actually, we’re just about to start!
Next, we learn how to make your blog a success.
There is a lot of material, but don’t worry. If you don’t have the time to read them all now, please bookmark this page and come back another time.
That’s all you need to learn.
Once again, there is no need to rush to read everything because it is quite long. Don’t hesitate to bookmark this page so you don’t forget.
Finally, congratulations! Tell your friends that now you can create a blog.