How To Start A Blog THE RIGHT WAY

If you want to learn how to start a blog that matters, pay attention.

My name is Matthew Woodward and I’ve made millions of dollars with my blogs and won 8 prestigious blogging awards.

I’ve spoken about blogging on stages all over the world-

showing an audience how to start blogging

I am one of the most qualified people on the planet to be telling you how to start a blog the right way so please pay attention.

I’ve helped thousands of people just like you to achieve their blogging dreams:

testimonials from other bloggers

So today I am going to take you by the hand and show you how to start a blog the right way step-by-step.

In the next 15 minutes you will have-

So let’s get started:

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How To Start A Blog In 5 Steps

How to start a blogLearning how to start your blog is very easy, just follow these steps-

  1. Pick a blog name. Choose something descriptive.
  2. Get your blog online. Register your blog & host it.
  3. Tweak your blog. Choose a free theme & customize it.
  4. Write your first post. This always feel’s amazing!
  5. Promote your blog. Get people to read your posts.
  6. Bonus: Learn how to monetize your blog to create income.

If you are short on time you can get started with A2Hosting for just $2.99/mo who set everything up for you including a custom domain name.

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Step 1 – Choose Your Blogging Platform

WordPress is the go-to platform for bloggers.

  1. It’s free for anyone to use (you just need a cheap webhost & domain name)
  2. It’s super easy to use even if you never built a blog before
  3. They have over 5,000 free themes to choose from to make your blog look awesome
  4. Over 91% of all blogs are running Wordpress, including this one!

Why You Shouldn’t Create A Blog On A Free Platform

People don’t know the difference between starting a self-hosted blog and using free blogging websites.

One of the biggest mistakes I see new bloggers make, is using a free blogging platform when they are just getting started.

Everyone wants to learn how to start a blog for free thinking they will become a famous author and make a stack of money.

But if you do this, you will seriously limit your potential success as a blogger.

All of the major free blogging platforms like Blogger, Medium or Tumblr suffer from the same serious flaws-

    • No Control – You have zero control over your blog. Tumblr/BlogSpot or whoever can choose to shutdown your blog and delete it at any time.
    • Lack Of Customisation – You can’t use any of the thousands of free Wordpress themes and plugins and are limited to very basic templates.
    • Limits – You are limited on how many images and videos you can upload or how many people visit your blog.
    • No Custom Domain Name – You will get stuck using an ugly domain name like http://yourblog.blogspot.com rather than just yourblog.com.
    • No One Will Take You Seriously – And the most important of all, is if you use a free platform it makes you look like an inexperienced beginner and no one will take you seriously.

If you are serious about learning how to start a blog and make money like I do…

…then do things the right way the first time! The choice is yours.

Plus it only costs $2.99 per month to do it the right way – so why take shortcuts?

Or read my full A2 Hosting review to learn why they are awesome!

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Step 2 – Choose Your Domain Name

Choosing a domain name is one of the most important steps of starting a blog.

If you don’t know what a domain name is, well it is the address of your blog – for example the domain name of this blog is just my name – MatthewWoodward.co.uk.

Before you choose a domain name you need to choose a topic for your blog.

If you’re not sure what to blog about here are a few suggestions-

  • Write a list of 3 things you are good at
  • Write a list of 3 things you are interested in or enjoy
  • Write a list of 3 things you want to learn about

topics-enjoy

That quick 5 minute exercise will give you more than enough ideas for topics for your blog. Just choose from your menu of ideas.

My advice is to write content about things you are passionate and knowledgeable about.

You’ll be able to create hundreds of posts that your audience find engaging and they will subscribe to hear more.

Once you have a topic for your blog you need to choose a good domain name.

If you are going to blog about a specific topic (which I recommend you do) then you should try and incorporate that into the domain name.

Or you could just use your name as your domain name like I did with this blog that focuses on blogging and digital marketing.

Learn how to get a free domain for a year (or more).

choose your blogs domain name wisely

Once you have picked your domain name (don’t buy it yet), I have some great news:

The hardest part of setting up your blog is over!

Now we just need to get it online and that can be done with a few clicks of the mouse and it really doesn’t matter if you want to learn how to start a fashion blog or a travel blog or even just have somewhere to write reviews of your family trips – the process is the same.

download the on page seo checklist

Step 3 – Setup Web Hosting & Wordpress

Next we need to setup your blogs hosting, install Wordpress and connect it with a domain.

If all of that sounds scary don’t worry, most of it happens automatically with a couple of clicks, but first let’s go over some basics.

What Is Web Hosting?

Web hosting is what keeps your blog “online” and stores all of your blogs files, images and content.

If you don’t have a web host then no one else would be able to see your blog!

A good web host means that your blog will be available to every single person in the world, every single second of every single day.

Avoid Bad Web Hosting Companies!

There are both good and bad hosting companies & choosing a host is an important part of starting a blog.

Many cheap hosts overload their servers which means your blog will be slow, which means updating it will take longer and it will take longer for your visitors to load it.

That is usually backed with terrible support so when you do have a problem, you’re on your own.

All of this means you can’t focus on building and growing your blog.

So the only hosting company I recommend for beginners is ​A2Hosting because-

  • 1 Click Wordpress installation – Installing Wordpress takes less than 30 seconds.
  • 24/7 support – No matter what happens, they are available to help.
  • ​Free SSL – ​Get a free SSL certificate at zero cost to you
  • ​Turbo Servers – ​Much faster than other budget hosts because of their SSD & turbo cache setups so your blog loads quickly.
  • ​Budget friendly– ​It costs just $​2.99 per month!

To get started all you need to do is headover to A2Hosting.com and click “Get Started”:

a2 hosting

​​Just follow the ​steps and that’s pretty much it!

You have now installed WordPress and your blog is ready to go!

Start a successful blog today

Although if you are super serious about starting your blog, you should look at what the fastest Wordpress hosting providers have to offer. Take a look at my WPX Hosting review​ or Kinsta Review but they are A LOT more expensive.

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Step ​4 – ​Customising Your Blog

Now Wordpress is installed, it’s time to customize your new blog to your liking. The first thing we are going to do is find and install a theme that you like.

The design of your blog plays a huge role in the success of your blog because it’s the body language of your blog.

How To Choose A Great Wordpress Theme

    • Simple & clutter free – The simpler it is to read and navigate your site, the better!
    • Mobile responsive – Your blog needs to look great on mobile as well, this is non-negotiable.
    • Optimized for speed – Your blog needs to load quickly to keep visitors engaged
    • SEO ready – It should be built with search engine optimisation in mind
    • Easy to customize – Ideally you can change the layout or colours in a couple of clicks
    • Built in shortcodes – This makes it easy to style your blog posts

The great news is there are thousands of free Wordpress themes that you can choose from.While they might not have all of the best features and support, they are free.

To find a Wordpress do that just go to Appearance > Themes > Add New

wordpress theme search

From here you can browse through the featured, popular and latest themes to your heart’s content. Just mouse over any that you like to get a live preview or to install and activate one.

Once you have done that you can go to Appearance > Customize to tweak things like colors & fonts easily-

customize your wordpress theme settings

Just keep tweaking things until you are happy!

If you are serious about your blog then you might want to invest in a pro WordPress theme that will help you to stand out from the crowd & save a lot of the headache that you often find with free themes (like things not working properly/zero support).

In fact I highly suggest you watch the video below which explains all of the problems I had when I started my blog-

Hopefully you don’t make the same mistakes!

In fact I worked alongside the MyThemeShop team to build the custom theme that you see on the blog right now.

So if you want a Wordpress theme that builds trust, loads quickly, ranks well and positions you as the authority in your niche then you can download my theme here.

steal your seo strategy

Step 5 – Writing Your First Blog Post

Now comes the fun part, it is time to start writing your first post!

Writing & publishing your first blog post might seem scary but I’m going to guide you through the process.

First of all login to your Wordpress admin dashboard (yourdomain.com/wp-admin) and then go to Posts > Add New.

You will be presented with a screen like this-

write your first blog post

Let me explain exactly what you are seeing here-

  1. Title Area: This is where you write the title of your blog post
  2. Add Media: This is where you can upload images/gifs/videos
  3. Content Area: This is where you write the main content of your post with text formatting tools above
  4. Publishing: This is where you control if your post is published and live to the world or you can choose to schedule it in advanced.
  5. Other: Choose or create a relevant category for your post or upload a featured image. If you don’t know what tags are then don’t worry about them.

Feel free to write anything you want for your first blog post as you get used to the Wordpress system and learn to use it’s features.

Here is an example post-

example blog post

Once it is done, just click on the blue Publish button and voila!

You have just written and published your very first blog post!

Now give yourself a pat on the back and take a break because you have just started your very first blog! Congratulations!

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Frequently Asked Questions About Blogging

So now you know how to start a blog the right way, I am sure you have a bunch of questions!

So I did my best to answer as many of your blogging questions as possible below.

Just click on the question(s) below to instantly reveal the answer!

Starting Your Blog

How much does it cost to start a blog?

The short answer would be around $80 to $100.

But the long answer is that this really depends on how much money you want to invest.

For example if you just buy hosting and use a free domain it can be next to nothing.

​At the other end of the spectrum you could spend $300 getting your site off the ground if you want to buy premium versions of plugins, have a higher-quality logo made and get a customised premium theme.

If this is your first blog though I’d recommend the $80 to $100 I mentioned earlier. This is more than enough to get you hosting, access to a good email marketing platform, a good-quality premium theme and a logo. Becoming a blogger doesn’t need to be expensive.

Who should I host my blog with?

I’d recommend A2Hosting​. Why?

Because they’ve built a hosting package that is designed for bloggers like you and me.

You can set up WordPress at the push of the button, access their incredible support and get lots of discounts on themes and plugins just for being a customer.

They are also really competitively priced and affordable for new bloggers. It’s a real win-win situation for all users.

There aren’t many other places you can start a blog for $​​2.99 a month!

Another domain host you could look at if you want to explore your options is Bluehost.

How do I design and customize my blog? Do I need a designer?

If you’re using a WordPress blog it’s not necessary to hire a designer.

Most of the best free Wordpress theme are easy to customize with a few clicks of the mouse.

Premium Themes – like the one I’m running on this blog – work a skin for your site.

You download them, upload them to your site, and then make the little customisations that you want to make the site look like your own.

my blogs wordpress theme

These themes range in price from free to $100+, depending on what you want to buy. But in my experience you can save over $500 on hiring a designer to create your site from scratch.

You can read my article about choosing your perfect WordPress theme here.

Where can I find affordable professional Wordpress themes?

My personal go-to site is MyThemeShop.

They helped me with my current theme, Authority, and they have incredible customer support.

But you can also find affordable WordPress themes at Thrive Themes.

How do you start your own blog for free?

If you are serious about starting a blog you should not use a free blogging platform.​​

​But if you don’t want anyone to take your blog seriously then you can start your own blog for free with a few simple steps-

  1. ​Signup to Wordpress.com ​and choose your subdomain (eg yourname.wordpress.com).
  2. ​Follow the steps in their blog builder to ​create your free blog.
  3. Choose a simple theme that you like the look of.
  4. ​Enable any of the plugins that interest your (you should activate JetPack for sure).
  5. Write and publish your first blog post.

​It will take you less than 10 minutes to do that but again, I warn you:

​If you use a free blogging platform you will cripple your potential success as a blogger.

All of the free blog platforms from Wordpress to Blogspot have the same serious problems-

  • Zero Control – You don’t own anything an if ​Blogspot decide to delete your blog then all of your hard work is lost. Google around and read the horror stories for yourself.
  • Limited Customization – You are limited to a very specific selection of templates and can’t take advantage of the thousands of free themes and plugins that are available.
  • No Custom Domain Name – Who wants an ugly domain name like http://startmyblogtoday.blogspot.com when you can have a custom .com domain – which are usually provided​ with hosting.
  • No One Will Take You Seriously – Using a free platform makes you look like an inexperienced beginner and no one will take you seriously when you are trying to grow your blog.

So feel free to start a free blog just to get a feel for how Wordpress works – but do not actually start your blog on a free platform, if you are serious about blogging this would be a big mistake.

It literally costs just $2.99 per month to do it the right way so why shoot yourself in the foot before you’ve even started?

Creating Content

I am not a good writer how can I improve?

You don’t need to be a ‘writer’ to be a good blogger.

Instead you just have to be able to communicate what you’re trying to say clearly, with good grammar and correct spelling. Infuse a little bit of your own personality and bring out your creative side then you’re onto a winner.

This comes mostly through practice and writing something, even just a few sentences, every single day and getting feedback on it.

I found it really helpful to develop my own blog voice that people could come to expect and set the tone of my brand.

It meant that I could self-edit my work in accordance with what I want the blog to read like, and improve my work against my own standards.

For example, every blog post I write should look stick to these rules:

  1. Tell it like it is – straight & to the point
  2. Like I’m talking to a friend in the pub
  3. No more than 3 sentences in a paragraph
  4. Short & punchy
  5. Keep it simple

If I don’t hit all of them in a post I know I’ve not done a good job.

But it also pays to learn some of the tricks of the trade that improve your work so take a look at my website content and SEO copywriting articles to learn more.

Should I write my blog posts in English or my native language?

In order to answer this you need to answer the question, “Who am I trying to reach?”.

English is the biggest market on the internet, but it’s also not the only language on the internet.

You can be just as profitable (if not more) in Hungarian or German or Spanish or Hindi or Thai if the people you want to reach also speak that language.

There are lots of success stories of people using English, despite it being their second language, and having great success.

But there are also thousands of success stories of people blogging in their native tongues and finding success too. Just like the Comunio sports blog, all in German, that reaches thousands of people in Germany, Switzerland and Austria every day.

If your English skills are good enough, and the people you want to reach are reading in English, then go for English.

Just don’t be worried about being too niche by using your native tongue; you may find the people you want to reach only read in that language.

How often should I be publishing new blog posts?

This is a hard question to answer and it’s another one of those annoying, it depends, answers. Why?

Because this really is a non-question. It’s not a problem that you should be worrying about, because the style of your blog, and the amount of work you’re able to put in will dictate how often you should post.

Seth Godin famously blogs every day. But his blog posts are short and they’re mostly his thoughts on things. However Robbie Richards was able to grow a site to 400,000 page views with just 20 blog posts, but they’re much longer and in depth.

Frequency doesn’t matter anymore. It’s all about what you cared to say, when you said it and how you deliver that message to people.

If you post one epic blog post a month but spend 30 hours a week promoting that to people and finding new readers for it, the results could be just as good as if you write a new post every day and spend just a few hours promoting it.

How often you choose to say it doesn’t matter.

Instead create an environment where when you speak, people listen. That way you can post as often as you like which allows you the freedom and gives you the space to work on your site when needed. Once a day, once a month, doesn’t matter as long as your audience wants to hear what you have to say.

How many words should my blog posts be?

A good rule of thumb is to aim for a minimum 1,500 words and then adjust for your audience.

There is evidence to suggest that longer posts are better for blogs. Looking at research curated by QuickSprout, they tend to get more backlinks, social shares and comments, while also ranking higher in Google.

But that’s not to say that short posts aren’t effective, either. I think one of the best points of view on this comes from the Content Marketing Institute, where they say:

“A blog post is like a mini-skirt:

It has to be short enough to be interesting, but long enough to cover the subject.”

If your post only needs 1000 to fully cover the subject to depth and provide enough value, then your post only needs to be that long. However if that post needs 5000 words, then it should be 5000 words long too.

No more or no less than what is needed.

But it’s also important to be aware of how your audience responds to different lengths of content. If you start getting more, or less, interaction and engagements when the post length changes, read the data and adjust accordingly.

Just make sure before adding new content that it is valuable and not just white noise that will encourage your readers to leave.

What type of blog posts should I be writing?

There are lots of different types of posts that you could write and I highly suggest you sign up to my free course that gives you some amazing templates to work with.

But for your best bang for buck you should start with these 5 types of blog posts-

  • List Posts
  • How To Posts
  • Roundup posts
  • Interviews
  • Personal stories

Then you can get an idea of what your audience responds to and adjust accordingly.

These are easy to draw inspiration for, don’t require too much research, and the structure is really flexible.

Although the more you put into a post, the more you’re going to get out of it.

Getting People To Read Your Blog

How do I get people to read my blog?

Traffic is probably the most written about topic on the internet. And truth be told there are millions of ways to get people onto your blog.

​I share 3 awesome strategies that are guaranteed to flood your site with traffic in my free blogging course.

But getting your initial traffic to your blog is quite simple:

  1. Find where your audience spends their time
  2. Find out the best way to connect with them
  3. Create website content that answers their questions
  4. Share it with them

For example if you run a blog about helping English speaking Expats in Dubai, you’d find all of the forums where those expats go to look for help, create great content that answers their questions, and then share it with them.

uae forums example

It doesn’t have to be forums, it could be social media or guest posting on other blogs they read or finding the newsletters that they’re signed up to.

And once you’ve started to get your initial traffic you can take a look at these 36 traffic generation tutorials to help you grow your blog even further.

How do I get more people to come to my blog from Google?

Further below you can learn how to integrate good SEO habits and start to get traffic through Google.

But once you’ve set up the basics, where do you go from there?

Well teaching that is far beyond the scope of one small portion of this FAQ so I highly recommend you visit my SEO portal to learn more.

Do I need to use social media?

You don’t need to, but it’s a good strategy to implement.

Having a presence on social media can help you build traffic, connect with new readers and increase your reach. It’s a great way to let people know about a post as soon as it’s gone live.

After a mailing list where your registered readers receive your articles, it’s one of the most direct ways of reaching your audience and they can go straight to your full post by simply clicking the link.

But don’t try to spread yourself too thin. Many new bloggers sign up to Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, Twitter, Periscope and Snapchat. But that’s honestly not manageable.

Instead focus your time on one channel where your audience spends most of their time – probably Facebook – learn their policy and get really good at that one channel.

Once you’ve figured it out, move over to another platform and repeat.

What is the easiest way to publish social media updates?

There are two ways you can approach the creation of Social media updates.

The first, is to simply go to each of your social media profiles and post the links of your blog posts. Old school.

Whilst this is effective, it can take a lot of time and isn’t necessarily an easy or the best process to manage.

On the other hand you could decide to use a tool like Buffer to help you get the job done much more quickly.

Buffer is a tool that will help you post social media updates to all of your social media profiles.

buffer

The good thing about Buffer is that you can schedule your social media updates, allowing you to ‘front load’ your social media efforts.

buffer home

Buffer also makes it easy for you review data, in terms of how your social media updates are driving traffic to your blog.

review your social posts

You can use this information to get a better sense of what content people are enjoying. You can then use that information to create similar posts in the future, of which have a higher chance of success.

The people receiving your social media updates might not always respond to the links that you are posting, because the blog post within the update doesn’t appeal to them.

You can help fix this by using different benefits, within different updates.

For instance, let’s say that I’ve created an interior design blog post related to ‘decorating an apartment bedroom.’

The name of the blog post might be ‘5 Interior Design Tips for Apartment Bedrooms’ and so I might post a social media update which uses that headline.

However, not everyone will respond to that.

The next time, though, I could post ‘Cheap Ways to Make Your Apartment Bedroom Amazing’ and on another I could use ‘Quickly Transform the Appearance of Your Apartment Bedroom.’

The core content remains the same, but I’m now able to appeal to people who value ‘cheap’ strategies and those who value ‘fast’ strategies. This therefore helps increase my reach.

You’ll also want to take some steps to improve the level of engagement that you have on social media.

In doing so, you’ll be able to develop a better connection with your audience whilst also increasing the potential number of people that will share your content.

One way you can foster engagement, is by simply asking your audience questions.

Not every social media update has to relate to a blog post and sometimes it can be a good idea to just speak to the people who belong to your audience.

If you’re ever struggling with something consider asking your audience for advice, or even just their opinion on a certain product or strategy.

You can also foster engagement answering questions that your audience has, directly on social media.

This is a good way to show off your expertise, increasing the number of people who will see you as an authority.

You can also do this using a Facebook Live video and this can be a good way to host a Q&A session; you may even want to consider create a Facebook Group.

When you create a Facebook Group you’re essentially creating a community of people who all share the same interests as each other. This can help foster interesting discussions and build goodwill with your blog.

Don’t forget to check out some of the best social media tools to help you grow your audience.

Build An Email List

Which is the best email marketing service for bloggers?

My personal recommendations is Aweber – take a look at my full Aweber review.

Not long ago we reviewed all of the best email marketing software that you can use and Aweber came out on top.

They had the best prices, were easy to use and allowed you to create more effective email marketing processes.

aweber

It’s super easy to get started and the primary goal of your blog should be to get your first 100 subscribers. Aweber makes it both cheap and easy to do that.

However if you have a little bit more experience and money to play with, I’d recommend that you use Drip.

It has a higher level of customisation for your automated processes and gives you more control.

Plus, I use Drip to power this blog so the proof is in the pudding and it doesn’t cost that much more.

drip email marketing for your blog

How do I get people to sign up to my email list?

Getting people onto your mailing list is a lot simpler than you might think. But it does require a lot of hard work although I share some simple strategies in my free blogging course.

The key is to give your reader a reason to want to give you their email address. Usually this is in exchange for something high value:

28 day seo challenge

Take a look at your own email subscriptions and think about why you’re subscribed to them. Usually it’s not just because their content is great. No, usually you exchanged your email address for something else.

For example they may have offered a free course, or eBook, or seminar or you may have needed it to get the results to a quiz on their site.

freelance writers example

Take a problem that your reader really struggles with and try to solve it for them with a free product, then ask for their email in exchange.

Are there any tools that make getting people to sign up to my email list easier?

Yes.

To start of with I’d recommend you try using OptinMonster which is what I use across all my sites (see my Optinmonster review for more).

email capture example

Everything easily customisable, can be connected to your email marketing software and can advertise your ethical bribe.

Take a look at this list of 17 email marketing tools that will help you grow your list.

Running Your Blog

What pages should my blog have?

Your blog will have lots of pages of articles. But, what else should be on there for your readers to look at?

Well at a minimum your blog should have an:

  • About Page: Where people can find out about who you are.
  • Contact Page: Where people can contact you and get in touch.
  • Sign Up Page: An exclusive page where people can sign up to your mailing list.

But depending on how you want to run your blog you can begin to expand on this. For example if you want people to write guest blog posts for you, you can add a ‘Write For Us’ section.

Finally I would suggest you have a privacy policy page. As I am sure you are aware over the last three months there have been issues across certain social media platforms so having this page can only reassure that names and other details aren’t going to be sold to the highest bidder.

Where can I get a cheap logo created for my blog?

Depending on your budget you should choose either Fiverr, SEOClerks or 48HoursLogo.

You can find many good designers that can come back with a professional logo design for your site.

design your blogs logo

You may have to pay more for specific add-ons, but you’ll rarely spend more than $20 for the total package. If I want to throw a professional site up quickly, this is usually where I start.

Running a 48HoursLogo design contest requires a bigger budget of around $200, but also comes with a lot of extra perks.

For example you’ll have around 20 designers all working and submitting design ideas to win and this is how I had the logo for this blog designed.

Is it possible to make my blog load faster?

Getting your blog to load faster is really easy.

First of all, after you start blog, head over to GTMetrix to run a quick baseline test and note down your results.

Then follow these simple steps-

  • Step 1 – Install a free caching plugin like this one.
  • Step 2 – Setup a free CloudFlare account using this guide.

Once your are done re-test your blog and jump for joy at your super fast, beautiful blog! Feel free to read my full guide to increasing website speed though.

How can I see how many people are visiting my blog?

The best way to do this is just sign up for a free Google Analytics account.

Then use a free plugin like this one to add all of the tracking code to your blog easily and it will instantly start tracking every single visitor on your blog in real time.

You can see which posts they are reading, which country they are from and much much more.

How do bloggers get paid?

​Bloggers usually get paid from a number of different sources-

  1. ​Google Adsense – ​Signup and starting generating income instantly.
  2. Affiliate Marketing – When you get paid a commission if you generate a sale
  3. Product Creation – Create a product to sell to your audience
  4. Consultation – Provide 1 on 1 help to you audience for a fee

​But honestly if you are serious about making money with your blog you should really sign up to my free course immediately.

It’s worth mentioning that youneed to focus on creating good content at first. If every post is a sales pitch, you’re going to turn people off. Help people first, get paid second.

Option 1: Adsense

Adsense is a platform owned by Google. When using Adsense all you have to do is install a little bit of code on your blog and then AdSense will automatically show ads.

When people click on these ads, you’ll generate an income. You can use a WordPress plugin to help you properly set up and shown Adsense ads.

Here’s an adsense ad running on a blog you’ve already seen, called Pinch of Yum.
adsense

It’s worth mentioning that this is probably the easiest way to monetize your blog. But it’s not going to make you a millionaire! And it can often damage the view of your site.

I much prefer this second option…

Option 2: Sponsored Ad Placements

Now, this method is very similar to what Adsense, but with a few exceptions.

Firstly, it still relies on you showing ads on you generating an income, using advertising.

However, with this approach, you’re instead allowing for individuals or companies to approach you and request permission to advertise on your site, within specific placements. Like on my homepage here:

advertise

You get to set the terms here and you’ll also have greater control of what ads are shown on your site.

This will be highly dependent on the value of the traffic on your site. The more of it you have, and the higher quality, the more you’ll be able to charge.

Option 3: Affiliate Marketing

This is anotherhugesource of income, and one that I use on my blog. (You can see the results of this in each of my monthly income reports).

Affiliate Marketing involves selling a product on behalf of someone else.

amazon affiliate

Think of it like this; every time you recommend a product, you get a cut of the sale. And it doesn’t cost the buyer any money at all! A win for everyone, right?

The simplest way to set this up is through Amazon as an Associate. But you canalsodo this by finding products you use and seeing if they have an affiliate program.

Option 4: Product Creation

This method requires more effort from you, since you need to learn what product people want, create it and then market it, all whilst taking care of existing customers too.

Product creation is themost profitable method because you get to keep 100% of the profits. Or, you can have your own affiliates to sell products so you can make money without even needing to be there.

For example, you could create an eBook like this Paleo blog has:

ebook

Or you could create something a little more robust and that costs more money, like a Udemy course.

Anything your customers are likely to buy (and benefit from) is a good idea in my book.

Option 5: Consulting

Consulting is often the most profitable way to monetize your blog and can also be the easiest approach, as you’re just working with a few clients at a time, each of whom pay you a high ticket price.

However, your ability to provide consulting is going to depend on the niche that you’re in as some niches lend themselves more to the consulting model than others.

If you want to get the best out of this method, then you need to be clear about the specific result/goal that you can help potential clients achieve.

You can then market your consulting services around that concept.

Easy enough to do – but you better know what you’re talking about!

How much money can you make from a blog?

Personally I have made over a million dollars with the blog you are reading right now which averages around $25,000 per month in profit.

​However some blogs make much more, in excess of $100,000 per month. However realistically most people tend to earn around $1,000 to $4,000 per month after their first year of blogging.

It really depends how hard you are willing to work because you only get out what you put in but you can definitely make money blogging.

You can read the entire progress of this blogs journey from $0 to ​$1,151,565 in my income reports.

​I published a monthly report that shared exactly what I did each month along with all of my traffic/income sources and expenses.

How can I automatically back up my blog?

Backing up your blog is easy and is something I highly recommend you do independently of your host.

There are a number of backup plugins available and most of them will sync to a cloud service like Dropbox.

Here are my 2 favorite free backup plugins

This is such an easy step, there is really no reason not to do it.

How do I start good search engine optimization (SEO) habits?

You’re not going to rank in the first position for anything straight away. So, while you’re growing your site and your rankings, it’s important to develop good SEO habits so you’re set up for success.

First take a few minutes to index your site and submit it to Google. You can index your site by visiting Google Search Console.

You should also:

  1. Install this free SEO plugin
  2. Read my SEO portal

And if you really aren’t sure where to start with SEO then I just you start with What Is SEO and work your way forward from there.

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What Are Your Thoughts?

545 Responses

  1. Hi Matthew, I really loved reading this article. I would like to know how profitable is a home and garden blog. I am interested in this niche but would want to know more about it before I venture

  2. Nice article I am really inspired. I have a question though? I read somewhere that it is possible to make $5000 with a travel blog in the first three months of blogging, how true is this

    1. Anythings possible. But realistically it will take longer if you are building a business from scratch. But there are a lot of ‘it depends…’ For example- it depends how much you are willing to invest! You need to be prepared to work for 6 months without an income and if it happens sooner, then great!

  3. Hi i am a new blogger it is really wonderful and resourceful content you posted I really appreciate you and i hope in future you will post it more thanks

  4. Thank you for this tips, I want to start new blog to review books and anything book related. I am scared to start and I am the type who gives up easily if they don’t succeed quickly. we will see how it will turn out.

  5. Great blog. Really helped me a lot to build my blog site. I want to see the aftermath after following these tips and it really worked. That’s why I came back and want to say thank you. great Job..

  6. By Reading this article i,am also going to start a blog soon. but i think the main problem is to get organic traffic and rank in google

  7. I must say thank you very much for this great guide. i used to work with you a while a go at 2020 and have followed your blog for some time now, i have made many sites but never stuck with them. With the help of this post and your SEO tips in general i plan to make a serious go at it.I have also started looking at affiliate programs to monetise the site, i have only ever used adsense prior to this so will see how that pans out.Thank you.Martins

  8. Nice way to present details of how to create your creative blog to attract and engage users to visit again n again. Really impress with your writing style and details you mention with depth. Thanks again

  9. This is a well thought out and professional presentation. Much work went into how this material was presented. Am grateful to be a subscriber and customer.

  10. A really really great and in-depth article. Appreciate the thoroughness. As a new blogger love to read these kinds of posts. They sure do help. Thanks again, Cheers! 🙂

  11. Awesome post Matthew. Your posts are pure value bombs.I am amazed by the loading speed of your blog.Which hosting do you use?

  12. Thank you for sharing this information. I started a blog in travel niche. But iam confuse in seo. Please guide me.

  13. Great post. Yes, starting a blog the right way, just like a home needs a greatfoundation, so does your blog. The first question most people have when considering blogging is, what the hell do i blog about. Most people end upoverthinking this process.

  14. Great blog post Matthew. I was looking for a guide to help my friend setting up his first blog and this is the perfect to get all the basic topics covered.Thank You

  15. This is a great post and helpful for the new blogger, very thanks for providing your best knowledge and idea.

  16. Great blog post Matthew. I was looking for a guide to help my friend setting up his first blog and this is the perfect to get all the basic topics covered.Thank You

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