You’ve been thinking about starting your own blog for some time now. You’ve done some research and discovered that there are people out there with some neat ideas about stuff, and you feel you also have something of value to share with the world. Or perhaps, you’ve heard of the wonderful lifestyle some people are living as full-time bloggers and despite the fact that it entails some serious hard work and dedication, you feel it’s something that suits you and you would like to try it out. The thing that’s been bothering you, however, is how to set up a blog. You wonder, what are the necessary steps necessary for me get my beautiful ideas out there and join this wonderful community. That’s why I’m here. Below are the steps necessary for you to set up your own blog, and start blogging today.
- Every Ship Needs a Captain with a Sense of Direction
The first step in setting up your blog is determining what you want to share with the world, or what will the blog be about. You see, if a ship left a harbor without a captain and navigation, chances are that it will hit something and sink, or end up a shipwreck on some island or shore. The same applies to blogging. You can get your blog up and running, and then get stuck wondering, “What’s next?” That’s why you should first determine what you want to blog about and then from there move on to the next step. Your blog can be about whatever you want; you can blog about teeth, toothpicks, space, spaceships, multiverses, hair, door knobs, your wife, your ex, your love life, babies, children, men, women, insects, dirt, stone, you get the idea.
- Select a Host
Once you’ve determined the subject of your blog, next you need to find a suitable platform on the web that will host it. There are many services online that will enable you to set up a blog, either for free or paid. Whether you should choose a paid service or a free one depends on your needs. I prefer to look at it from the perspective of control. Paid services will give you more control over what you can and can’t do with your blog, whereas the free ones will have restrictions. Furthermore, there are online blogging platforms that will host the blog for you, and there’s the option of hosting your own blog. The latter option has more freedom about what can and can’t be done with the blog. However, you should be aware that hosting your own blog can be tricky because there are things that will require you to have some web design and development knowledge for you to be successful.
If you just want to start blogging with minimal setups and tweaks, check out
These are the best blogging platforms as far as I’m concerned. Of course, you are free to check out others.
If you feel you are up to the task of hosting your own bog, consider the following hosting services:
These are the most affordable and reliable hosting services that are ideal for bloggers.
- Pick a Name for the Baby
Now, you know what you want to blog about, and you’ve picked a suitable blogging platform. Next, you should pick a name for your blog. Pick a name that’s easy to remember. Short names are ideal because, well, they’re short. But your blog’s name doesn’t have to be short. The main thing with picking a name for blogs and websites (if you’ll ever get there, or if you’ve been there) is going for a name that’s easy to remember. It can be a few words or even a short sentence. But please, don’t use sentences if you can’t restrict them to less than five words. FYI (for your information) names for blogs or websites are called domain names. You’ll hear this a lot once you become a regular blogger. So just pick something that will be easy to remember and easily relatable to your blog.
- Make It Your Own
With the name picked, next, you need to register it to make it yours so that no one else in the world will use the same name for their blog. You’ll be surprised how often two different people, separated by oceans, can think of the same thing. In the world of picking domain names, this happens too often. The trick here is that as soon as you pick a cool domain name for your blog, register it immediately. If you choose to register it after a coffee break, or after you come from the bathroom, don’t be surprised to find that someone else already registered a similar name – just a minute ago. This happens too often with domain names.
- Design and Decoration
Well, as long as the previous steps have been followed to the latter, and everything has gone well so far, you now have your own blog and all that’s left is for you to customize it. Pick a theme that suits whatever your blog is going to be about. Also, think about color, and the number of columns you’ll want to be featured on the blog. Consider the contents of the blog, and whether it’ll have pictures. If so, what percentage of the blog will be pictures and what percentage will be words?
Once the theme is selected, you’ll need to add content. You can generate your own content, or hire someone to do it for you. Tada! You officially have a blog.
- Development, Growth, and Promotion
Your blog is essentially ready. It’s there and anyone in the world can access it and read your posts, provided they have the address. At this point, you want to get as many people as possible to know about your blog and become regulars. You can achieve this by using social media, your phone contacts, and also just by using word of mouth with interested parties. Promote your blog and have as many people as you need reading it.
Plugins
Finally, there are plugins – small software that you add to your blog for extra features. Mind you, these are not for everyone. If there are features you thought were available on the blogging platform you chose but you noticed are missing, or if there are features you wish were available on your blog, depending on the nature of the platform, you can add the extra features using plugins. But if you feel contented with what you have, very well.
And that’s basically it as far as setting up a blog is concerned. It’s a very simple process and one that can be accomplished before lunch, before dinner, or before dawn; whatever suits you.
