Start a Blog – How to Guide

by Rawzaba Alhalabi Published on January 30, 2018

Ever thought of sharing your views, knowledge, and experiences, at a deeper level than on social media? If yes, then start a blog to get those ideas written down and communicated to the world.

There has never been an easier and better time to start a blog.

Creating a blog can be a useful tool in more than one aspect. It is one of the few available tools that are informal and open to becoming a direct reflection of you and your talents.

It’s also a great tool for engaging your prospects at a deeper level and sharing with them your experience and knowledge.

Continue reading, so you can explore some ways in which you can start a blog, maintain and grow your blog.

Start a Blog to Improve Your Service

We live in a wonderful age. This age of the internet has provided us with so many tools to deliver our services to the world. One of these modern tools is blogging. Blogging can help to improve your service in more ways than one.

A blog is a regularly updated online web page that acts as a medium for your thoughts and passions. A blog can be anything that you want it to be. Blogging can be used as a tool to improve the delivery and/or quality of your service.

Here are 5 ways that a blog can improve your service:

Attracting Constructive Feedback: A blog can allow for readers to provide their input which can provide you with new insights

Detailed Research For Blog Posts: Research is required before publishing a post. This results in an increased understanding of your craft

Complete Immersion in the Writing Process: The process of articulating your thoughts and organizing a detailed blog post acts to organize thoughts in your own head

Provides a Personal Touch: Blog posts provide an opportunity for you to provide insight into your point of view and your opinions

Free Content Provides Added Value: Providing a significant amount of your knowledge through your blog provides increased value to your potential customer, making it more likely for them to be comfortable to hire you for your services

Understanding the power that blogs can have is very important in this age of connectivity. It can be used as a marketing tool and a medium for your passion. Considering the steps mentioned above will provide insight into the potential benefits of starting your own blog.

Ways to Start a Blog – Successfully

With so many blogs available to online readers, it is imperative to give readers a reason to choose your blog. It may help to ask yourself what causes you to stay loyal to your favorite information sources.

Here are the 3 ways to create a successful blog:

Find ways to be unique: What makes you different than the rest? Use this difference as your central theme. Doing this will show readers that you can provide them with potentially new insights

Provide an appropriate amount of free material: Provide an appropriate amount of free material without compromising the value of your paid services. By doing this, you can sustain a loyal readership and set your blog up to become a marketing tool
Challenge potentially flawed ideas in your industry: Since a blog can be an unregulated medium in which you can present your ideas, it makes for a good place to challenge what you may not believe to be true within your industry. This comes at the price of controversy but can stimulate interest in your blog posts.

Having multiple perspectives as to what makes a successful blog will provide you with the necessary tools to guide your blog to the top. The 3 ideas listed above can allow for a fresh and unique blog that is based on your insights to be created successfully.

Tactics to Attracting Improved Readership As you Start a Blog

There are many ways to go about attracting readership, but the basics are often under-utilized. Reaching readers and then providing them with an incentive to read is very important.

Here are the 4 tactics for attracting improved readership:

Utilize online social mediums

Sites such as Instagram, twitter and Facebook can allow for the use of hashtags and advertising which can reveal your posts to a widespread audience
LinkedIn is also useful in that it offers an article writing and publishing tool that can be used in conjunction with your blog service
Online forums such as Reddit are also useful in that they contain communities involved in any and all topics. These are great places to stimulate discussion

Stand out as you start your blog

This is a very important point when you start a blog. Being unique is the key to giving the readers incentive. This incentive can be generated through the discussion of fascinating or controversial topics.

Encourage readers to join in on a conversation

Posting articles and encouraging readers to share their opinions or feedback can garner better responses. This will allow you to refine your ideas and to potentially think of new ideas

Experiment with new ways of doing things within your industry

Performing these experiments and blogging about them will create tremendous intrigue within your online following. Readers love to hear about experiments and results, especially if they don’t have the time to try them themselves

Following these steps will allow readers to gravitate to your blog for a fresh and dynamic perspective.

Start a Blog to Portray Your Unique Story

We have talked about being unique in order to produce an incentive for readers to read your blogs. Everyone has a unique story full of twists, turns, and valuable insights. Understanding your story and bringing that element to your blog will allow for a better connection to your readers.

Here are the 3 steps to portray your unique story when you start a blog:

Think back to what got you to this point: You have experienced things that most people may not have experiences, and that can bring a unique touch to your blog theme

Ask yourself: “What have I experienced that makes me worthy of readers’ loyalty and respect?”: What past experiences do you consider to be an asset?

Provide people with YOUR story: Chances are that most people can relate to your struggles and they will respect your experience

Understanding your unique past can help you to deliver a personal touch to your blog. Making your blog more personal will allow for a deeper connection to your loyal readers. We often take our past experience for granted, but there are plenty of struggles and victories that can provide insight to those who may need it.

Reasons to Maintain Blog Post Consistency – Essential decision to make and commit to before you Start a Blog

Explore the final but equally vital component of a great blog which is consistency. When you start a blog, you need to maintain consistency to move you closer to attracting customers and mastering your craft.

Here are 3 reasons to maintain blog post consistency:

Show readers that you have the dedication to your craft: Whether once a month or once a week, your readers will begin to wait for the next post

Provide maximal free value: Doing this will allow for potential customers to be more comfortable to make the jump to your paid services

Consistent blogging will keep you researching and staying up-to-date: Research for each blog post will keep you at the peak of your understanding of your craft and it will keep you up-to-date with new happenings

Staying consistent can be difficult. That’s why determining the frequency of your posts is essential. Readers will come to expect this frequency of articles especially if they provide plenty of value. Taking into consideration the 3 reasons above can provide the appropriate amount of motivation to keep you delivering valuable content.

Choices to Make When Starting Your Blog

Explore the options that we suggest you take into consideration. Get ready to set-up your blog right away. There are many blogging services and blogging styles that should be considered before starting. Understanding which direction you are going to take your blog can make your desired outcome clearer to the reader.

Here are 3 choices to make when you start a blog:

Choose your approach

Is your blog going to be a technical blog or a personal blog? Or is it going to be a mix of the two?
A technical blog can explore topics that you find interesting within your industry in an informative and passionate way
A personal blog can be unrelated to the industry you’re in. Instead, it can lead your readers through what other things you find interesting

Choose your service before you start a blog

Services such as Blogger.com, wordpress.com, medium.com or tumblr.com are all free services but offer slightly varying options and layouts
The majority of blogs are created using wordpress
com has a paid option in which you can create your own domain name like “www.yourdomainname.com” rather than the traditional “yourdomainname.wordpress.com”. This also removes ads and provides you with more online storage

To host or not to host

You have the option to create your own domain name and self-host your blog
This option requires the purchase of a hosting service (such as hostgator) and installing the wordpress software onto it

Having a clear and concise strategy as to what you want your blog to convey will help to attract the right readers. The free options would be preferred if you will be casually using your blog, but the paid options should be considered for more serious blogging ventures. Putting some thought into what your ideal blog would look like can help you to understand what first steps to take and taking into consideration the 3 choices above can help you to get started.

Practical Steps to Start a Blog using Wordpress

Find here a step-by-step process to starting a WordPress blog through the WordPress website. After watching this video, you will know how to begin blogging through WordPress with the paid or free versions of the service. Here are the 5 steps to start a blog and launch it:

Start by going to wordpress.com
On the main screen, you want to press on the “Get Started” button
Now that you’re at the “Get Started” page, you can proceed to enter your information
Upon reaching the next screen, you will be lead through a few initial steps to setup your website

The 4^th step is the one where you will be given the option to continue with the free version, or upgrade to a paid version.
The benefits of each option are listed and suit different scenarios
The free version will give you a basic subdomain like “yourdomain.wordpress.com” whereas any of the paid versions will give you a custom “yourdomain.com” domain name

Once these steps are complete, WordPress will lead you through a tutorial on how to control your site

Congratulations! You have set up a basic WordPress account and website!

Steps to Self-Hosting Your Blog

Explore a step-by-step process to starting your own website which will include WordPress blogging options. This option is more suitable for some people since it offers much faster download times and the ability to design a full website that has much more than just a blog on it. For this example, we will be using a hosting service called host gator. Here are the 12 steps to self-hosting your blog:

Visit hostgator.com
At the main menu bar, choose “Web Hosting”
On the following screen, you have 3 pricing options. The cheapest “Hatchling Plan” will be sufficient to setup a single website
After choosing your pricing option, you need to enter your custom domain name. The domain name will work only if it isn’t already in use. Continuing down the page, you will need to enter more information. There are also more options offered that may be of use to you
Upon completion of your payment, you should check your emails for an account info email from Host Gator
Click on the link that is next to “Your Control Panel” in the email and enter the username and password that they have provided in the email
Now that you have entered the Host Gator Control Panel, you want to scroll down until you find the heading titled: “Software and Services”. The option you want to click on is “Quick Install”
On this new page, you will find a list of items titled “Popular Installs” on the left side of the page. Choose the “WordPress” option
Under where it says “Install WordPress For FREE” choose “Install WordPress”
You can now proceed to choose your domain name from the drop-down menu while leaving the “install/path/here” box empty. The “Admin User” box is just any username that you can choose. The rest of the page should be straightforward
Once you move on, you will be shown a progress bar at the top of the page. When WordPress is finished being installed, it will tell you so. When finished, you want to click on the “View Credentials” drop-down menu on the right of notification bar saying that the install is complete. This will give you a link to the login area of your WordPress add-on, along with your username and password
Click on the “Admin Area” link and proceed to enter the username and password provided

Congratulations! You have set up your own website which is fully equipped with WordPress. With this, you can go on to create a store on your website while maintaining a blog in the same place! The possibilities are literally endless!

Businesses around the world are increasingly leveraging the power of blogging to enhance their online presence.

There is no reason that you can’t start a blog to promote your business or just to share content on topics that are interesting to you. It could be used as a form of Passive Income or just to experiment.

We hope this “Start a Blog” guide will pave the way to start your blog and we look forward to reading it soon!