How to create a blog step by step: The complete guide

Creating a blog can be very beneficial for your personal or business brand. It’s a great way to express yourself and can increase your online visibility, connect with your audience and become an additional source of income.

This article contains a complete beginner’s guide on how to create a blog. We’ll talk about finding a niche, creating a blogging platform, publishing content, and promoting your blog, among other things.

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How to create a blog in 8 simple steps

If you are looking for a quick guide on how to create a blog, here are the eight steps you should follow:

Choose a niche for your blog. Choose something that you are passionate about. Ideally, it should be a topic that also interests others.
Get web hosting and a domain name. Buy the accommodation that best suits your budget and needs. Then think of a custom name for your domain, check its availability, and register it with a domain registrar.
Set up a platform for your blog. Choose a platform and configure it to be able to start publishing content.
Create your blog with WordPress. We have chosen this platform because it is the most popular.
Design and customize your blog. Change its design and functionality to your liking.
Publish content. Familiarize yourself with the available publishing tools and start planning, writing and publishing articles on your blog.
Promote and grow your blog followers. Plan and execute ways to promote your blog to increase your traffic and gain loyal readers.
monetize the blog. Once you have significant traffic and readership, apply methods like ads and affiliate marketing.

In the next few sections, we’ll break down each of the steps to creating a blog and provide more detail.

1. Choose a niche for your blog

A niche refers to a specific topic that your blog will focus on, as well as allowing you to determine your target audience. It will also help you choose the blog and develop a focused blog strategy.

Some are books, travel, games, photography and cooking.

It can be tempting to cover a wide range of topics when starting a blog. However, trying to master all the topics is incredibly difficult and unfeasible. You may get a few successful posts, but your audience will be scattered, making it difficult to maintain a loyal readership.

That’s why it’s important to stick to a niche that can build a devoted following. A loyal audience will look forward to your next piece of content, giving your blog a steady stream of traffic.

To find the perfect niche for a successful blog, keep the following tips in mind:

Choose a niche that you like or are passionate about. Writing about a topic you like will always be more satisfying than forcing yourself to write about something you don’t care about. Think about your hobbies, interests, or topics you’d like to learn more about. If possible, make them more specific. A good example would be a book blog focused on reading on a budget.
Choose a niche that has audience potential. There should be a pre-existing level of interest in your chosen topic to ensure that you will have an audience to target. Use it to find the search volume for specific keywords related to your niche and determine if people are talking about it on social media and in community forums. This can give you ideas to write on your blog.
You don’t have to be an expert to capitalize on a niche. Being an expert brings a certain authority that many readers seek, but it is not a requirement. What is most important is having a unique perspective and a willingness to learn. For example, you may not be a professional photographer, but you can start a blog on how to get started in photography as a beginner. If authority seems essential to your idea, you can include interviews with experts on your blog.

2. Get web hosting and a domain name

Once you have chosen a niche, it is time to start preparing a website for your blog. Two of the most important steps in launching a blog on the Internet are getting hosting and a domain name.

In short, hosting is a service that allows you to publish a website and all its files online, making it possible for people to visit it. You can read more.

Acquiring a hosting means renting a space on a server that belongs to a hosting provider, which gives you access to an allocation of resources necessary to run your blog.

Types of hosting for blogs

Most web hosting companies, including , offer different types of . Depending on the type of blog you want to have, some hosting plans will be better suited to your needs than others.

Let’s take a brief look at each type of hosting package offered by :

shared hosting. It is the cheapest type of hosting, in which users share the resources of a server between several websites. It is excellent for small websites, such as personal blogs. Shared hosting plans range from €1.49 per month.
. A type of shared hosting that is optimized for WordPress websites. If you plan to use WordPress for your small blog, this plan is a perfect option, starting from €1.99 per month.
cloud-hosting. A powerful yet easy-to-use type of hosting where you have access to the resources of a network of cloud servers. It is convenient to move to a when you have a lot of content and a considerable number of followers. Its starting price is €9.99 per month.
VPS Hosting. A powerful and flexible type of hosting where you get dedicated resources from a server. The is an excellent option for technical experts who want complete control over server resources. VPS hosting plans start from €3.49 per month.
WooCommerce Hosting. A type of hosting designed specifically for online stores built on WooCommerce, the open source WordPress eCommerce plugin. He starts at €3.45.

All plans offered by come equipped with free, 24/7 live support, and are eligible for a 30-day money back guarantee.

Once hosting is set up, it’s time to get a domain name. A is what users have to enter in the address bar to get to your site. For example, is our domain name.

To get a custom domain name, you go to the domain registrar of your choice. Some web hosting companies, like , act as domain registrars. Therefore, it is possible at the same time.

If you buy web hosting for a year or more on , you will also receive a name for a year.

At , try to make it easy to remember for users to visit your blog again, and make it as similar as possible to its name. To help you find domain name ideas, try our or a .

3. Set up a platform for your blog

Once you’ve purchased a hosting plan and chosen a domain name, it’s time to decide on the platform your new blog will run on.

Hosted or self-hosted?

Depending on the platform you choose, you can opt for a hosted or self-hosted solution. It is essential to know the difference between the two.

Hosted platforms include it all. They usually include all the necessary tools to create a website. There is no need to purchase hosting and domain name separately.

Some examples of blog hosting platforms are the like WordPress.com, Zyro, Squarespace and Weebly. However, WordPress.com should not be confused with the .

Here are the pros and cons of choosing one. hosted platform or a website builder for your blog:

pros

Quick Install. Hosted platforms are usually all-in-one website building solutions. There is no need to purchase hosting or a custom domain name separately before creating your site.
Very easy to use for beginners. Using a hosted platform is easy, even for beginners. That’s why starting a personal blog and publishing your first post is possible with just a few clicks.
Dedicated support. Many hosted platforms have a dedicated support team that you can contact via live chat, email, or phone.
No maintenance work. Site security and backups are managed by the platform, so you can focus on publishing and promoting your blog.

cons

limited control. You must respect the rules and restrictions of the platform. It is not possible to exercise full control over your site and hosting resources.
limited property. Your blog and all its content are stored on the platform’s server, so you do not fully own it.
Not very flexible. Most of the hosted platforms are based on a closed source system. Templates and plugins are usually limited to what the service officially offers. Also, migrating to another platform is often impossible. You may have to redo the website from scratch.
hard to climb. Hosted platforms are not designed to handle massive websites. If you have plans to grow your website, consider using a self-hosted platform instead.

If you go for a self-hosted blog, you will need to purchase blog hosting separately. Examples of self-hosted platforms are the like WordPress.org, and Joomla.

A is software that allows users to build and manage a website through a graphical user interface. It allows you to create websites without having to program them from scratch.

Here are the pros and cons of having a self-hosted platform or CMS: