How To Start A Successful Blog – The Beginner’s Guide!

Have you ever thought about the word blog and what it means?

For many people, blogging is just a way of keeping in touch with their own two brain cells.

But to those serious about it, a blog can be much more than that, their whole livelihood.

So, how do you start a successful blog?

This article will give you plenty of insight and advice on how to start a successful blog from beginner to expert.

Let’s examine everything you need to know about starting and running a successful blog!

What Is a Blog?

A blog is a type of website written and published regularly to help readers answer questions they have (or just for entertainment.) In contrast to a magazine, a blog usually doesn’t have an editorial staff, is not peer-reviewed, and doesn’t have a traditional circulation.

Blogs are a great way to share thoughts, experiences, and ideas with an online community.

A blog may contain various content types, including informative articles, opinion pieces, personal experiences, and blog comments. 

A blog may be informal or formal, short or long-term, structured or disorganized. 

Blogging can be a great way to make money online, as it doesn’t require too many special skills or knowledge. 

According to the Income School YouTube channel, you can expect to earn around $2.3k/month with a blog with around 100 posts.

However, the Income School YouTube channel has also said that if you put digital products on your website, like a video course or an eBook that solves a problem that the reader has, then you can expect to earn around $3.3k/month with a blog that has about 100 posts.

However, the posts on a blog only get shown on Google until they reach a certain age.

So, if you make a blog post, you’ll likely have to wait for around 8 – 12 months until Google shows it to their searchers.

This is because Google doesn’t want to show any new, risky content that might be bad, so it tests it out in small groups first.

But, as long as you write a lot of helpful content that answers questions that people on Google have, readers will come! 

Once you get the readers, you can either put ads or sell a digital product, like a video course, and then rake in the money.

With the wide range of topics and ideas that are possible to cover, it’s easy to find a niche and make a living.

Why Should You Start a Blog?

Blogging can be an effective way to make money online, as it doesn’t require any special skills or knowledge. 

All you need to do is to write a lot of articles that answer unanswered questions, and readers will come! 

Blogs are a great way to build your reputation and get exposure to your products and services. 

And, if you have a knack for it, you can make a career out of blogging as a profession. 

Blogging is a proven method for growing your business. 

With millions of readers online, it’s no wonder that blogging is a proven way to make money online. 

Every business can benefit from blogs. 

Whether you want to promote your products or services or share your thoughts on current events, blogs are an effective way to share content and get your voice heard.

How to Start a Blog

Blogging requires a lot of effort but has massive potential for success. The best way to start a blog is to get started today and look at YouTube videos.

But, if you want a quick guide to blogging, here it is.

1.) Decide on a Blog Topic

The key here is to brainstorm ideas until you find one that interests you. 

Then, narrow down your topics to a few more niche topics, and brainstorm some more. 

You’ll need to narrow down your topics even more since once you’ve started blogging, the chance that you will have a better article or resource than your huge competitors is small, so you must start super-niche to get the small, easier wins and work your way up from there. 

Let’s take my blog as an example.

I started with the health niche and then furthered that down into diets and weight loss.

But, since that’s still too broad, I narrowed that topic to the ketogenic diet and intermittent fasting niche.

And, since that’s also slightly broad, I niched my articles even more to answer the “unanswered” questions on Google.

For example, instead of making a post called “How to Lose Weight With Keto,” which is what everyone does, I may write an article like “How Much Weight Can You Lose In a Month With Keto And Intermittent Fasting?”

And the way I find these articles is by searching phrases on Google, like “How much keto ___” and then I let Google fill in the rest of it, and then I make that article.

This shows me what people are searching for, and it also helps me with finding “unanswered” topics.

Once you’ve chosen your topic, it’s time to move on to the next step.

But, you don’t need to worry about your blog topic too much as long as it’s niche.

A website called oliveoil.com is doing really well, and it’s literally just about olive oil!

So, choose a topic you’re interested in and go through the niche system I talked about, where you narrow down your blog’s topic until it’s super-niche.

This will make you stand out against the competition since you’re answering questions that people haven’t answered yet.

2.) Decide on a Blog Name

Blog names are incredibly important, as they help direct people to your blog. You can name your blog anything you want, so long as it directs people back to your website.

I named my website johnkaya.com because it’s more about me and my specific advice.

But, if you aren’t specifically an expert in what you’re writing about, which is most people, then you should make a simple, corporate blog name.

For example, since my site is about keto and intermittent fasting, I could’ve called it something like livingketo.com or goketo.com.

Once you decide on that, you’ll have to go to a domain hoster and buy a domain.

After that, you must go to a website hosting service and use the domain that you bought from the domain registrar.

There are plenty of online tutorials on how to do this, so watch those.

3.) Get Your Blog on WordPress

WordPress is the base software that most people use to run their blogs. You can find detailed instructions on how to get your blog up and running on WordPress here.

But remember that you want to get the self-hosted version of WordPress, which doesn’t come from WordPress.com.

WordPress.com’s self-hosted free website plan is hosted by WordPress, but there are so few features that you can’t viably use it.

Instead, use a regular hosting company like Cloudways and use self-hosted WordPress from there.

4.) Post Onto Medium As Well

Medium is a platform that’s similar to YouTube but for blogging. You can post articles onto Medium, and when you provide value and readers read them, you can make money with the Medium Partner Program.

But, if you cross-post your articles onto Medium, then you must add a canonical link of the original WordPress website post, so Google knows to rank the WordPress website’s post instead of the Medium post.

Medium earnings don’t really account for much compared to how many articles you need to create, but they can be an easy way to share your message and make some quick money.

What You Should Remember When You Make Your Blog

Once you’ve selected the right platform and theme, and found your blogging niche, you’re ready to start blogging. 

Here are the most important things you need to think about when starting a blog:

1.) Audience

How will you attract readers to your blog? How will you retain them?

As long as you logically go through the reader’s pain and solve their problem, your audience will be satisfied.

2.) Content

What will make your blog stand out from the rest? How will you create content that will keep readers on your blog for longer periods of time?

I personally use Grammarly Premium to make my content better and more concise.

I also use a premade header Google Doc format for most of my articles.

For example, in that Google Doc, I already wrote out the headings with X in place for the specific topic, so I can just quickly fill in the Xs and write my articles.

And, since most of my posts answer a similar question to the other posts, like “Are Granny Smith Apples Keto-Friendly?” I can just use the same template for most of them.

3.) Search Queries

What are people searching for? How will your articles answer questions? What are your potential article topics?

I keep a Google Doc where I answer all of the questions that I can make posts about so I can stay organized.

And most of the time, I only use questions for the titles so I can address the search intent better.

For example, instead of making a post about the ultimate guide to keto, I’m more likely to make a niche response post, like “Are Granny Smith Apples Keto-Friendly?”

4.) Make a YouTube Channel

Making a YouTube channel can be a simple way to attract visitors to your products.

But, if you haven’t made a solid living from blogging alone, I recommend that you make your blog successful before you move onto YouTube.

This is because blogging by itself is already hard. 

So, there is no need to add a 2nd responsibility to yourself until you’re ready.

However, if you’re ready to make more sales and money by creating YouTube videos, I would highly recommend that you start a YouTube channel.

You can also just answer the questions from your blog articles, so you don’t have to think about new topics or research.

You could even just read off of the “script” of your old blog articles and then rake in more dough.

Conclusion

Blogging is a great way to make money online, as it doesn’t require any special skills or knowledge, just the will to learn and work. 

All you need to do is find what people are searching for, write a lot about that topic, and readers will come! 

Blogs are a great way to share thoughts, experiences, and ideas with an online community and make an income.

I hope this helped!

If you want to learn more about how to stick to your daily habits so you don’t get distracted, you can read my article here where I share the simple way to build lasting habits.

Or, if you want to see what a good response post looks like, you can go here.