It's not news any more that you can make money online by blogging, or is it?…
The world of blogging has exploded in recent years! It’s now one of the most popular and easiest ways for individuals and organizations to share their news and thoughts with the world. In the past few years, social media has been the go-to platform to achieve such goals.
But, nowadays, writing on a blog site has become a better way of communicating with others. These days, it’s not unusual for people to write blog posts and share links to them for Facebook and Twitter followers to check out. Doing so helps them to have the best of both worlds.
Do you have an excellent command of the English language?
Are you great at writing attractive, powerful and articulate content?
If you answer yes to any of these questions then you just might consider starting your own money-spinning blog empire today!
If you’ve never set up and managed a blog before, this handy article will help you to get started. It will also share with you the secrets to making money from your love of literature. This one thing I ask though: Don’t forget to mention this blog when you’ve made your first million!
Alright, let’s get started…
Step 1: Buy A Domain Name and Set Up Hosting
You will doubtless know that there are free blogging platforms out there. The only trouble with these free services is that you don’t get much control over them. If the hosting servers go down, you can’t expect any complaints to get remedial action immediately.
If however, you pay for your hosting, you can expect better reliability and 24/7 technical support. After all; you get what you pay for in life!
So if you truly want to build a blog that makes you money, the first thing you will need to do is buy a domain name.
In case you don’t know, a domain name is the website address you type into your browser’s address bar. Domain names are friendlier than typing in a series of twelve numbers separated by periods. And domain names are also memorable, which is more than can get said for IP addresses!
For example, the domain name of this blog is www.WebIncomeJournal.com!
Once you have chosen and bought your domain name, the next step is to pay for hosting. Some hosts charge an annual fee, whereas others charge on a monthly basis. Make sure that the host you choose offers good value for money.
Step 2: Install WordPress
Now that you’ve got your domain name and hosting sorted out, the next stage is to install some blogging software onto it! I recommend installing WordPress. It’s open-source, meaning it’s free.
Most hosting packages allow you to do a one-click install of WordPress from your hosting control panel. That means you don’t have to worry about downloading ZIP files, extracting the contents and then uploading them to your host via FTP.
WordPress is an easy to use blogging platform. It also powers over 75 million websites worldwide, making it the most popular system to date.
Step 3: Customizing WordPress
Once WordPress gets installed, you can then customize your blog. You can install themes on your blog. There is a range of different styles, layouts and color schemes you can use. Just go to Appearance > Themes to see the choice available.
The Themes shown in there are from the official WordPress repository. They are all designed by other WordPress users just like you. If you don’t see anything you fancy, you also have the choice of buying premium themes from the likes of ThemeForest.
Premium themes often have plenty of extra features and plugins over the free, open-source ones. If you can afford it, I recommend buying a premium theme on that basis. Themes start from as little as $35, depending on what you buy and which vendor you buy from.
Step 4: Automating Your Work
WordPress can’t automate your content – at least, not all of it! But what it can do is post automatic links to new content on your blog. Using a plugin, you can tell WordPress to submit new blog post links to your Facebook and Twitter accounts.
That saves you a few minutes of copying and pasting your URLs! You can even tell it to post hashtags using your blog post tags as the source. Some people use services like Google’s Feedburner to syndicate new blog posts into RSS feeds. The world needs to know about your new blog posts, and this is a way of doing so.
Step 5: Marketing Your Blog: The hands-off approach
Putting links to new blog posts through social media is one thing. But how do you get people to check out your dynamite content in the first place?
If you want to make some serious money from your blog, one way is to use a digital marketing agency. In a nutshell, you pay them some money, they do the hard work, and you end up with plenty of visitors to your site. The result? Plenty of income through your blog!
It wasn’t until recently that I learned how useful such agencies are for bloggers. If curiosity is getting the better of you, check out a review of Today’s Growth Consultant. That review describes the kinds of things these agencies can do to help you grow readership figures and generate income from your blog.
I recommend getting quotes from a few different agencies if you are going down this route. It’s important the deal and working relationship feels right before you start handing out cash.
Step 6: Marketing Your Blog: The DIY approach
If funds are tight, you might wish to start out with a DIY approach. The good news is that there are plenty of things to help you get started.
Once you’ve got a few posts on your blog, I recommend signing up to some affiliate link vendors like TradeDoubler and VigLink. The way they work is simple. When a visitor clicks an affiliate link on your site, that click gets registered with the vendor. If your visitor buys something from the vendor, you get a cut of the sale: your commission!
You should also consider submitting guest posts on other sites and linking back to yours. Just make sure you are linking to relevant content. Otherwise, search engines may blacklist your website as being spammy!
So, what are you waiting for? It’s time to go out there and use your influence to start making money online blogging!
