How To Start A New Blog
How To Start A New Blog
Article by Esteban Ferreira13
How To Start A New Blog – Business
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So, you wanna know how to start a new blog? Well then, you’ve come to the right place. My article will outline the most important things you should know in order to get started. Of course, there are several more steps involved and you’ll have to do more research to get a complete list…or I can show you an alternative way. Continue reading the article to see what I’m talking about.
How to Start a New Blog – Domain Name
How to start a new blog without a domain name – it’s impossible. So, first things first, buy a domain name. Before doing anything else, any new blogger must do this. Decide on something you like then purchase it through a provider like Go Daddy Inc. I recommend them because I use them and they’re phenomenal, the service is outstanding and their prices even better. Right now, they’re one of the largest domain sellers worldwide. Surf the web or Go Daddy website for coupons or promo codes that’ll get you a discount.
How to Start a New Blog – Hosting
After getting your domain name has been created you will need to host it somewhere. You could use Go Daddy since you’re already registered with them but you don’t have to. There are tons of web hosting companies to choose from like Yahoo Web Hosing or Hostrocket. Just do a little research and look for things like reliability, customer service & support and obviously, price.
How to Start a New Blog – WordPress
A big part on how to start a new blog is installing WordPress. It’s a tool you’ll need. You’ll find many web hosting companies offering content management system (CMS) script installation or free blogs. Again, Go Daddy or Powweb both offer these services and have great auto script installation systems. The whole thing takes about 10 minutes to install the entire WordPress on your web server and this includes database and uploads of any necessary file. WordPress is the most poplular blogging script available, not to mention the easiest.
After installation, log-in to the dashboard or control panel. See if there is a “latest version” of the script available. If so, I recommend you download the updated version. Once plug-ins and add-ons are installed in WordPress it might make you stick with the older version due to version requirements.
How to Start a New Blog – Permalinks
Now’s the time we load the blog with features. Activate permalinks from WordPress located in the dashboard or the control panels (see Options Tag). This will help create a static URL for the blog rather than your basic or dynamic WordPress URL. Doing this helps give you the advantage over search engine optimization (SEO) since many search engines (like Google) do NOT prefer signs or symbols (? or = ) in the URL address.
Example:
http://www.howtostartaanewblog.com/?p=4 (dynamic URL)
http://www.howtostartanewblog.com/your-blog-title (static URL) (which is search engine friendly)
How to Start a New Blog – Plug-ins
Title Tag Plug-ins: Create a title tag for each of your posts. This feature is very important to SEO. I’ll go into more depth about this in the SEO section below. For now, install the title tag plug-in by uploading the folders or the single file. There are several varieties of title tag plug-ins for WordPress. You can even use two scripts at the same time. The reason people would want to use two plug-ins is to get ultimate control over the blog post. See the next step to get a better understanding of why this is done.
Meta Tag Plug-ins: These are needed to write different meta tags (meta descriptions and meta keywords) for different posts in WordPress. Google doesn’t follow meta tags, but Yahoo does. And since they are the second biggest search engine around it’ll behoove you to do so. With that said, always be sure your meta keywords and meta description come right after the title tag. Many top class search engine optimizers believe this is a great way to attract search engines directly to your website. Along with the title tag plug-in, you can use the SEO title tag plug-in to make a more unique and more attractive page for the users as well as the search crawlers.
How to Start a New Blog – Theme
When choosing your theme or template keep in mind 3 factors:
Keep it simple – if the web design is overly flashly or fancy then you’re actually doing the opposite and will drive visitors away. If the eye gets distracted people tend to just leave and find someone else. Not to mention, search engines cannot and will not read flash designs.
Have a navigation bar – make the site very user friendly. Have a bar at the top in which you can add all the important pages of your blog to. This helps visitors maneuver about easier and helps search engines find other blogs or posts quicker.
Have search boxes – use a theme or template that ha built-in search boxes located at the top of the page. If you’re unable to then use widgets (see Presentation tabs in WordPress dashboard or control panels).
You’ll be able to find many free WordPress themes online. Make yours a unique header image instead of using someone else’s same header or image that comes with the template. Keep the site simple and neat. A clean look is good for new visitors. Especially ones who are not familiar with your site’s navigation or layout. Try to keep extra URL’s, links, unnecessary activated plug-ins, ads and side bars off the home page. You might think it looks good but but visitors will probably think differently. It’s similar to selling a house. The realtor tells you to clean up the clutter, put stuff away and make the appearece clean and inviting. That’s what you need to do with your blog.
How to Start a New Blog – Analytics
The final thing to do is install Google Analytics. This collects and complies all your blog visitor’s information such as the number of unique visitors, page visits, languages, locations of visitors, and much more. This is vital data and helps you get to know more about your visitors. When you know more it will help drive web traffic and web traffic is the single most important element of your website. Taking the time to study this research will be worth your while.
So these are just the necessary components to getting your blog started. As mentioned before, there are many other steps involved. They’re all found online and can be done on your own.
I created my blog all on my own and I am in no way a tech person.
Of course, it took me several, several weeks,
a ton of patience and a ton of Google searches on “how to…” If you’re like me,
I work a regular job of 40-50 hours per week,
am a husband and father of 4 boys so, my time is stretched thin.
About the Author
But, you don’t have to endure my same headache because now there’s something so much better. An alternative to doing it yourself is Empower Network
. Creators David Wood and David Sharpe have created a way for you to blog without the headache of set-up, training on how to get started, plus they do the selling while you collect 100% of the commissions. You can figure out how to start a new blog
on your own or have my Empower Network review explain how it’s done.
Use and distribution of this article is subject to our Publisher Guidelines
whereby the original author’s information and copyright must be included.
Esteban Ferreira13
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