When I started blogging, I visited many blogs to gather perfect information on how to start a blog. Later I realized that writing a long and informative post on “How to Start A Blog” would help new bloggers. This guide starts from scratch and ends up at an advanced level on how to start and maintain a blog like a pro.

This single post is enough for beginners to set up a perfect blog! I will also create a Youtube video for this post as well.

To make this easy and simple to understand, let us break this long post into 8 simple steps.

Step 1: Select a niche and do the research.
Step 2: Pick a descriptive name for your blog.
Step 3: Purchase domain and hosting.
Step 4: Set up the WordPress.
Step 5: Select a good WordPress theme (we currently prefer Neve because it’s fast).
Step 6: Create important blog pages.
Step 7: Install the foremost plugins for your blog.
Step 8: Promoting your blog online.

Step 1: Selecting a niche

The most basic and important step is that you need to think about it before starting a blog. A niche can not and should not be selected only based on what you like. It is one of the most important steps and will largely determine your success.

If this is the first website you’re starting. You should at least give 2-3 days, ideally a week, just to select a niche and then research it. Researching the niche is really important! You should at least have 5 topics or post ideas even before you register the domain.

Once you have decided!

Step 2: Setting up a name & logo for your blog:

Finding a name is really tough. I know that! Try to have the following characteristics in the blog name:

It should be descriptive
It should be less than 15 characters (This is not a hard rule)
Think about combining 2 or max 3 words to get a name e.g. BareMetalWarrior or BuyUsedWebsites (this website, I know it’s not a great name)
If it can be brandable (unique, small & descriptive) then it’s the cherry on the pie.
Register the domain and block social media handles as well by checking with the tool Namecheckr
Always go with .com

Don’t fret much about the name, you’ll start liking it after some time. But also do not plan to change it later!

Step 3: Purchasing the Domain and Hosting:

Now register your domain name and find a good hosting provider. I personally use Namecheap for domain registration and CloudWays for hosting mainly because Namecheap provides the cheapest domain names around and Cloudways is best to run VPS without much technical knowledge required. Always look for managed hosting, you can thank me later for this.

But if you’re just a starter you should either go with shared hosting or managed hosting service like EasyWP from Namecheap. Though I have never used it. But I will certainly try them out and update you accordingly.

NOTE: Use the COUPONFCNC code while registering domain names on Namecheap to get 20% off. It always works!

Step 4: Setting up the WordPress:

Depending on the hosting provider you’ll either get access to Cpanel or some other controller software where you can install WordPress.

Your blog is ready to work on!

Step 5: Selecting a good WordPress Theme:

A theme is an important factor in WordPress. You should only choose a theme that is small, fast, and preferably free. Right now, our favorite is Neve because it is one of the fastest and I really like its minimalistic and clean looks.

Don’t spend too much time making your website too good because it is useless initially. Take a look at our websites to know

Step 6: Creating and Publishing important pages:

Pages like Privacy Policy, Disclaimer, Contact, and About are very important for any blog because this help in creating your EAT (Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) with Google and other search engines. These should be the first pages that you should publish.

Step7: Installing the required plugins for your blog:

Plugins are like add-ons to your website, they are useful for the website. But always weigh the pros and cons of any plugin. Try not to have more than 7 plugins activated at one time. Most people will give you a list of plugins that you should have on your website. But I will argue against even having the most important ones like Akismet.

90% of the websites should have their comment section closed because it doesn’t add much to the functionality besides slowing it down. Most often than not we see websites that have open comment sections but zero comments.

Even the SEO plugin is not required because what an SEO plugin will offer you can easily be achieved by stock WordPress install and a little change in your writing habits will go a long way. We are writing a post where we detail the reasons why you don’t need an SEO plugin in 2022. We’ll share the link here.

Step 8: Promoting your Blog:

There is only one promotion that you should use initially and that is SEO. Try to focus all your efforts on getting search traffic first. After 3-4 months, you can start to focus some of your attention on social media accounts. But that too should be limited because social media gobbles up a lot of time without much return. On the other hand, SEO pays a lot compared to the efforts it requires.

How to start a blog in 2022