How to start a blog in 2023

So, are you looking at how to start a blog? If yes, then you are in the right place!

I started my blog (BloggingStep.com) in 2016, I was a newbie to blogging and knew less than nothing about blogging at that time. I had the same problem and same question – How to start a blog?

I am sure, you are reading this post as you want to start a blog with one or many of the below reasons:

1. You wanna make money through your blog content.
2. You want to become a published author.
3. You want to get more exposure for your existing business.
4. You want to attract an audience or build awareness for your niche.
5. You want to tell your story and meet new people.
6. Or might be any other reason!

So here on this post, my main aim is to let the beginners (especially for those who want to) know the steps to create a good and successful blog in WordPress.

Who can start a blog?

In early days, it was very difficult to maintain a blog, but now in these days blog can be maintained very easily without having any advanced technical skills. But if you have any basic knowledge of HTML and CSS then that will give you some extra benefits.

Now I would say anyone can start a blog, and for any reason. If you are a professional (of any services like a designer, SEO, development and any other), then I recommend you that you should maintain your blog in your expertise that will help you increase your knowledge and build your network. I am sure you will also get more exposure to your existing business.

These are the main steps that I’ll cover:

• Choose the topic/niche you want to start a blog.
• Select the blogging platform
• Choose a domain name
• Select your hosting partner
• Install WordPress
• Install Theme & Plugins

Benefits of Blogging

Before moving ahead, let me tell you that blogging has several benefits, both personal and professional. Here are some of the key benefits of blogging:

1. Creative Outlet: Blogging allows you to express yourself creatively and share your thoughts, experiences, and ideas with others.
2. Building a Community: By consistently providing valuable content, you can build a loyal audience and engage with people who share your interests.
3. Personal Development: Writing regularly can help you improve your writing skills, critical thinking, and self-reflection.
4. Establishing Authority: Blogging in a specific niche can help establish you as an expert or thought leader in that field.
5. Networking: Through blogging, you can connect with other bloggers, influencers, and industry experts in your niche, which can lead to collaboration opportunities and new business relationships.
6. Brand Building: Blogging can help you build your personal or business brand, as it provides a platform to showcase your values, personality, and expertise.
7. Monetization: Blogging can also be a way to earn income through affiliate marketing, advertising, sponsorships, and selling products or services.

Overall, blogging can be a rewarding and fulfilling experience, and can offer a range of personal and professional benefits.

Now It’s Time to Start Your Blog!

Step 1 – Choose the topic/niche you want to start a blog

When you are starting your blog, you should know the purpose of your blog. So I would recommend you to choose the niche of your interest, that will help you manage your blog content. Suppose your interest in sports category (that can be cricket, basketball, football, IPL and any other), you can start writing your blog posts on any of them.

In my case, my interest was in web development, so I chose WordPress & Blogging as my niche. I started my blog content in writing post something related to WordPress & Blogging.

Step 2 – Select the blogging platform

You need a site builder and CMS platform. You can choose any blogging platform like WordPress, Joomla, Drupal, Magento and any other. But I recommend you to use WordPress for your blogging site as it’s very user-friendly and easy to access. You can read more about WordPress on my post “What is WordPress?”

I will recommend you to use Self Hosted WordPress blog and please stay away from free blogging platforms like WordPress.com and Blogger.com as they don’t provide ownership and also having some limitations.

The benefits of using the self-hosted websites are:

1. You will have 100% ownership over your blog/website content
2. You can manage your website with your great domain name like www.bloggingstep.com instead of any subdomain of other website like abc.wordpress.com
3. You can do complete customization of your website.
4. You can make money with your blog content or by placing advertisements of any other firm (in case your blog goes popular)

Step 3 – Choose a domain name

To setup a self hosted WordPress blog you need a domain name something related with your niche.

Choosing the right domain name is very important. So here are some tips that you should follow:

1. Take any domain having .com/.net/.org extension
2. It should be easy to remember
3. You can use your personal name
4. Don’t use any numbers, hyphens in your domain name

Step 4 – Select your web hosting partner

If you want to start a blog you need to have web hosting, that allows your visitors to access your website. In these days, there are different types of web hosting services are:

• Shared Web Hosting
• Reseller Web Hosting
• Cloud Based Web Hosting
• Virtual Private Server (VPS)
• Dedicated Web Server
• Managed WordPress Hosting

There are so many hosting providers, who are providing all the above services. Please read my other article Which service is best and you have to choose for your website for better understanding about your web hosting partner.

Step 5 – Install WordPress

For installing WordPress on your localhost or directly on the server. You can go through my articles “How to install WordPress on Localhost (XAMPP)” and “How to install WordPress on Live Server”.

Step 6 – Install Theme & Plugins

For understanding what are WordPress themes and plugins. I have written a separate article “WordPress Themes & Plugins” that will explain to you in detail about what are WordPress themes & plugins and how you can install on your WordPress website.

Note: After setting up your blog, I am sure your blog will give you back something if you can manage your blog content in a way that can help other people. Because people will love your content and they will follow you and come back to you for more updates about your niche.

Hope you will launch your blog soon. 

All the best and Happy Blogging!

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