Start Your First WordPress Blog

You might be wondering how to start your first successful WordPress blog?

Yes! I’m happy to see you here! ?

I’m here to explain to you the essential steps to follow for an awesome and successful blogging career ahead. Sometimes, I wish I would have started my personal blog over 10-15 years ago. But, unluckily, I’ve started my personal blog just 2 years ago, still, I’ve managed to get a healthy amount of visitors and subscribers for my blog.

In this guide, I have incorporated my learning since the start of my personal blog in a simple and easy way so that all the newbies can take the benefit from my learning and pursue their career into blogging.

So, before proceeding with how to start your own WordPress blog, you must know WHY? because without knowing WHY you’ll surely fail.

Why to Start A WordPress Blog?

Each and every person who owns a blog have different reasons behind starting their own WordPress site.

I believe that learning can improve at a faster rate, only if you share your knowledge with others and this is the only reason for me to start my first WordPress blog.

Consider the 3 most popular reasons before starting your first WordPress blog:

Passion

Passion can be about anything you are interested in. It can be Sports, Cooking, Technology or just anything you can think of. I would suggest that you start a blog about your passion. This will help you write articles about your passion and you’ll love doing it.

I’ve started my blog out of my passion for WordPress and Blogging. This is the only reason my personal blog exists.

Online Presence

A blog can give you great exposure to the digital world and has the power to boost up your business using the online presence. Many people who have their own business or products have the aim to gain online presence and exposure for their business and products.

Even people who love to write and share their own stories to encourage others with the help of the community will also require their own blog for online presence.

Nowadays, Online Presence is the need of every human to get a great amount of exposure.

Earning Money

Last, but not least, people do the blog to make money for their basic or luxurious living lifestyle. There are people who do blogging part-time as well as full time. Making money with your blog is hard work with smartness, dedication, consistency, and passion. So, for those who are just at the threshold should not look for earning.

I do part-time blogging usually during weekends. I try to share my learning with visitors. So, to become a successful blogger, you should continually learn new things.

Pro Tip: If you are new to blogging, never choose Earning Money as your vision, it will surely fail and de-motivate you.

Can you imagine yourself in the first 2 popular reasons for blogging?

Yes!

Then, you’re in the right direction to proceed further with HOW.

How to start your first profitable WordPress blog?

Starting a blog is easy, but maintaining a blog with regular updates is a tough task. It will require Dedication, Consistency, and Passion about the topic you write.

I’ve simplified this article with 6 essential and proven steps to start a blog that is easy to create and profitable (of course!).

Don’t worry, I’ll walk you through in a more concise manner so that you’ll understand every single bit here.

1. Selecting a Topic
2. Identify your Target Audience
3. Choose a Blogging Platform
4. Purchase a Domain Name & Hosting
5. Install and Setup WordPress
6. Get familiar with your blog!

Step 1: Selecting a Topic

A topic is an essential part to start communication. Hence, it is an integral part of your blog to start communicating with your blog readers.

Topic is often referred as Niche in Blogosphere.

Selecting a Topic can be an easy task. But, It may take time and effort in the right direction, if you’re new to blogging.

Some people have a clear vision of what they want to blog about. In my experience, most people, I’ve met don’t know what topic to start with for their blog.

Pro Tip: Always choose a topic in which you are interested and passionate to write and talk about it anytime, anywhere.

Still unable to identify a topic for your blog?

Yes! Don’t worry.

I’ve prepared a list of topics for you that can strike you about your hidden passion:

• Food
  • Recipies
  • Healthy Diet
• Politics
• Global Warming
• Parenthood
• Do It Yourself
• Beginners Guide
• Life Experiences
• Reviews
  • Product Reviews
  • Service Reviews
• Entertainment
  • Movies
  • Music
  • Celebrities
• Jokes and Humour
• Facts and Myths
• History
• Sports
• Technology
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Android
  • Mac
  • iOS, and
  • many more
• Gaming
• Personal Stories
• Travel

These are some of the topics. But, there might be possible that you want to pick up something else for your blog.

It doesn’t matter what topic you select unless and until you enjoy the topic, and are interested to learn more into it.

3 Points to remember before selecting a topic for your blog:

• Blog about something that has plenty of space for discussion.
• Blog about something you are interested in.
• Selecting a niche in which you can self-esteem yourself as an authority.

Pro Tip: Feel free to try and experiment with a few topics, and check what topic best suit your interest and passion.

Step 2: Identify your Target Audience

This is an essential key step for the success of your blog. Identifying Target Audience and then promoting content based on your target audience can improve engagement on your blog. Hence, you will succeed in blogging.

Success of your blog is directly proportional to the target audience.

You must identify your target audience based on the blog topic. I am assuming that you’ve already finalized the blog topic in Step 1.

Who can be your Target Audience?

Perhaps, this is the most critical question to ask you before the beginning of your blogging journey.

Don’t worry, I will help you out with identifying your target audience.

For Example,

You have selected a blog topic to be Weight Loss, then you’ll wonder that your target audience will be obese peoples.

Your Target Audience can be identified in terms of

• Age (e.g. 18-35)
• Type (e.g. Obese People, Diet-Friendly People and People who want to become healthy)
• Interest (e.g. Food, Food, and Food)

So, considering the above terms in our example blog topic Weight Loss, You have to target people with age ranging from 18 – 35 who are obese, diet-friendly and who want to get healthy and loves to eat food anytime anywhere.

3 Reasons To Define Your Target Audience

• Always ensure that you’re creating the right content for the right people.
• Understanding how to create better content that benefits readers.
• Content that Increases Engagement and Conversion with readers.

Try it yourself: Take a piece of paper, research and note down some of the stats for your target audience based on the blog topic. Monitor the engagement of your blog in the next 3 months, implement changes requires based on statistics you received. Again, monitor engagement for the next 3 months and so on.

Step 3: Choose a Blogging Platform

I’m using WordPress Self Hosted version as a blogging platform. I recommend it to every newbie blogger because it is open-source, easy to use and flexible.

There are many reasons behind choosing the WordPress Self Hosted version over Online Version. This is why I am able to provide many features to my blog readers easily.

I won’t be explaining to you about other blogging platforms in this article. I believe that WordPress is a perfect blogging platform for everyone.

However, Here is the list of blogging platforms for your information:

• WordPress.org [Self Hosted Version]
• WordPress.com [Online Version]
• Blogger
• Joomla
• Drupal
• Tumblr
• Medium
• Ghost
• Squarespace
• Wix
• Weebly
• TypePad

Step 4: Purchase a Domain Name & Hosting

To start a blog, you must purchase a domain name as well as a hosting provider to host your amazing website. Before you proceed, I would recommend you to know the basics about Domain Name and Hosting?

What is Domain or Domain Name?

In simple terms, a domain name is your website name.

Technically, A Domain Name is the identification used as the address of your online business. For my website, it is mehulgohil.in

A domain name is an identification string that defines a realm of administrative autonomy, authority or control within the Internet.

Wikipedia

Domain names are formed by the rules and procedures of the Domain Name System (DNS). Any name registered in the DNS is also known as the domain name.

What is Web Hosting?

In simple terms, web hosting is your website storage space where all the web pages reside.

There are many different types of hosting available these days. You can check the below-listed type of hosting and select based on your needs. However, if you need any help in starting your first blog, then shoot me an email using the contact page.

• Shared Hosting – Best for Beginners, but I don’t recommend it.
• Reseller Hosting – Best for Resellers.
• Cloud Hosting – Fast and Scalable, Anyone can adapt it.
• VPS (Virtual Private Server) Hosting – Best for agencies and developers.
• Dedicated Hosting – Best for system admins.
• Elastic Hosting – Best for enterprises.
• Managed WordPress Hosting – Best for serious business owners and bloggers.

There are lots of WordPress hosting options available in the market. Being a WordPress developer, I would recommend you to start with a Managed WordPress Hosting.

However, if you want to start your first WordPress blog with a cheaper host within your budget, then you can go with BlueHost as it is topmost recommended by WordPress itself (Check it yourself on WordPress official site).

Why BlueHost?

• Provide a free domain name (worth $10/year).
• Competitive Price Model – $3.95/month.
• Free SSL Included (Helpful in SEO)
• 24/7 Support.
• Over $150 advertising credit on Google, Bing, and Yahoo.
• Most preferred WordPress hosting provider for 10+ years.

Let’s proceed with purchasing BlueHost hosting to host your first WordPress blog.

To start with purchasing BlueHost hosting, you need to head over to the BlueHost site and click on the “Get Started Now” button.

Then, you’ll be asked to choose the best hosting plan as per your needs. You’ll be able to see the page as below:

I would recommend you to select the basic plan. It is worth the value, and as a newbie blogger, you won’t need the plus or choice pro packages until you grow your blog and get more regular visitors on your first WordPress site.

Once you complete finalizing your plan, click on “Select” to proceed with that plan and you’ll be taken to a page where you will be asked to provide an existing domain name or can avail the free domain name from BlueHost for a year.

Here is the most essential & interesting part of the process. It will ask you to choose your new domain (if you want to avail your free domain) or you can select your existing domain. You can play with names and come up with ideas and see if available. Some people just go with their first and last name as the domain name like me.

For Example, mehulgohil.com

Once you’ve finalized the domain name you want to select. Then, click the “Next” button below that section. 

You’ll be then redirected over to a page where you’ll be required to provide your sensitive information to create account and payment information to purchase the hosting.

Here, you’ll be asked to enter your sensitive details like Name, Address, Phone Number, and Email address to create your account on BlueHost. Alternatively, you can use the Google Sign-in button to fetch the details from your Google Account.

Here, you’ll be asked to choose your package information and add-ons. If you’re a newbie blogger and a worried about the investment as you’re just starting, I would strongly recommend that you go with the Basic Plan for 1 Year in the beginning.

But, If you’re okay with the pre-investment, then it’s better to go with a Basic plan for 3 Years to get a better discount rate.

Also, I see that you don’t need any of Domain Privacy Protection, Codeguard Basic, or SiteLock Security in the beginning. So, I would suggest you start your blog as it is and uncheck all the unnecessary add-ons.

So if you choose the Basic 1 Year plan, and uncheck Domain Privacy Protection, Site Backup Pro, and SiteLock Security, your package will be for $71.40 with a free domain name.

Once you are done with selecting your plan, then you will be asked to proceed with your payment by providing payment information as shown below:

Here, you’ll need to provide your credit card details to proceed with the payment. You can also click on the “more payment options” link to choose from other payment methods.

Once you’re done with the payment, you’ll receive an email confirmation from BlueHost along with all the necessary login information for your hosting account and domain name.

Now, You’re all set up and ready to install and configure your WordPress blog. Woohoo! 

Now, Let’s proceed with installing and setting up WordPress on BlueHost being the cheaper and WordPress recommended hosting provider.

Step 5: Install and Setup WordPress

Installing and Configuring WordPress is a quick 5 minutes installation process and even their support team can help you in the process.

To start with installing WordPress, you need to head over to BlueHost dashboard after logging into your BlueHost account.

Scroll down to Website Builders tab and then click on Install WordPress as shown below:

Then, you’ll be redirected to a page where you’ll be asked for new WordPress admin credentials to be applied for future login.

Then, select your domain name where you want to install WordPress. Now, click on Advanced Options to choose and customize a username and password for your WordPress site. Then, click Install and you’re done!

Congratulations, 
You’re now having an online presence!

To login to your WordPress admin dashboard, you’ll need to go to the following URL in the browser:

Admin URL: https://yourdomain.com/wp-admin/

It will then ask you for your username and password to log in. Once logged in, it will take you to the admin panel of your WordPress site where you’ll be able to manage your site pages, posts, and look & feel. 

Step 6: Get familiar with your blog!

In the beginning, The WordPress admin dashboard looks weird and hard enough to let you forget about blogging. But trust me, you will learn everything about WordPress admin in a short span of time.

At this point, I would recommend that you spend some time checking out the WordPress admin panel and see how it works. It’s not necessary to get over everything but just to get a feel of how it works and what are your options available.

I would suggest you go through the awesome guide on learning WordPress admin panel.

Conclusion

Here, you just learned how and why you should start blogging. Also, you learned about the domain name and hosting with a complete detailed explanation of how to create and purchase a hosting account.

I’ve also explained how you can easily install and configure your first WordPress site.

Let’s summarize what you’ve just got by signing up and creating your first WordPress blog on BlueHost:

• A special price for hosting worth $3.95 per month (instead of $7.99).
• A FREE domain (worth $15/year).
• A super awesome 30 days money-back guarantee.
• Free SSL certificate
• 24/7 support.
  

If you’ve any questions related to this guide, you can shoot me an email via the contact form. I’ll try to revert back as soon as humanly possible to help you out.

Don’t forget to share this ultimate guide with your friends who may find it useful on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Google+. Thanks for your support!