How To Start A Blog And Create Compelling Content?

While it is normal to think that you know how to start a blog, chances are you don’t. I hate to break your bubble – but it’s kinda true. In 2017, I created a blog to write about whatever that suited my fancy. While in the beginning, it made me happy, I gradually became frustrated when I realized I had no clue about making money from blogs. 

Moreover, knowing how to write wasn’t enough – I was writing for myself. Naturally, if I was crafting compelling content, I would have seen traffic on my blog. Moreover, the lack of a robust SEO strategy also made things worse. 

Needless to say, I abandoned my blog and started spending time writing for other blogs. It’s been 7 years since then. Currently, I am an established blogger with 7+ years of experience. It wasn’t an easy journey – but just because I struggled and had to painstakingly learn from my mistakes, you can relax. 

Instead of wasting time over years of research, stay tuned to find out how to start a blog successfully – create compelling content for the same. 

Stay tuned.

How To Start A Blog? A Step-By-Step Guide

Blog writing has become an increasingly profitable business owing to the growth of Content Marketing and brands investing in it. The industry is seeing an upsurge in the number of industry-specific blogs and the growth of revenues from the same.

If you are thinking of starting your blog, this is the perfect time for you to take that decision and make the start. However, like most businesses, blog writing involves certain foundations to be set up at the outset.

These foundations will ensure how successful your page is, and whether you are getting the right amount of traffic to monetize your site within a few months.

If you follow our systematic guide to blog writing, chances are that you will be making thousands of dollars in a few months.

So, here’s a step-by-step guide on how to start a blog:

Step 1: Pick The Right Name And Domain

Your blog name should be an extension of what your blog content is based on. In other words, if you are writing on a particular industry be sure to use the word in the name of your blog. This will make the connection obvious and apparent, increasing the recall value.

For example, if you were writing on fashion or style trends, a good idea would be to have a name like ‘The Urban Fashionista’, or ‘The Style Diva.’ This will help in identifying the audiences of your brand easily.

Social media is an inextricable part of blog promotion. You need to make sure that the username on your social media profiles like Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook should have a user name that is similar to your blogging website.

The second part relates to choosing a domain. Try to choose a .com or a .org domain as it would mean increased visibility and acceptability in front of global audiences. A local domain like .in (India-specific) or .au (Australia-specific), will limit your appeal in front of certain audiences.

Always remember that there is a certain hierarchy attached to domains, and if you do not do it right, chances are you might be limiting your audiences at the very start.

Step 2: Create A WordPress Custom Theme Or A PhP Platform

Many people support the tremendous value attached to WordPress. If you are beginning a blog content site for the first time in your life, it is a good idea to invest a few dollars and get a customized WordPress Theme.

However, if you feel that the WordPress theme is not solving the various parameters of your blog site, you can always go for a web design and development process. We feel that WordPress is a good place to start, given the kind of customization it now offers. It is also highly affordable and perfect for content sites in many ways.

Try to select a theme that suits the kind of industry you are writing about and your target audience. If your blog site is about B2B industries, selecting colors and themes that are subdued, professional-looking, and simple is a good way to proceed.

The theme and colors should complement the industry, the target audience, and most importantly, your style of writing.

Step 3: Create Quality Content For Your Website

Quality content is what will power your blog site today, tomorrow, and forever. A good start would be to set some guidelines for your content, as well as for the content you would receive through guest posts.

Set a word limit for the articles on your site. Try to set the limit at 1000 words or more. Long format content is highly promoted by Google and other search engines and scores well on several metrics.

Ensure that you are only creating original and plagiarism-free content. You can do this with the help of a Plagiarism checker. At all times during your blog writing process, a good idea would be to check for grammar mistakes in the articles.
A free grammar checker software will help you maintain the quality of the content on your site. This software is an indispensable tool to have at all times.

If you are writing original content that excites audiences, you will see a drastic level of improvement in your blog site within a few months. Moreover, an increase in traffic and metrics will help you monetize your site in a very short time.

Step 4: Create Social Media Pages For Promoting Published Content

Once you have set up your blog site, and have set the foundations in place, you should create social media profiles of your site. You must use Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Snapchat, and other platforms.

As soon as you publish your article, share it on social media channels. This will help increase their visibility and drive audiences to your website. You can also set aside a small budget to promote good articles on social media.

This is a proven, time-tested, and convincing strategy to drive audiences from social to the website. You can also share it on your profile, or ask a few of your friends to share them. The more the visibility, the better the reach.

Social sharing is a necessary mechanism to help increase the metrics of your site. In other words, the number of times people click from social media and go to your site, Google thinks it is a credible site for information.

Step 5: Select The Right Avenues For Monetizing Your Blog

While many avenues did not previously exist for blog owners today, not all of them are of a good variety. You should always ensure that you are in charge of what kind of monetization you want to go for.

You should be very careful of dealing with link-building companies and guest posting services and should properly vet the content, the links, and the payment structure. In time, there are several bad links placed on your site, and your ratings, rankings, and reach will plummet drastically.

Always check whom are you working with and their credentials. Decide on the payment structure upfront. If you are just beginning to see traffic and an increase in metrics, a safe option would be to start with Google AdSense.

Step 6: Pick A Niche

Audiences that consume online content are becoming highly evolved. You cannot write about everything or all industries. It is always a good idea to start with a particular segment and then go into its sub-divisions.

For example, if you are looking to start a technology review blog, you can start with mobile phones, laptops, televisions, music systems, and the like. Once you have established your credibility, and are witnessing a good traffic flow, you can further specialize.

Do not stop the existing blog, but create a new one with a niche audience and following- for example, a blog site on just gaming laptops, and nothing else. This will help filter your existing audiences to the new site, and you will continue enjoying the same traffic and monetary benefits.

Step 7: Know Your Target Audience

A blog’s content is created with a target audience in mind. This will help you choose your style and tone of writing, how informal or formal you are, colors, and images. It is never a good idea to use terms like YOLO, FOMO, and others when your audiences are above the age of 60.

Understanding your audience is a point where even good bloggers fail miserably. You need to keep in mind that online audiences are aware of minute and intricate things. This means that they will be able to differentiate between genuine content and paid content.

Avoid unnecessary external links where they are not required. Ideally, there should not be more than two external links on a particular article. You can always ensure that the external links are of good quality. This will help your credibility and be good for the health of your blog content site.

Step 8: Optimise Your Blog’s Performance Through WordPress

Even the best content or blog writers need technical help. WordPress knows this and helps you immensely improve the performance and reach of your article. When you are updating the draft in your WordPress dashboard, you should always follow their guidelines and improve the article.

For example, the ‘Readability Analysis’ and the “Keyword Analysis’ of WordPress should always be optimized by the writer. The number of times the keyword is mentioned, whether it is there in the title, the first paragraph, or how many transient words are used, is important.

The WordPress analysis puts forth a scientific and technologically advanced analysis that helps you improve the article. Always remember, that these are in harmony with the latest Google updates and help improve rankings, searches, and credibility of information on your blog site.

Step 9: Never Compromise On Content Quality And Ethics

In our experience of working with hundreds of content sites and bloggers, I have seen two major trends. Some are sticklers for quality and ethics. Then some would compromise on it for extra and easy money.

Over a period, I have experienced first-hand that the people who maintain quality and do not compromise often start slow, but end up doing better. Contrarily, the people who started with compromises early, and made a few bucks, performed badly, once the updates started coming in.

The right path is to follow the ethics of the business. Many people will offer you money for bad links, and objectionable content. Saying no would be tough, but it is the right thing to do. In the end, it will be immensely beneficial for your business and revenues. ‘Keep Google Happy’, should always be your motto!

Step 10: Be Patient And Consistent For Long-Term Success

If you have made up your mind about religiously following the above-mentioned steps, then this point assumes added importance. Setting a good foundation takes time, but it is necessary. You will start feeling that results are not coming about, traffic is not increasing, and revenues are not rising.

However, you need to keep in mind that all the above problems will go away after some time. This time might be 6 months to a year. However, once you have seen it through you can start expecting real results. The age of the domain also matters.

In other words, Google will see that a year-old domain has over 200-300 good-quality long-format articles without any bad links. It will start promoting your organic reach monumentally after a year. The key is to hang in there and have patience. Remember, content marketing yields long-term dividends and not short-term stopgaps.

How To Create Compelling Content?

So, what makes a blog post GOOD? 

Good blogs are objectively educational and interesting – if it fails to add value and help the user then chances are your blog will not perform as per the latest content guidelines from Google. 

Moreover, your blogs must be solving a problem, answering relevant questions, or offering actionable steps to help the user. Also, it is imperative to remember that while educational and informative blogs are good, you have to make them interesting and engaging. 

After all, you don’t want your readers to fall asleep, or leave your website seconds after arriving there since it can increase your website’s bounce rate. 

Crafting Compelling Content

So, how can you create compelling content?

It is a simple process. Your introduction can make it or break it for you – human attention span lasts for 7 seconds. So, if you have to hook your audience with an engaging introduction and make them scroll down (like I just did with you guys). 

Don’t forget to use examples to ensure your readers can relate to your perspective on a certain topic. 

In addition, I’ve briefly laid down the steps to create a compelling blog post below: 

1. Choose the type of content you will be creating.
2. Pick content topics that both you and your target audience are interested in.
3. Create topic clusters around the broader topics and do keyword research based on the same. 
4. Google keywords to understand their search intent. Find the content gap and related questions.
5. Generate working titles and create a solid outline covering major points. Then, start writing a compelling introduction.
6. Once you are done writing the whole blog, proofread it properly. You can use Grammarly for the same. 
7. Add images and other visual elements (like infographics) to your content. Also, add CTAs (call-to-action) to your post.
8. Optimize the content for on-page SEO.
9. Publish your content and start promoting the same on social media.
10. Track the blog’s performance over time. 

Launch Your Blog Today!

The tremendous success of blogs has ensured that blog writing has not remained just a hobby. Rather, a full-time vocation that can be highly profitable if you follow the right steps. The growth of Digital Marketing and Content Marketing has completely transformed the world of content. 

In our experience, knowing how to start a blog can transform your hobby into a profitable business. We have seen individuals who started as novice bloggers, own and manage close to thirty to fifty blog sites simultaneously. 

These individuals are now earning thousands of dollars every month from their sites. These bloggers have invested time, money, and energy into reaching wherever they are now.

This is not to say that you will never reach that position. On the contrary, you most definitely will you might even be more successful. The key is to do it right, from the start until the end. A successful blog is all about displaying quality and having patience. 

Once you have mastered these two pillars, you will start seeing the tangible results of your efforts.

If you have the right foundation, and the right intentions, chances are that you will be quite successful in a short period. Do reach out to us if you want to know more about how to start a blog, or how to start monetizing from your blog. We are always there to lend a helping hand to fellow bloggers.

Best of luck, and Happy Blogging!