How To Start A Blog in 2021

Best Step by Step Blogging Guide For

Are you ready to learn how to start a blog 2021 with step by step guide?

Great, it will be your life-changing decision for sure, because working for yourself and earn a good amount of money can change your life drastically.

Who am I? To Teach You How to Start a Blog & Earn Money?

I am Karan Bhardwaj, a full-time blogger and digital marketer from India. I started my journey in 2014 and starting a blog was one of the best decisions of my life.

Right Now, I am running more than 20+ money blogs and they are generating [Four Figures in USD] for me every month.

So, if you are ready to learn how you can make passive income with your first blog that helps you to live your life like BOSS then left everything aside, and follow this guide & start your own blog.

Here, I am going to teach you “How to Start a Blog in 2021 From Scratch Step By Step Guide”.

So you don’t need to ask someone to teach you how to create a blog, and not only creating a blog but you can learn how to make money through a blog on bloggingthrive.com as well.

As I said, in this guide, I am going to teach you every step, so to start a money blog, you need to follow the steps mentioned below.

Steps to Start a Profitable Blog:

• Choose Profitable Niche for Your Blog
• Choose Best Domain for Your Blog
• Choose Best & Reliable Web Hosting Provider
• Set Up Your Blog with WordPress CMS
• Choose Best Looking WP Theme for Your Blog
• Must Have Plugins for Your Blog
• Write & Publish First Blog Post on Blog
• Blog Promotion Methods to Get Targeted Audience
• Best Ways to Make Money from Your Blog

Step#1: Choose Profitable Niche for Your Blog

Choosing the best niche for blog is the most common but at the same time, most important step to start a blog.  

What is Niche?

A niche is the main topic that reflect your blog nature. In simple words, if you are in love with dogs than you must start blog in dog niche.

But what, If you don’t know what you love and what not? Let’s understand how to choose a niche for blog?

If you want a successful blog than, you have to go with the niche where you can write without taking help of any other source.

For Example: If you are one who always love to spend time with your plants, and all your friends and family want to know how you take care of your plants than you can start a gardening blog easily because in this niche, you can write how to take care of plants, flowers, etc.

How to Choose a Niche for Blog – Step by Step:

• First, you need to create a list of 10 interests where you can write and teach readers.
• Select any one topic which shows your passion towards that topic.
• Make sure, your topic must have audience and to check this, follow below step carefully.
• Go to Quora, and enter your niche [Ex: Gardening], if you found questions in that topic, than your niche has audience for sure.
• Follow same pattern in Pinterest, and check whether your niche has some pins on Pinterest or not.

If you follow above steps, and found one topic for your blog than you can start a blog where you have audience to read and you will get so many options to earn money from your blog.

Learn More: How to Choose a Niche for Blog [In-Depth Guide]

Choose Best Domain for Your Blog

Choosing the right domain name is as important as selecting right niche for your blog. Because your domain name reflect your blog purpose.

Before you start looking for available domain names that you choose for your blog, I would highly recommend you to do some research about your niche and keywords that you can add in your domain name.

Note: If you already decided your domain name, or you already purchased the domain name than you can skip this part and go to hosting section.

If you are new to this term, and want to know what is domain name? Than let me explain you quickly.

A Domain Name is an identity of your website in web world that helps users to access your blog via entering your domain in browser URL bar to access your blog.

Let me break the URL in parts, so you can understand: https://bloggingthrive.com

• HTTPS://: Hypertext Transfer Protocol
• BloggingThrive: Domain Name
• .com: Domain Name Extension

Here are some .com alternative domain extensions that suits you:

• .co: It is commonly used for startups, companies, commercial or community based sites.
• .info: This extension used for mainly on information based sites or blogs.
• .net: It is an abbreviation for ‘Network’ and you can use it for tech based blogs.
• .org: Sites comes under non-commercial or non-profit organizations.
• .biz: Want to start a commercial, business, or e-commerce site, use .biz extension.
• .me: It is uses for personal blogs, journals etc.
• .online: People using this extension to share online business with readers.

Note: Try to grab .com if possible, because this extension can be used in any niche in the entire world.

My Tips to Choose Best Domain Name:

1. Use Main Keyword: You can try to add the main keyword in your domain name, so your audience can understand your blog niche, at the same it will help you in SEO for long run. [Ex: While Choosing Domain Name for this website, I choose Blogging as my main keyword because I want to teach newbies about Blogging]
2. Always Choose TLD Extension: There is no doubt, choosing TLD Extension for blog/website is always profitable. It will increase the domain value in www world. [Note: You can choose .org, .net as well].
3. Try Not to Add Numbers: Always try to focus on English alphabets while choosing domain name, some people choose domain like [learn2earn.com but they should go for learntoearn.com because this domain reflect more relation with niche].
4. Short & Easy to Remember: Always try to grab those domain that are easy to remember, easy to pronounce, easy to type, and make sure it should covers within 2 meaningful words.
5. Try Prefix & Suffix: You can always try to use a prefix or suffix with your primary keyword and you can surely find best domain name that reflect your niche.

If you still can’t find your favorite domain than you can one tool called LeanDomainSearch that will help you, to choose more relatable domain name.

Learn More: How to Choose a Domain Name [In-Depth Guide]

How to Choose Best & Reliable Web Hosting Provider 

To start your blog, you must have your own web hosting space and domain. In this section, I am going to share one of the best and reliable web hosting company to take the blog online.

Quick Intro: A Web Hosting is a cloud space where all your files of blog stored and help your blog to get live for normal users because without hosting, your blog won’t be available to access on the internet.

You can understand hosting as a hard disk where you store all your data such as images, articles, plugins, themes, etc.

You always should choose the web host that is reliable and it must be affordable in your pocket as well.

In starting, when you need a simple and quick solution, where Best Shared Hosting plays a big role, and here I Highly Recommend Bluehost which is reliable and pocket friendly web hosting for everyone who wants to enter the blogging world.

It comes with all useful features such as:

• 99% server uptime
• High-speed servers
• High end secured servers
• Easy to Use cPanel dashboard
• Plenty of Hosting options to choose from
• 24/7 customer support
• Free SSL Certificate
• 1-click WordPress Installation
• Recommended by WordPress as Best Hosting
• Money-Back Guarantee
• Only Costs $2.95/month [With My Special Link]

Follow Below Step by Step Guide to Register Your Own Domain Name [FREE] along with Web Hosting Plan:

Step #1: Go to Bluehost.com

Once you click on my Special Link, you will land on the home page of bluehost.com. Now, click on the Get Started button.

Step #2: Choose Best Web Hosting Plan

Once you click on Get Started, you will see 4 Shared Hosting Plans.

These hosting plans include Basic, Plus, Choice Plus, & Pro.

Each & Every hosting plan is perfect for starting a brand-new blog, I personally recommend going for the Basic Plan first to start your blogging journey.

Step #3: Enter Your Desired Domain Name

So, now you are ready with your domain name as I shared the steps in section #2 “How to Choose Best Domain for Your Blog”.

Now, after choosing your hosting plan, you will be landed on the new page where you will need to enter your custom domain name.

As you are a beginner, so you will need a new domain name, so enter your desired domain name, and you will get your domain name free for the first year.

If you still want to take the time to choose your blog name, you can later sign in and choose your domain name later.

Now, you need to create your account, and it is a final step to start your own first blog.

Step #4: Enter Your Details

Here in this section, you need to provide the “Account Information” details where you need to provide your genuine details to create your account.

Make sure you enter genuine details only, first name, last name, country, proper address with zip code & phone number, and most importantly Email Address.

Now, scroll down, and you’ll see the Package Information section.

It allows you to pay for 12, 24, 36, or 60 months and REMEMBER the most months you opt for the most savings you will get for long term plans. If you are just starting a blog, and want to run this blog for Make Money then I highly recommend going with the Basic 36 Month Plan because it is the best plan for anyone who just started and planning to run a website for the long term without any tension.

Note: In the image, you can see Package Extras and you can Uncheck options like Codeguard Basic and SiteLock Security because you don’t need these features.

Now, finally, pick your payment option, and choose Credit Card or PayPal.

If you don’t have Credit Card then you can use PayPal and if you don’t have a PayPal account then you can Create PayPal Account easily.

So, grab $2.95/month with 36 Months and you can grab 63% OFF on your hosting plan.

Grab 63% OFF Here

Step #5: Now Create Account & Set Secured Password

Now, you must get a confirmation mail on your registered email address, and now after confirming your account, enter your domain name, and create your secured password for your account.

&

Step #6: Log in to Bluehost Account

Here enter your domain name and password, you must submit to the account.

Now, you are ready to have a look at your website, but before that, you need to install WordPress and getting into your blog dashboard.

Set Up Your Blog with WordPress CMS

There are two methods, Automatic Install WordPress & Install WordPress Manually [I Recommend Manually], because it helps you to learn how to install WordPress with cPanel.

« Automatic WordPress: Step by Step »

Once you log into your account WordPress automatically start installing, you don’t need to do anything.

Once the loading page is done, you will see a page with a title like “Pick a theme that inspires you”. Here you can choose any theme because every theme is FREE of cost to pick and install directly on your WordPress blog.

Note: I recommend you to scroll down and click on Skip, you can try GeneratePress Theme which I am using for BloggingThrive.com and all my other money sites because it is one of the best and fastest theme for WordPress CMS.

Now you will see, Start Building button, click on it and you will be redirected to the WordPress Dashboard.

« Install WordPress Manually »

• First, go to your Bluehost account and click on My Sites.

• Click on the Create a Site button in the top-right corner.

• Now, provide your Site/Blog Title & Site Tagline and click on Next.

• Now, choose your domain name and click Next.

• Hold on, while page loading.
• Now, click on the Login to WordPress link on the left side section.

• Now, you will be redirected to the WordPress Dashboard.

• Now, click on Orange Button called Coming Soon Active, click on it.

• Now, click on Launch Your Site

• Now, you can visit your blog by typing your blog name in the browser.

Choose Best Looking WP Theme for Your Blog

Best WordPress Theme

GeneratePress is one of the fastest loading WordPress Theme, I came across in my blogging journey. I have used 100+ themes on my money blogs but after using GeneratePress, I can’t switch to any other theme because it comes with a clean design, fast loading, schema optimized, and many more features. I highly recommend generatepress theme.

Download GeneratePress

Must Have Plugins for WordPress Blog

Plugins are one of the most essential things for a WP blog because plugins help you to set on-page SEO, Speed, Content Creation, Adding Table, and much more. There are tons of plugins for every use on WordPress, but there are some essential WordPress plugins which I highly recommend for every website or blog.

So, want to know, which plugins I always prefer for my blogs?

Here’s is the in-depth list of best and must-have WordPress plugins:

Elementor Pro: There are so many page builders available in the market to design your blog in a unique way. Elementor is one of my personal favorites because of its easy to use interface and free elements to design a good looking website. I also tried to Thrive Architect which is my second favorite page builder.

Rank Math SEO: SEO plugins are the heart of your blog because without setting proper SEO your blog won’t rank in search engines. Rank Math is one of the most popular SEO plugins that I use for all my blogs, Later I was using Yoast SEO which is also a great plugin for FREE purposes but the Rank Math plugin gives a good boost to your new blog.

WP Rocket: You might read my On Page SEO Ranking Factors where I clearly mention that Google loves fast loading sites because speed is a ranking factor but speed up wp site isn’t that easy task. Here WP Rocket plugin helps you to optimize your blog or website and helps your blog to load faster. I highly recommend you to Invest in WP Rocket and it will be your best to invest too.

Thrive Leads: You might know the value of collecting emails of your readers, if not then you are missing instant traffic for sure. If you want to collect readers’ emails then you can try Thrive Leads which helps you to create Popup Lightbox, Screen Filler Overlay, Sticky Ribbon, Content Lock.

UpdraftPlus: Taking Backup is one of the best practices for every blogger or a website owner. I lost my money site because I didn’t take backup and that day, I learned a lesson and start taking WordPress blog backup. But if you don’t want to take backup manually then you can try UpdraftPlus which will take automatic backup of your full website, and you can restore your website anytime. You can also try the All in One WP Migration plugin which is FREE.

Anti-Spam: Once you start your blog, spammers start commenting on your blog posts, but don’t worry it won’t harm your blog until you approve them. But saving from this headache, you can try Anti-Spam will detect comments whether it looks like spam or genuine comment.

Resmush.it: If you always use lots of images, screenshots, graphical items in blog post then it will optimize your blog images and helps your website to load faster.

Social Snap Pro: If you want your readers to share your blog posts then you can try the Social Snap Plugin which helps you to add social media sharing section under your blog post title.

Note: Never use nulled or cracked plugins, these type of files helps hackers to hack your website easily.

If you are investing your money on hosting and domain then you must be looking for long-term blogging and don’t want to lose your blog just because of one cracked plugin or theme.

How to Install Plugin on WordPress?

1. Go to your WordPress dashboard.
2. Now, go to Plugins > Add New
3. Then upload your plugin as a zip file and click on Install Now
4. Now, after installing, you need to activate it to start using.

Write & Publish First Blog Post on Blog

So, now you have your own blog where WordPress installed. So, you must be wondering how to write the first blog post with on-page SEO.

Let me help you to write your first post on your blog:

To create a blog post, you need to go to Dashboard > Post > Add New

Now, you will land on the post section, and here you can start writing your first post. You can directly start writing on your WordPress post section because it has an auto-saving feature so you won’t miss your article.

First Place Your Title in the “Add Title” section and later, you can start writing your blog post with on-page SEO guidelines.

How I Write Blog Posts for All Sites: [Quick On-Page SEO]

• First Add Your Title where Your Main Keyword must mention.
• Now, Add Your First 100 Words where your Main Keyword must mention, along with one Long Tail Keyword.
• Now, Add First Heading and Make it Heading 2 [H2] and this heading must contain your Main Keyword.
• Now, Add Featured Image where you need to add your Main Keyword as Alt Tag in image section.
• Now, add 100 Words where Add Secondary Main Keyword or Long Tail Keyword.
• Now, Add Heading 3 and this heading must reflect your article topic and here also add your Main Keyword.
• Now, you can add Paragraphs, Images, Tweets, Videos, Infographics

Blog Promotion Methods to Get Targeted Traffic

You might be aware of the term called Organic Traffic and if not, then let me explain you to it.

Organic Traffic is traffic that comes directly from Search Engines such as Google, Yahoo, Bing, or DuckDuckGo. To get organic and targeted traffic you need to learn How SEO Works because SEO is the only way to get organic traffic.

But getting traffic from Google isn’t that easy, it needs a lot of SEO Techniques which you need to learn.

So, how to get targeted traffic on your blog, if it’s new and no one knows about it.

Pro Tip: Immediately Create Social Media Accounts with Your Blog Name on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Quora, and all other Popular Social Media Platforms.

What is Social Media Blog Promotion?

Well, this term Social Media Blog Promotion is the term which every blogger should be serious about it.

Many new bloggers, ignore this and focus on creating new content every day but if no one reading your published blog posts then what is the benefit to create new content?

Here, Social Media Promotion helps you to get Initial traffic on a Blog.

How to Promote New Blog Posts on Social Media?

There are so many social media platforms where users spend their time for time-pass and some of them want to learn about new topics.

So, let’s begin, the process.

Facebook

Who doesn’t know about Facebook, well maybe you don’t know the value of Facebook in terms of getting traffic but it is one of the best platforms to grab targeted traffic.

Simply create Facebook Page and a Facebook Group with your blog name, on this page and groups you can add and connect with the audience who are interested in your niche and want to learn from you.

Whenever you publish the latest blog posts, share your article on FB Page or FB Group so your followers can read that post and you can get instant traffic.

Quora

If you are not promoting your blog posts on Quora, especially your How to Articles or Tutorial Guides which helps Quora Users to solve their queries.

You can understand, Quora as traffic generation machine that can give you huge number of targeted traffic on your blog post for long term.

Twitter

You might not use Twitter, because in starting, I also don’t like Twitter as it is quite different from Facebook. But if you want to reach out to an audience and brands at the same time then the Twitter profile is a must for you.

Twitter can give you thousands of traffic if you target the right audience with proper hashtags.

Pro Tip: Getting Twitter Followers, isn’t that easy for everyone, so my suggestion for you is that, once you Create Twitter Profile than start follow top profiles in your niche, for example: If your niche is Tech than you should follow Microsoft, AndroidAuthority, Google, Mark Zuckerberg, Sunder Pichai [WHY?], because by doing this, Twitter algorithms understand your profile and suggest your profile to those who are also in Tech Niche.

If you are into Blogging Niche then you can follow BloggingThrive on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest & LinkedIn because I share a lot of the latest news and tips on these social media platforms.

Youtube

I understand that there are few people who are not comfortable in front of the Camera and creating videos for YouTube. But If you can try this then this will be the best decision in your blogging journey.

Video content is the future because people consuming videos more than text content and you might be the one too who loves to watch videos instead of reading big articles.

You can create a YouTube Channel for free and you can create YouTube videos with the smartphone and reach out to more audience via videos and you can place your blog post links in YouTube video descriptions so viewers can reach to your blog posts as well.

Best Ways to Make Money from Your Blog

Well, talking about Make Money with Blog is quite an important thing, and in this section, we will talk about some working ways to make money from your blog.

Making Money with New blog isn’t that easy because the new blog doesn’t have authority, traffic, and approved advertisement accounts.

But as you started a new blog and you start publishing great content on this blog so soon it started getting an authority in search engines.

Once you have at least 10+ posts and all must-have pages on the WordPress site then you can apply for the advertisement accounts, affiliate accounts, etc.

Here I am going to provide you a list of ways which you can check out and understand which platform suits your niche and started making money as soon as possible.

Best Ways to Make Money with Blog:

• Affiliate Marketing: Affiliate marketing is a process, where we recommend someone’s product to our audience, and if they like the product and purchase it from our affiliate link then we make a commission from the product owner. You can check this post on how to choose the best affiliate products and become an affiliate marketer.
• Advertisement: This is highly recommended for any type of blog. I personally use this on my micro-niche sites. While talking about Advertisement on Blogs there are so many advertisement platforms such as Google AdSense, Infolinks, net, BuySellAds, etc. You can check out Best Advertisement Platforms to place ads on a blog and make money out of it.
• Offer Service: If you are good at something, and you create a blog on the same topic. For Example: If you are a florist and you can create amazing flower bouquets and you teach people how to make bouquets on your blog then you can offer your service so your nearby readers can order your service too.
• Sponsored Posts/ Product Promotion: Sponsorship is a great method that I personally use on my blogs to earn more than $500/month. If your blog has an audience and authority in search engines than companies or digital marketing agencies can contact you and offer you an amount so you can share their product or service on your blog and give them credit [add link of their site in your blog post] and they will pay you to promote their service to your audience.

Conclusion:

I hope, you found this in-depth guide on How to Start a Blog in 2021 useful and now you have your own personal blog to start earning money via a blog.

Here my job isn’t to end but I am there for you always, you can connect with me and if you need any help then you can contact me and I will help you for sure but before contacting me, I highly recommend you to find your query in the BloggingThrive Blog section and if you don’t find any solution than I am there for you.

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