How to Start a Blog and Make Money Online

Unless you have been living under a rock, in today’s society there are many alternatives to the traditional daily full-time job. People can earn money by creating a business revolving around their interest.

Isn’t that great to dabble in a hobby and get paid? It can now be a reality, and all you need is a little bit of inspiration, persistence, and creativity. Whatever your hobby is, or whatever you’re into, you can write about it on a blog.

Imagine such picture: Every morning you wake up, turn on the computer and learn how much money have you earned during the sleep! It’s not a fantasy because thousands of people nowadays are earning money blogging and living life at their leisure.

Some are on the fence with starting a blog because they think they won’t be able to write regularly and maintain their weblog consistently. However, if you sum up all those messages you send to your friends every day, those amount of text will exceed a regular blog post.

So, don’t fool yourself, you are can write, yet it is not enough to simply start a blog that will give you an income.

Use the following steps and learn how to earn money blogging.

STEP 1: Define a topic you are proficient in

Your topic should carry over a sense of purpose for your blog. Yes, there are blogs devoted to the most obscure topics, and some newbies even think that to attract an audience you must write about things nobody is talking about out there. That is only partially true because, without existing interest, there is no audience. Besides, not every writer will produce the same content on the same topic.

Make sure you’re at least knowledgeable within this chosen area. For example, do not write about assignment writing services if you are not experienced in it. Leave that to the professionals. Choose only such topic that will be of interest to you with a personal touch to make it unique.

STEP 2: Choose the platform

Internet offer users many platforms to create blogs for free. They are very simple to use for the beginners. For example, blogger.com is a free blog service provided by Google; however, if your aim is to make it a business, you can only go so far with Blogger. Plus, there will be limitation on placing ads, which, by the way, are highly frowned upon by search engines.

Real legitimate blogging needs to be done on your very own custom domain name. It will require some cost and time to get it set up but will be well worth your effort.

The most popular platform to start a blog is WordPress. It has a wide variety of tools that will boost your blog. It’s free also, but a custom domain name on WordPress costs $18 per year, which shouldn’t be a big deal if you’re serious about blogging. When you create your own domain, it makes your website independent and you’ll have full access to the variety of features to further improve it.

STEP 3: Be creative with the appearance

Visitors make the initial impression of your blog based on the domain name and the design. It is not professional to have a website name like “JohnnysCoolBlog.com”. The name must reflect the topic of your blog and be unique. Be creative and visitors will remember you.

Now regarding design, web hosts usually offer ready-made templates. It is very convenient to implement them, but you need to customize it to make it unique (i.e., put a banner, change colors of the theme, etc.). With a domain and design exclusively of your own, you’ll have a stronger chance of attracting and retaining the right audience.

STEP 4: Attract the audience

Readers do not appear out of nowhere. At the beginning, you need to get the word out about your blog through other people or via social networks. These are folks who could become your die-hard loyal readers.

If your content is top-notch, they will share your blog with others and the number of readers will increase exponentially. That is why it is important to update your blog with frequently with fresh contents.

The next step in audience engagement is to show your activity on other blogs. Leave comments and add a link to your blog. You’ll then multiply the number of readers and generate a huge amount of traffic that will contribute to the potential of money you could make. But how do you make money with your blog?

STEP 5: Monetize your blog

There are many different ways of making money with your blog. The most common method through advertisement or sponsors.

Here are some options for ad placing to start earning money!

• Include In-text and link advertising. (Examples: Matomy SEO Text Link Ads and Infolinks)
• Sell advertising space on your blog page. (Examples: Google AdSense and Bing Ads)
• Practice affiliate marketing. (Examples: Commission Junction, Amazon Associates, and ClickBank)
• Write product reviews. (This is a combination of the other three monetization methods with providing your own thoughts and opinions to get the action you want your readers to take, such as a sale or a click.)

So there you have on how to start your very own blog for free today. Happy blogging!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Lisa Griffin is a blogger and freelance writer whose lifestyle credo is “Always dream and shoot higher than you know you can do. Do not bother just to be better than your contemporaries or predecessors. Try to be better than yourself.” You can contact her via Twitter.