Blogging For Beginners: 11 Things You Need To Know

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Are you thinking of starting a blog?  Need a resource that offers a ‘blogging for beginners’ pdf with tips and tricks?

Over 10 years ago I was in your shoes and I just wanted someone to lead me by the hand and most importantly help me avoid all the mistakes.

There wasn’t any resource available to show me what I needed to do for free.  In fact, I had to spend hard earned money to learn the ropes.

By the way, spending money on training is not a bad thing at all.  Investing in your blogging education is important but the basics should be available for free.

The truth is I was so very disappointed because I did not learn a lot which means that my progress was a lot slower than I expected.

It is time for me to give back to anyone who needs my help to get their head around the basics and avoid the errors.

The purpose of this post is to give you a headstart so that you can avoid the pitfalls as much as possible.

Disclaimer: please note that this post may contain affiliate links which means that if you buy one of my recommended products I get paid a commission for sharing the link at no additional cost to you.  I only recommend products that I have tried myself and have experienced success.

1. Your Emotional Investment

Nobody talks about this at all but one key element of becoming a blogger is your mindset.  Without the proper mindset, you will fail.

Blogging is a long-term investment that requires you, the blogger, to be ready to invest 5, 10 or even 15 years of your time.

If this is a turnoff for you or you don’t have that kind of time to invest in blogging then starting a blog is probably not right for you.

Some people write once a month, others write once a week and still others write several times a day.

The scariest part of blogging is coming up with ideas for your next post.  This is especially true if you are new.

As soon as you hit publish it is time to think of your next post.  It is advisable that you should have sufficient content for 6-12 weeks.

If that sounds too scary then don’t worry I will be sharing a number of resources that will help you overcome this hurdle.

2. What Can I Write About?

One of the most important aspects of wanting to start a blog is deciding what your blog is going to be about.

This is why it is important to really spend time understanding your passion.

As I already mentioned blogging is a long-term game so you need to be passionate about your niche.

Trust me when I tell you that if you are not passionate about your blog topic you will run out of steam in a matter of weeks.

If you are one of my readers you know that I started over 100 blogs in the last 10 years.

The number one reason why blogs fail is that there is a lack of passion for the chosen topic. So you can become bored very quickly.

Find your passion then spend time finding a niche that is associated with that passion.

For example, if you are passionate about creating videos you have many options in this area.

3. Blog Writing Examples

At this point, you are probably still not sure if you want to be a blogger and you may want to practice writing a few pieces.

It is a very good idea to start a blog with 10-20 posts ready because it gives your readers sufficient content to stay engaged.  These blog post ideas will help.

I spent some time writing extensively about what you need to include in each blog post from a content point of view.

These 11 article writing tips will guide you through that process so that you will avoid the mistake of blogging for the sake of writing.

You need to set short term and long term goals of what you want to achieve by blogging. Every single blog post will need to also consider the search engines.

Yes, search engine optimisation (SEO) can be technical but I have spent a lot of time outlining how to do it simply.

The Yoast SEO Tutorial will help you optimise every post for the search engines which will help you rank for traffic.

>Need Help Creating Your Blog? Grab My FREE Blog Creation Service – Click Here<<

4. Types Of Blogs That Make Money

Before you decide if blogging is for you it is important to check to see if it is possible to make money from your niche idea.

There are many obscure niches out there that generate an income.  It is also important that your only motivation isn’t money.

Any business that solves problems are the ones that make money.  In other words, solve problems and the money will follow.

One of my mentors did an extensive study on the most profitable blog niches that make a minimum of $2,000 a month online.

These niches are:

1. Travel
2. Mom blogs
3. Food
4. Marketing
5. Personal Finance
6. Lifestyle

I wrote extensively about these niches outlining what vehicles they use to generate their income and how you can achieve the same in this blog income report.

5. How To Blog Like An Expert

Every successful blogger will tell you that there are some standard tools that they use to help them achieve their goals every day.

If you plan to run your blog like a business it is important to use tools that will keep you efficient and prevent you from overwhelm.

After starting your blogging journey you will discover that you have so much to do so it is important to implement some time-saving tools to give you that success.

Sometime in the past, I wrote about 20 tools that successful bloggers use to help them stay efficient.

As you look at the list you will notice that I broke the list down into five categories to include writing, design, plugins, engagement and video.

This is because there is so much more to blogging than writing a post and clicking the publish or schedule button.

>>Need Help Creating Your Blog?  Grab My FREE Blog Creation Service – Click Here To Get Started<<

6. Manage Time Like Blog Experts

Very soon on your blogging journey, you will come to realise that you are going to have to learn to manage your time better.

Blogging can be a time suck if you let it control your life.  There are several ways that you can improve the way you manage your time.

I took the time to write extensively on some time management tips for busy bloggers.  You will find some genius time efficiency tips here.

One of the best ways to help you manage your blog in an efficient manner is using applications on your phone while travelling.

You may find yourself in a doctor’s office, on a train or on a long journey somewhere and you can actually use this time to get stuff done.

Take advantage of these 9 productivity apps that you can use to get stuff done when you are not at your desk.

7. How To Come Up With A Blog Name

Before you decide on a blog name you need to make sure you truly understand what you are going to write about.

You also need to have a keen understanding of your audience.  What problems are you trying to solve for them and why.

Every year a lot of people go through the process of rebranding their blog which is a lot of hassle.

To avoid this mistake I suggest that you spend about two weeks thinking about your blog name.

Take advantage of the blog post I wrote that outlines a host of clever blog name ideas that you can use to reduce errors in your blog name.

Getting your blog name right or at least 95% correct will save you a lot of heartache in the long run.

8. Blog Editorial Calendar

I mentioned earlier that it would be best for you to start your blog with 10-20 blog posts already crafted.

At first, this may sound impossible but if you follow the tips I outlined in the SEO tips for Mom Bloggers article you will understand why this is so important.

In fact, most bloggers will tend to have a blog planner set up that outlines all of their blog posts for the next 3 months.

Others have their content planner filled with ideas for 12 months.  If you are a blogger in the lifestyle niche you can take advantage of these 200+ lifestyle blog post ideas.

If however, you are a food blogger I do have a resource with over 1,000 food blog topics that you can use for your blog planner.

I will be outlining blog post ideas in other niches soon so you will need to check back regularly to see when they are ready.

9. Blogging Platforms

As a blogger, you will notice that there are a lot of blogging platforms available to start a blog.

Any expert blogger will tell you that it is better to start your blog on a self-hosted platform compared to a free one like Blogger or Wordpress.com.

This is because you will have more control on a self-hosted platform and you will have a lot more options available to you as a blogger.

The blogging platform I would recommend every time is Wordpress.org even though it involves a lot more steps to get started.

It means that you will need to buy your own domain name and invest in WordPress hosting for your blog.

I have written extensively about finding your perfect domain name and I even outlined a list of WordPress hosts that I use and recommend.

10. Start A Blog

I have spent a lot of time outlining all the steps that you need to take before you even start a blog so I hope you found them useful.

Once you find yourself in a comfortable place where you are ready to create a blog then I have a blog launch plan available as well as a free course.

I took the time to create over 20 videos outlining the process to create a blog challenge here.  If you just need to short version you can see more here.

You will notice that so far nearly every resource I have given you comes with a pdf that you can download or some other freebie to help you on your journey.

It is important to remember that you need to complete all the previous steps before creating your blog.

>>Need Help Creating Your Blog? Grab My FREE Blog Creation Service – Click Here To Get Started<<

11. Blog Traffic

You are going to need an audience after you created your blog.  If you are wondering how to get this done let me elaborate.

One of the fastest ways to grow your blog traffic is by using Pinterest.  If you never thought about this platform before then check out my Pinterest tips here.

Without an audience, you will be blogging in vain so traffic is the lifeblood of your blog.  I have also spent time offering additional blogging resources to increase your blog traffic.

You really need to know in advance where your audience spends most of their time.  Which social media platform are they on?

Once you know this for sure then you need to promote your content on that platform so that they can find you.

Conclusion

Even if you are a complete beginner it is possible to use blogging for beginners resource to help you to avoid the pitfalls and start a blog successfully.

You are very lucky to use the ones I have so that you can make fewer mistakes and become successful much quicker.

If your end goal is to make money blogging then you need to have a look at three resources that I have.

1. How to make $25,000 a month
2. Steps to making $100,000 a month or more
3. Blog income reports from 42 bloggers

As you can see it is possible to make money online as a blogger because there are many who went ahead of you and did it.

It is now up to you to take the next step or even share your experience so far.  What has been your biggest struggle so far in starting a blog?

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If you are still in the process of trying to get approved for Adsense then check out these Adsense alternatives.  If you are at the stage where you want to know how bloggers make money take a look at the blog income report study that I conducted.

Want to take advantage of some free traffic to your blog from Pinterest? Check out my Pinterest tips here.  Grab these 20 tools used by successful blogs.

If you are a startup or small business and you need to hire a virtual assistant to complete tasks such as social media marketing, blogging, keyword research or Pinterest account management then take a look at these packages.