How to Start a Blog for Free in 8 Simple Steps

Blogging is a great channel to express your ideas to the world. Although, you may have wonderful ideas to share, you may be restricted by your knowledge of the technologies involved in starting a blog. This guide will show you how to start a blog that is aesthetically pleasing and fully functional, all in an easy step-by-step tutorial. 

By having a blog you maintain, you can:

• Express yourself and share your passions
• Teach something you know
• Polish your writing skills
• Make some decent money
• Gain reputation in your professional network
• Market your business, idea, skills or brand

A blog is a type of website that contains written content, also known as blog posts. Bloggers share content on topics of their interest and connect directly with the readers. This guide will teach the basic steps of creating a blog which can be done by anyone with basic computer skills.

Step #1: Select a Perfect Topic for Your Blog

Unless you are writing a blog to market you product which already exists, you need to select a specific niche for your blog. Consider the following points when choosing a particular topic for your blog:

• Does the topic interests you. You will enjoy blogging if you write about something you are passionate about.
• Choose a topic which is specific and not broad, possibly unique. 
• You must have enough ideas and content to share on the topic you are choosing.
• Select a topic which has enough audience interest.

As an example, you may not want to start a blog on music in general but on teaching how to play guitar. As an other example, travel is a very general topic with a lot of competition, travel photography is more specific.  

Step #2: Choose a Blogging Platform

After you have chosen a niche for your blog, you can proceed to the next step of selecting a blogging platform. There are plenty of blogging platforms available such as WordPress, Blogger, Wix, Tumblr and Weebly. WordPress and Blogger are two of the most popular platforms, however, this guide will use Blogger platform as an example, as it is completely free and convenient to setup. 

Various Blogging Platforms

Blogger is Google owned blogging service that allows creating and hosting up to 100 blogs per account. All the blogs are hosted for free at Google Servers and typically accessed from a subdomain of blogspot.com.

Step #3: Create the Blog

Creating a blog using Blogger is a very simple process, consisting of following steps:

1. Sign in to Blogger (https://www.blogger.com).
2. On the left menu, click the down arrow.
3. Click "New blog" menu option.
4. Enter a suitable title for your blog.
5. Click "Next" button.
6. Choose a blog address or URL.
7. Click Save.

Following above specified simple steps, you have a fully functional blog ready to post content without paying a cent. The blog address or URL with Blogger is a subdomain like yourblog.blogspot.com and unlimited free hosting is provided by the Blogger platform. However, if you plan to register your own domain like yourblog.com, you can do that using Google Domains for a small annual cost and connect your blog with your domain.

A major step in creating a blog is deciding a good title and address for your blog. Choose a title for your blog which briefly specifies what your blog is about. Moreover, unless you have a personal blog on your name, choose a domain name (address of your blog) which clearly identifies your blog's niche to the readers as well as to the search engines. Since most single word common domain names may have been taken already, try a combination of keywords related to your blog, to select a name which is memorable as well as catchy. 

Step #4: Get your Custom Domain (Optional)

Once you have a ready blog with a subdomain, you can proceed further to modify the design of your blog and start posting content. However, it is recommended to register and own your custom domain, such as "learntocode.com" or "travelwithscott.com", and connect it with Blogger. A custom domain is easier to remember and it offers various other benefits such as email accounts and connecting to some other content hosting (blogging) platform without changing domain name. Domain registration is a very simple process using Google Domains, costing around 10-20 USD per year. There are other popular domain registration services also available such as GoDaddy or Bluehost, which may offer lesser price and better services. Anyways, a custom domain can be easily created in few clicks and linked to Blogger. When registering a custom domain, it is suggested to create a .com domain as it is common and easy to remember.

Adding a Custom Domain in Blogger

Step #5: Modify Blog Design

You can modify the blog settings, theme, design and layout based on your likings and preferences. In case of Blogger, you can change entire blog layout and design in just a few clicks. The customizations are applicable for desktop as well as mobile view of the blog.

Customizing Blogger Theme

You can modify the design of your blog in one of following ways:

• Select one of many freely available themes. Themes control the overall design of blog.
• Customize the look and feel of your theme using various menu options.
• Add a variety of gadgets in your blog such as "Blog Search" or "Contact Form" etc. 
• Modify the layout of blog and the position of gadgets.
• Modify the HTML and CSS of entire blog.

Step #6: Write and Publish Content

A nicely looking blog without sufficient and valuable content has no purpose. In fact, you may not be able to get traffic to your blog or generate revenue from it unless you have at least 40 - 50 original and top quality posts on your blog. The content of your blog includes static pages (homepage, about us, contact us etc.) and posts. For creating great content, remember these general guidelines:

• The content should add some value for the specific audience in a significant way. You are sharing content for the interest of your readers and not for yourself.
• The content should be well structured and well presented. All the graphics and text should be clearly visible  and understandable. The reader should be able to comprehend the information presented in your blog by skimming through it. 
• The content should include graphics / images / videos where necessary. Content is not only limited to text, but other forms of material are also engaging and informative.
• For better ranking in search engines, the specific keywords related to your post should be included wisely in title, headings, image "alt" tags and throughout the content, without compromising content quality.
• If you plan to generate revenue from your blog, embed monetization strategies smartly in your content, without overwhelming the readers or hindering their engagement.
• The post title should be catchy, attractive and engaging.
• Your content should be original and it should come from your mind based on your knowledge and experience in your niche.
• Review and edit your work after you are finished writing the post.  

Creating and publishing a new post in Blogger is an easy process. There are plenty of options available to create and edit the post, most of which are self-explanatory, as indicated in picture below.

Blogger Post Edit Window

Step #7: Promote the Blog

After creating awesome design and adding great content, you must market and promote your blog to reach the intended audience. There are variety of promotion strategies you can take such as:

• Tell your inner circles and your friends about your blog through social media or word of mouth.
• Submit your blog to multiple search engines such as Google and Bing. In case of Blogger, blogs are automatically indexed by Google. 
• Use attractive and catchy description for the blog and each post to be displayed in search engine results. You can specify those descriptions in Blogger settings.
• Talk about your blog on different related blogs and social bookmarking sites (Reddit).
• Use paid advertising methods such as Google AdWords and Facebook.  

Step #8: Monetize the Blog

Once you have done all the effort to put up a fully functional blog with great content and got sufficient number of interested readers, its time to generate some revenue. However, your primary focus should be creating quality content and your readers, and not earning money. There are several options to monetize a blog, few of which are specified below:

• You can run ads on your blog. Google AdSense is the most common choice for ads. However, Google may not approve running AdSense ads if there is no sufficient and quality content on your blog. Integrating AdSense in Blogger is very convenient since both services are provided by Google.
• You can enroll in several affiliate programs related to your blog and earn money from commissions by promoting different products. There are several affiliate programs available online such as Amazon, Shareasale and Clickbank. Again, you need to have acceptable content and visitor count to be approved by affiliate merchants. 
• You can sell your own products, services, memberships or premium content.
• You can sell an e-book containing all the material in your blog.

This guide explains necessary steps to get started in starting your blog. If you need further assistance, you can contact me any time.