How to Start A WordPress Blog That Makes Money [2023 Edition]

Are you looking to start a WordPress blog today?

Do you want to set up a WordPress site really quickly? Do you want to know how to start a WordPress blog without any technical knowledge?

Welcome. You’re in the right place.

There are a couple of things you need to start a WordPress site.

• A domain name (Facebook, Twitter, Amazon – these are all domain names)
• Hosting (this is where you store and manage your files, emails etc)
• A cup of coffee (to keep you sane while creating a WordPress site, it’s easy though)

This “how to start a WordPress blog” step-by-step guide covers the following:

• How to start a WordPress blog in 5 simple steps
• 5 important things to do immediately after launching a WordPress blog
• How to write your first blog post and bring 1000 visitors to read it
• How to make money from your blog from day 1 (3 really good tips)

Are you ready? Let’s get started.

How to Start A WordPress Blog In 4 Simple Steps

Here is the step-by-step guide which helps you in starting a WordPress site in few simple steps.

Step 1: Choose a topic

Before you even think of starting a WordPress site, choose the topic for your blog. Your blog success depends on the topic you choose.

If you are not sure of your target audience, you won’t see any traffic coming to your blog.

How to choose a topic?

Choose the topic what you are passionate of. Why because if you choose a topic that you are not at all interested, you can’t be consistent in posting articles on your blog and a blogger should be very active.

When you choose a topic you are passionate of, you will have more idea topics too. So, choose the topic very carefully.

Check the competition for your chosen topic. Make a list of all such blogs so that once you start blogging, you should connect with them all to increase your follower base.

Don’t do’s:

• Don’t choose a topic just because someone is making money from it.
• Don’t choose a topic that you don’t know much about it.
• Don’t write articles on different topics. You will never know who is your potential audience. Focus on one niche and write articles around it.

Step 2: Get a domain

Readers recognise your blog based on the name you choose. Once you are done with choosing topic, name your site domain which is easy to remember and clear.

Write down all the ideas and check for the availability.

Choose your domain name carefully as it has the ability to increase the brand of the product

Don’t use your personal name as domain name. Your business depends on the domain name you choose.

How you can get idea for your domain name?

• Make a list of some keywords around your blog niche and create name from it.
• You can use this domain search site to get domain names for your blog.
• You can also use wordoid tool.

Some other tools to choose domain name

1. Bustaname
2. Domain suggest tool
3. Name generator
4. Domain bot

Tips to remember while choosing a domain:

• Never keep hyphens in your domain name.
• Choose keyword centric domain name.
• Use simple words that are easy to remember.
• Unique and catchy

Step 3: Choose a web host

Once you choose the domain name, you need to choose a web host and get registered.There are lots and lots of web host service providers.

To make your blog available in the internet, you need to do hosting.

Which web host is better, free vs paid?

Based on my experience, I should say, paid version is always better.

In free web hosting, you won’t be able access all features, just they will allow you to design the page from available themes. If the site goes down frequently. Visitors don’t show interest. In free web hosting, you will have slow access to website.

Some free web host service providers impose restriction on the amount of traffic to your blog site.

So, go for paid version which assures reliability and speed of access.

Consider these while choosing a web host.

• That which gives 24/7 customer support.
• That which offers reliability.
• That which gives enough web space.
• That which offers high bandwidth and good amount of web space.
• Whether host allows you to set up your own mail address or not.
• Price also matters a lot. You must get full features for the money you pay.
• Do they offer backup?
• Check ‘uptime’ that host provides. Uptime is the time that server is up and running. It is always measured in percentages. For example, if the web host service provider offers 99% uptime, it means your site will experience 1% down time. 99.5% uptime and above is acceptable.
• Do they offer multiple domain facility?
• Whether they offer user-friendly control panel or not.

If you ask me about web host service provider that which covers all the above accepts, I say Bluehost. Bluehost provides high quality hosting that too at an affordable price.It’s even recommended by WordPress since 2005.

Even for a complete beginner, Bluehost is very easy to use and install. To create a blog, Bluehost offers 1-click WordPress installation.

Apart from all the above mentioned ones, Bluehost offers money-back guarantee.

You can choose whichever web host service provider you like. However, make sure that they are reliable and offer easy installation like Bluehost.

Installing WordPress on Bluehost

Want to create a WordPress blog in 5 minutes? You’re in the right place. This is a step-by-step guide for beginners on how to install WordPress on Bluehost.

Why use Bluehost?

• It’s the #1 hosting service used by over 2 million website owners
• You’ll get a free domain name
• They offer anytime money back guarantee!

Okay.. are you ready to create your own WordPress blog? Let’s go..

Disclosure: I do earn a small commission if you choose Bluehost and sign up through the links here (and at no additional cost to you). In addition, you’ll also get a free domain name when signup with them.

Note: All the links on this page will open in new tabs (for your convenience).

Step 1: Click this link to start your WordPress blog in under 5 minutes and click “get started now” on Bluehost home page.

Step 2: Type in your desired domain name (domain name registration is free with Bluehost for 1 year).

Tip: Make sure to pick a .com domain name that’s easy to remember and type.

Step 3: Fill out your account information and click “next”

As you can see, you can set up your blog for 12 months at $5.95 per month or get a lower rate for a longer period of time. I pay $3.95 a month for 3 years.

Select your desired package and click the blue NEXT button at the bottom.

Step 4: Create your password and login to your account

Now.. it’s time to create a password. Make sure to have a strong password that’s not easy to guess.

After creating your password, enter your domain name and password to login to your Bluehost account.

Final step: Create your WordPress blog

Now it only takes a minute to create or install WordPress on your newly created blog. Once you’re on the Bluehost CPanel,  you’ll see the section that says “Site Builders” – click the WordPress icon.

You’ll be now redirected to MOJO Marketplace, where you’ll be shown a popup that allows you to install WordPress on your blog.

Again click on the WordPress icon to install. (See the picture below)

Now you just have to click on “Install” on the next page.

You’re almost done.. now you’ll find 3 steps.

Step 1: leave everything after the domain name completely blank and you’ll be fine.

Step 2: Name your website

Step 3: Uncheck the all boxes (they all are unwanted!)

Oops! Directory exists! Are you sure you want to overwrite its contents

Note: Don’t panic it is normal if you see the above message. You just have to click the check box and click complete the process.

Voila! You’ve successfully created WordPress blog using Bluehost in 5 minutes.

Now, login to your WordPress dashboard using login information (username and password). Save your login information in a secured place.

Email me at kuntalarahul9@gmail.com (if you’ve any questions)

Step 4: Start writing

Finally, it’s time to start creating content for your blog.

Before start writing, this is what you should do:

• Name your blog. In the dashboard, go to “Settings”, click on “General settings”.
• Under “Site title” section, give name to your blog. In the “Tagline” section, write short description about your blog. What your blog is about in just very few words.
• Again click on “Settings” and then “permalinks”. Here you must choose structure to your posts. Click on post name.

There you go, now start writing your first post

How to create a post?

• On dashboard, hover your mouse on “Posts” tab, click on “Add new‘“ In the post editor, give title to your post and write content in the editor.
• Once finished with writing, click on “Publish” that appears to the right side of the dashboard.
• You can select category for the post

Some tips for writing:

1. Always write unique content. Never ever copy from other sites. If the same content is written somewhere why is that readers should read your content? So, be unique in your writing.
2. Write lengthy content at least 1000 words if you want your content to be recognized by Google.
3. Use good resolution images in your content wherever you feel it’s necessary.
4. Make sure that you write keyword centric article.
5. Write useful and helpful content.

Now, you are done with creating a blog and wrote one post too, make sure that you write consistently and active in blogosphere. It’s time to concentrate on getting traffic to your blog. Write a post that attracts readers and build your brand in digital world.

5 Important Things To Do Immediately After Launching A WordPress Blog

Just launched a new site? Are you wondering what to do next?

You’re not alone.

Let me tell you a quick story of mine.

I launched my first blog on WordPress in 2012. At that time, I had no clue about what to do next. I published a “welcome to my blog” post and that’s what I pretty much did. No about us page, no contact page, no plugin was installed – heck, I didn’t even set up Google analytics to track my website’s traffic.

Guess what? That’s the surefire way to screw up your blog launch.

And I don’t want YOU to repeat the same.

Over the last 5 years, I’ve installed over 100 WordPress sites for my clients and friends and I NOW know how to properly launch a “search engine friendly WordPress site”.

Here are few important things you MUST do immediately after launching a new WordPress blog. Make sure to spend time to implement them while reading the post.

1. Set up an about us page

You need to say what is your blog about. This section helps you to gain targeted audience to your blog. It should describe what is your blog niche and should tell them what they will get from your blog.

This is where you can convert your visitors to loyal customers. So, it is important to set up an about us page.

How to set up an about us page?

• Type yourblogname.com/wp-admin/index.php. You will be directed to dashboard page.
• In that there is a section called “Pages” in left corner of the website.
• Hover mouse on “Pages”, it shows you “All Pages” and “Add new”.
• Click on “Add new”. You will be shown “Add new page”. In that, give “About Us or About Me” in the title bar.
• Now, in the description write the content saying what is your blog niche and how it helps readers.
• Once written, you will be shown options to adjust font sizes, alignments etc. You can do adjustments based on your requirements.
• Don’t forget to add your image in “About Us” page. How you can add is, click on “Add media” and upload picture. Give title to your image. Whatever the title you give, keep the same in Alt text too and then click on insert.This is for SEO.
• Save it as draft and change permalink which is just below the title page. Click on “edit” and change how you want Google to index this page. You can edit as /about-me or/about-us.
• Click on Ok and check the preview page.if you are okay with it then click on “Publish”
• That’s it, now you can see an about us page properly formatted.

2. Essential WordPress plugins for better performance

W3 Total Cache:

Want to improve your website speed? Install this plugin. This has been used by over 1 million WordPress sites worldwide. This particular plugin is used by so many top companies namely mashable.com, AT&T and many other.

It improves the overall site performance by 10 times. This particular plugin helps in reducing page load time thereby increasing visitor time on your site.

WordPress SEO by Yoast:

Every blogger and marketer knows the value of SEO. For any website or blog, SEO plays a vital role. Even though you optimize your content for SEO, you need one plugin that can improve your blog site’s SEO

How this plugin further helps you is, it helps to choose a focus keyword for your blog post, helps in increasing organic search traffic to your blog. It also analyzes your blog post to make sure that the content you wrote is loved by Search engine.

Google XML sitemaps:

If you want to increase your blog’s traffic from Google, you need to first make your content index on search engines. So what to do let the search engines indexing your blog? Use sitemaps.

Sitemaps help search engines to automatically get notified whenever you create a new post on your blog. Search engine crawlers immediately start indexing your site if you are using a sitemap. This plugin helps you easily set up an XML sitemap for your WordPress sites.

Contact Form 7:

It is highly important to manage multiple contact forms as users prefer several means to contact. You must give that availability to them. This you can give by installing Contact Form 7 plugin.

Google Analytics Dashboard for WP:

Just publishing content is not enough. You need to track your site like number of visitors visiting your blog, from where blog traffic is coming. Page views, organic searches, outbound links and many other.

How you can do this? Just install this plugin and everything is taken care.

3. Create a contact page

You need to set up a contact us page on your WordPress site from day 1 to let others to easily contact you. You can use Contact Form 7 plugin (it’s widely used and free) to create a contact form on your WordPress sites.

The potential customer looks for your mail address or phone number to keep in touch with you. So, don’t neglect creating contact us page.

Here are the simple steps to create a contact page:

In the #2 step we installed some important plugins. One of that is Contact Form 7. To set up contact page, you can use this plugin.

1. Go to dashboard, hover “Plugin” click “add new” . Here, either you upload the plugin that you downloaded or search for that plugin, then install it and activate the plugin.
2. Once you activate it, you can see “contact” in the dashboard.
3. Click on it and customize your contact form based on your needs.

4. Install a WordPress theme

Apart from the content, the design you select for the blog also attracts the readers. There are both free and paid themes available in WordPress. For an absolute beginner, I suggest to go for free theme.

Firstly, you can make use of available free themes or you can upload you own if you are not satisfied with the available ones.

Here, if you are creating WordPress on WordPress.com, you can’t install theme or upload theme to your WordPress blog. You need to make use of what is available and activate it.

If you are creating WordPress on wordpress.org, then you can have options to install and upload themes.

How to Install a theme on wordpress.com?

• Login to your site. Say for example, yourblogname.com/wp-admin/index.php.
• In the dashboard, hover mouse on “Appearances” , click on “Themes”.
• You can select free or paid themes at the top of the page.
• It will display all the themes available. Each theme describes its functionality and also shows demo how it appears.
• Select one theme that looks appealing to you and click on “Activate”.

Now, you have successfully activated the theme.

How to install a theme on WordPress.org?

• In the dashboard, hover mouse on “Appearances” , click on “Themes”
• Click on the “Add new” button at the top.
• Here, you can opt for themes with specific features. It displays themes based on your selection of features.
• Hover the mouse on the theme that you like and click on “Install” button.
• Once installed, it shows you the message saying “live preview”,”Activate”, “Return to theme installer”.
• Click on “Activate”

Now, you have successfully installed and activated the theme on WordPress. Alternatively, you also can upload your desired theme using “upload theme” button and repeat the above steps.

There are no flexible options in free hosted WordPress blogs. You have to use what is available. If you want more features, go for premium.

5. Create social media accounts with your domain name

You need to spread the word through social media networks like Facebook, twitter etc after setting up a WordPress blog. That way it becomes easier for search engines like Google to easily recognize your brand name and URL.

So set up your accounts on

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Instagram
• Pinterest
• YouTube
• Google+

How to Write Your First Blog Post And Bring 1000 Visitors to Read It

Are you confused how to write first blog post that brings 1000 visitors?

TRAFFIC is the new currency.

Most of the bloggers quit blogging. The only reason is lack of traffic. So, it’s really important to get visitors to the blog  But before that concentrate on writing killer blog post. Not all posts brings visitors.

You need to follow strategy in writing your first blog post. First impression is always the best impression.

What are you waiting for?

Here are the 5 simple yet powerful steps to write your first blog post.

Step 1: Come up with an idea

Before even starting I hope you have selected your niche for blog. Once selected, the very first thing where everyone gets stumbled is, what should I write now? What type of topic should I write? What points I can highlight? Where to get idea? And the question list goes on.

It’s terrifying, isn’t it? But not any more…

Here are few quick ideas that you can use to write your first blog post.

1. Write your own personal story: use these as 2 to 3 paras..
2. Write a “welcome to my blog” post:
3. Write about your favorite blogger (link to their best articles and let them know about it)
4. Burst a myth in your industry:
5. Publish an interview with any expert in your industry:

Still not satisfied?

Here are the SEVERAL ways you can come up with an idea.

• Observe your niche competitors’ posts. Make a list of top 20 blogs in your niche and see what kind of posts they are publishing. Get an idea from those posts. You can subscribe to their mailing list and check once the post gets published.
• Check trending topics in your niche. You can use bottlenose for it. So you can understand what type of content people are interested. Start writing about it.
• Use Buzzsumo, enter URL and see what type of posts are shared massively. Take up that topic and write it in your own words with updated and useful information.
• Check Quora. Yes,check mostly follow up questions under your niche topics and write about that.
• Go to reddit and find subreddit related to your niche blog and observe what type of information people are interested in. Take up one and start writing.

Step 2: Research, research, research

So, now you have an idea for your blog post. What’s next?

Research.

If you want to add quality to your blog posts, then you must research well before writing. Remember the old quote, First impression is always the best impression. If readers likes your very post then you have successfully gained loyal visitors to your blog.

If you just write what you know, it’s not enough. You need to add facts, statistics to your content. Do topic research and keyword research efficiently.

Here are the tips how you can do it.

• Observe how your competitors are writing, what facts they mentioned. If you feel something is missing, note that and include in your post. For example, you want to write about “How to do marketing your product without investment?” then check that in Google and take up the first three links in search results and observe.
• Perform keyword research before start writing. Google displays those links that which has keyword rich content.

Use these tools while doing keyword research.

1. Moz keyword explorer tool helps with bunch of keywords for your topic. It also gives the information of CTR(Click-Through-Rate) and overall score of a particular target keyword.
2. With Keyword.io tool, you can get the idea of what your audience are looking for.
3. If you want to know what keywords are highly popular then use SEMrush.

Once you are well aware of keywords, start writing content around those keywords. Never stuff keywords unnecessary just for the sake of it. Write meaningfully.

Step 3: Use the AIDA model to write a brilliant first blog post

Most of the bloggers fail in getting visitors to their blog. Just because you did good research and wrote great content, nothing happens. You need to grab readers’ attention. Once they are interested in your write up, they share it.

If you want your readers to take action on your post, then use AIDA model to write killer and engaging blog posts.

What is AIDA? It is an acronym for:

A = Attention

I = Interest

D = Desire

A = Action

Here’s how to use AIDA to write a spectacular blog post.

#1 Attention: You know 8 out of 10 people reads post title first. So, attract attention with post title. Take up any topic and search in Google. Check the top ranked pages in search results and see which has catchy headline.

Not every post title draws attention of the audience. The one which is catchy get the clicks.

So, write a eye-catching title for your blog post. If your post title is not compelling, no one ever reads your post content. Your post title is the first thing that gets attention. If post title is not attractive, everything goes waste.

#2 Interest: So, now readers click on title. It’s time to make sure that your content is very interesting to the audience. Write useful, engaging content. The very introduction part itself should instil interest in the readers to read further. So, you need to take care of every detail in the post.

Here are some tips to build interest in readers’ mind.

• Use sub headlines to stimulate readers’ interest.
• Break down into simple points.
• Whatever you insisted in headline, expand that in sub headlines.
• Make a CTA(Call-To-Action) at the end of the post.

Check forums of your blog niche to know for what questions, people are searching answers. Try to explain that in your post.

#3 Desire: Some posts just go viral over social media and whereas some not. The reason behind is lack of desire.

How to build desire?

Start with a story. Talk about your mistakes. Use quotes. Use statistics. Use bullet points in your blog posts. It ignites readers’ passion.

#4 Action: You need to explicitly mention to your readers what action you want them to take. How you can do that? Use CTA’s (Call-To-Action). It tells the readers what action to take next. You can ask them to share post or subscribe to list or leave comment.

Step 4: 6 things to do after writing your first blog post

1. Re-read your article: You don’t want to publish your first blog post that’s full of grammatical mistakes, right? Re-read your article. Proofread it. Read out loud. Ask your friends for help. Make sure your first blog post is error-free.
2. Avoid jargon: Don’t use corporate words. Keep your writing as simple as possible. As Neil Patel says, even a 5th grade student should understand your copy!
3. Post on Facebook: Or twitter or Instagram. I don’t know where you spend most of your time online. Use that channel. Let your friends, family and relatives know about your new blog launch. Ask them to retweet and share your stuff on social media. It gives you a nice initial traction to make your first blog post go viral.
4. Leave 50 to 100 comments on other blogs: If you are new to blogging and writing your first posts, make sure to get into the habit of commenting on other blogs. That’s how you get the initial traction. That’s how you can attract the first comments on your sites.
5. Find an influencer blogger in your niche to promote your first post: Find at least 1 to 3 influencers in your niche. Link out to their sites from your content. Email them and let them know about it. Ask them to tweet about it. Most people will be happy to share if they find your stuff interesting.
6. Grab a cup of coffee (I’d prefer a beer) and enjoy your first tiny success :)

How to Make Money From Your Blog From Day 1

How early should you monetize your new blog?

Few so-called marketing gurus say you should wait until you get your first 1000 email subscribers, 1000 visitors a day or 6 months.

But let me tell you 1 simple thing.

Every REAL business (blogging is a business btw) makes money from day 1.

• Newspapers sell ads from day 1
• Gyms offer premium memberships from day 1
• Coffee shops, restaurants, bars.. Almost every REAL business monetize from day 1

Why don’t you?

Stop treating your blog as a blog. Treat it as a business from day 1 and that’s how you start putting serious efforts to make money blogging.

Let’s now talk about how can you make money from a blog from day 1.

3 practical ways to make money from a blog from day 1

#1. Create A “Hire Me” Page

Offer services or consulting from day 1.

People will NOT buy just because you’ve a hire me page on your blog.

At least your blog audience will know that you are offering premium stuff.

They might not buy from you on the beginning day itself but if you consistently create value to them through your content, they will definitely give a look at your premium stuff. That’s the key to generate sales from the beginning itself.

That being said, here are few tips you can try to get more sales from your hire me page.

1. Offer your services for free in the beginning: When you are offering services (writing, logo design, WordPress installation, SEO or anything of that sort), don’t charge from day 1. Instead offer them for free. Let others trust you. Try to serve as many people as possible for free. This helps you build a portfolio and social proof to boost your income in the future.
2. Create a portfolio: A portfolio acts as social proof. Try to land on top blogs in your niche with guest posts. Attract backlinks from top blogs. Find out every possible way to build a strong portfolio that can be helpful to grow your sales through your hire me page.
3. Showcase testimonials: Refer to the #1 point. Try to get as many unique and genuine testimonials as possible by offering your services for free in the beginning. Once you’ve enough of them, you can start displaying them using people’s names and faces. Testimonials help you boost your overall sales.

#2. Find a “how to” article and offer it as a service

I learned this from Bryan Harrys who blogs at Videofruit. Here’s how it works.

1. Find a how to article
2. Offer it as a service

Let’s talk about it in detail.

Step 1: Find a how to article

Neil Patel writes exceptional articles around marketing. Here’s a great article on how to get 10K+ visitors from Quora to your sites. The post is really informative and packed with powerful insights.

Just read the post once.

Now, you know more about getting traffic from Quora than 90% of the people online.

Step 2: Offer it as a service

Your job is now to offer it as a service.

You could offer something like “Get 5000+ visitors per month from Quora”. There will be a TON of people (including me) who will be ready to grab that kind of service.

But how do you find “customers” to buy your service?

Here’s a simple 3-step tutorial you can follow.

1. Go to Buzzsumo (get their 14 days free trial) and enter the URL of the “how to” article that you want to offer as a service.
2. Click on the “View Sharers” button to find out who shared it on social media.
3. Click on the “Followers” filter at the top left. This will show you a list of Twitter users that have 1) shared the article 2) have a sizable audience (i.e. enough money to pay you for a service).

Now, you just need to contact with those guys and offer your service. As a rule of thumb, at least 1 out of 20 people will accept your offer. Charge them $500 or $5K depending on your service.

Quick note: Here’s more detailed information about how you can use this strategy to quickly make money by Bryan Harrys.

#3. Find a blogger who is already making money and partner up with them

Bloggers who are already earning money from their blogs always do one thing: they spend money!

Money making bloggers try to automate their stuff as much as possible. That’s why they hire people to write their content, design their sites and manage their email marketing stuff.

Here’s where you need to start looking for opportunities to help them.

Find out how you can help other money making bloggers. Email them to know whether they want any help in creating content or improving their SEO or anything of that sort.

Try to work with them for free in the beginning and if they are getting good results, you can ask them to pay. That’s how you can use blogging partnerships to make money from the beginning of your blogging journey.

Here are 3 simple tips to use this strategy to make money.

1. Find ways to get leads. Find out where your customers hang out. Know their names, blog URL along with their twitter handles. You can use tools like Quora, Buzzsumo, twitter etc to know money making bloggers in your industry. Create a spreadsheet and include their details.
2. Reach out to 10 to 15 people through email every single day. Tell them that you’re interested in partnering up with them. It’s even better if you already have a service to promote. That way, you can offer your services for free in the beginning.
3. Do this until you build a good rapport with some of them and then ask them to pay for your services. If they are happy with your services, they would be glad to pay!

Conclusion on starting a WordPress blog and making money from it

It’s been almost 920 days (over NINE HUNDRED DAYS!!!) since I posted something new on this blog. The last article was published on 22nd July, 2014

Almost 2 ½ years. That’s insane. I shouldn’t have done that. During all these days, I was busy in making excuses and building other projects. From now on, you will be seeing consistent blog posts getting published on the blog, I promise :)

If you are launching a new WordPress blog and if you have any questions or doubts (even if they are silly), mail me at rahul@learnblogtips.com and I’ll do my best to answer your queries. Did you like this massive post (over 5000 words) on starting a WordPress blog? If yes, please share it with others so they can benefit.