So are you ready to start a blog for your business? You have ample ideas in your head. You have done some research on the strategies for starting a successful blog and you are quite excited now right?

Though everything seems so exciting somewhere down the line it also seems quite stressful at times. So before starting your blogging journey let’s make sure we are heading the right way.

So today let’s see some of the things that you might want to think about before starting your blogging journey.

Having this kind of checklist ensures that you have a full-proof plan ahead of starting your blog.

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. This means, I will earn a small commission at no extra cost to you from qualifying purchases.

So let’s begin….

1.Define your “Why”

These are the first step that needs to be cleared when starting a blogging journey. If you are keen on starting a blog this is what you need to ask yourself first.

Know your why, I know every experienced blogger will tell you the same story here, but this is what the foundation of your blogging business starts from.

When you feel demotivated and overwhelmed blogging for several months down the line, this is what is going to motivate you and help you to get back on track.

Hence it’s very important to know your why. Why are you starting your blogging business? is it for sharing your knowledge & skills with the world, or is it making a full-time income or is it to spend more time with your kids or to get out of your 9-5 job?

Whatever your reason may be, it’s important to know your WHY and jot it down in your planner, notebook, phone where it will be visible to you.

When things get too real and when you tend to slip into a rut and get overwhelmed this is when your WHY comes into action.

This first step is what you know is the choice that you made to start your blog and this is what is going to keep you motivated throughout your blogging journey.

2. Choosing A Niche For Your Blog

Now being a blogger requires you to write a lot of content for your readers. So the first thing you need to decide is what are you going to blog about?

You need to be able to answer this question with ease. What is it that you will share with your audience? what are you passionate about that you would like to share with your readers? How are you going to offer valuable content to your audience?

You need to dig deep and know how you will help your audience and what is in it for them to come and visit your blog. It’s all about people and how best you can serve them with your great content.

Hence it’s very important that you choose your niche first. Niche means categories like food, lifestyle, technology, gardening, or something that you are passionate and knowledgeable about.

Picking the right niche from the beginning itself is an important part of starting a blog instead of blogging for a couple of years and then realizing that this was not something that you were into.

You may also check an in-depth article that I posted a few weeks back about How to choose a profitable niche for your blog.

3. Define Your Audience

So now you already know your “why” before starting your blogging business and you are also ready with your Niche (what kind of content you are going to share).

Now the tricky part comes here, to know who is your target audience? Who are you writing the post for? The thing to remember here is, your blog should be not about you it should be for people, your audience, and how best you can help them with their queries and problems.

Know who would you like to serve? Are they students, stay-home Moms, young women who are looking to start a business? Know your audience.

4. Picking The Name For Your Blog

This is the fun part! Just don’t complicate things here. Most of the newbie bloggers are stuck here for days, weeks, and even months. This is the first hurdle that a new blogger would experience when starting a blog.

The more you complicate the more time you will take to start your blog.

Pick a name that is google friendly, easy to remember, easy to pronounce, and something that does not include special characters or numbers.

Down the line, you will notice that the name of your blog actually doesn’t matter to your audience but your content does. Your blog is all about the value you are going to provide to your readers.

If your reader is happy with your content he/she is surely going to remember your blog name or they may literally bookmark your blog too (Which I personally do).

So do not spend too much time picking your blog name. Only the important thing you need to do is to research if the name that you are willing to keep isn’t taken by other bloggers or any companies which might lead to legal issues.

So keep your blog name unique & simple but do not waste too much time on it.

5. Select your hosting partner and domain.

So now you are past your blog name and you are well aware of your three “W’s” that is why you want to start a blog, who is your target audience, and what is your niche. So now it’s time to start the actual blogging process.

The first thing that you want to do is to buy your domain name.

Now being a new blogger some might be wondering what is a domain name?

A domain name is simply referred to as the address of your website that people will type in their browser to visit your site.

One thing to remember here is, if you are very much serious about making blogging your business and earn from your blog, then I would highly suggest that you go with (dot).com domain instead of (dot).org or (dot).in or whatever else your country code domain you might get.

It not only looks professional but also helps when people try to search your blog. As (dot).com is the favorable choice for people when it comes to internet search.

Now let’s talk about hosting.

Hosting and domain are two different aspects of blogging. Now hosting is where all your files of your website are stored. It’s like, hosting is your actual house and domain is the address of your house.

So when it comes to selecting a hosting for your blog, the first thing to take into account is their customer service.

Do some research in this area. You need to have a hosting partner who has good customer service as being a new blogger you will come across certain issues that need to be solved and this is when you will need the help of your hosting partner.

You will find very good hosting sites such as Bluehost or GoDaddy. I personally use Hostinger which is quite affordable and have the best customer service.

And please refrain from free hosting if you are really serious to go full time with your blogging business.

You may also like some of these related articles:

5 Daily habits of a professional blogger

6 Reasons why scheduling your content is important.

10 Reasons why no one is reading your blog.

6 Easy & fast ways to increase blog traffic.

8. Write 10 Blog Posts Before Launching Your Blog

This is one of the most common questions that is being asked. How many blog posts should I have on my new blog?

Now when I started with my food blog, I ended up writing 12 blog posts before I started sharing with my audience. I would highly suggest that you aim for at least 10 blog posts before you launch your blog.

This helps mostly when people visit your blog for the first time and find multiple articles already written which keeps them hooked on your blog to explore your content.

This way it gets easy to drive traffic to your blog immediately and get noticed.

This also helps Google to know that you are consistent with your blog post and many times you could get instantly approved for AdSense if you have some good traction coming to your website.

If you have already set your email list then there are more chances that people would actually start joining your email list from day one itself as they already know that you are providing content that they are looking for which might be helpful for them.

So don’t just write one or two blogposts before launching your blog. You need your readers to stay on your website for long and binge on your awesome content.

9. Creating A Content Calender

Even before I started with my blogging journey, I maintained an excel sheet with all the blog ideas that I wanted to put out there.

This way it was far better to schedule my content consistently. Being a newbie blogger, it is important that you have your content strategy ready even before you launch your blog.

Creating a content calendar helps you get organized with your content planning. You are well aware of what blog post to start writing next which makes your blogging journey far easier.

10. Secure Your Blog

Securing your blog is one of the most crucial things that you have to do as a blogger.

Securing your site helps make sure you have nothing to worry about when it comes to spammers or attackers who are ready to pounce upon your website.

Also, it is very important to have your legal pages set up for your blog. This is very necessary if you are going to make money from your blogging.

Now if you are using wordpress.org, they already have a few plugins that help protect your blog from spammers and hackers.

Some of the best plugins are Akismet, Jetpack, Titan Anti-spam & Security. There are many more but these are the ones that I use for my sites.

11. Start Building Your Email List From Day One

This is one step that most beginner bloggers overlook.

Once you publish your first ever blog post, you should immediately start building your email list.

An email list is not only to share your blog post but it helps build trust between you and your audience too.

Your audience are willing to subscribe to your emails as they are getting valuable content in their mailbox. Eventually, when you create your own products, services or courses, you will be able to share those details with your audience via this email marketing.

Final Thoughts:

Starting a blog is exciting and scary too. As a beginner blogger, you will have to work on your research and strategies even before you start sharing your blog with your readers.

The points mentioned above will give a good idea about the flow of how you should approach your blogging journey.

Remember, blogging is exciting but it can be too overwhelming as well as you go deeper and deeper in this journey. All you need is patience.

Truth be told, you are not going to get any traffic in the first 3 months. You might not get approved for Adsense or even some affiliates but do not get disappointed.

Eventually, if you are consistently posting on your blog and sharing on social media, you will start seeing progress. Just give it some time. Blogging takes time. Be patience.

So these are some of the things that you need to do even before you launch your website. Making everything clear ahead of time is going to help your blog in long run.  

I hope you find this post useful to you. Let me know if you are willing to start your blogging business in 2022? and how far you have come?

You may follow Eralivine on Pinterest, Facebook & Instagram for more information on blogging, self-improvement and simple, mindful & productive living.

Thank you for stopping by….

Eralivine helps you to get more productive, take a step in self-improvement & personal development and help guide beginners with their blogging journey

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