How To Start a Blog In 2024 And Make Money (Beginners Guide)

Did you know that you can start a blog in 2024 AND make money from it?

Running a blog can be lucrative. Within a year, many people can start making $500-$1000 per month from their blog. This could jump to more than $2000+ per month if you continue your blog for a few years and diversify your income streams!

If you manage to grow your audience enough, your blog could become a 6-figure annual earner.

While you can’t expect this to happen overnight, blogs still present a legitimate opportunity to make money—even in the age of the podcast—so what are you waiting for?

Benefits of Starting a Blog

Think of your blog like a business. Although it takes effort to build, the work you put into it pays off. Here are a few benefits you’ll get from starting a blog:

1. Creating semi-passive income: Blogging is semi-passive income, meaning you have to put some active work into it, but you’ll still be able to make money from it indirectly. Blogging doesn’t have to be a full-time job to be successful, and you can make money from it even if you only put in a few hours of work per week.
2. Working from home: There’s no commute required when you’re running a blog! You can work on your website completely from home, giving you the freedom to keep it going on your own time.
3. Building a community: One of the wonderful things about blogging is that you get an opportunity to build a community of like-minded people who are equally passionate about a topic. This can give you an outlet to express yourself while also making sure your business has greater longevity.
4. Gaining recognition: Running a blog can put you in a position to gain recognition as an expert voice in your industry. This can help you launch other projects in the future or position you to make a bigger impact in your career field.

If you like the sound of making money from home without having to work at it full-time, read on to see how you can get your blog started today!

Related: John Lee the Wealth Dragon Who Perfected Passive Income

How to Start a Blog in 3 Simple Steps

Starting a blog is a short process you can do at any time. Here’s how you start:

1. Get a Domain Name & Hosting

Your domain name is the website’s address. For example, our domain name is wifiwealth.com.

Hosting refers to renting a space online for your website to sit. Without hosting, no one would be able to see your blog.  

You need both a domain and hosting to launch your blog. Here’s how you get them.

To purchase a domain name:

First, choose a name that’s memorable and related to what your blog is about.

Then, check the availability of a domain and purchase it online through a domain hosting provider like NameCheap. Domains are purchased on a yearly basis, so make sure you keep track of your account details wherever you purchase the domain name so you can renew it next year.

To host your website

After purchasing your domain name, you’ll probably see an option to set up your hosting on the same site where you secured your domain—but it’s usually better to look for hosting separately to get the best service possible.

Pressable is a good option for blogs. It’s a managed hosting provider owned by WordPress itself, so you can be sure you’re getting a good provider for a WordPress website. Any time you have a hosting issue, you can contact support and they’ll take care of it for you.

With a 100% uptime guarantee and scalable traffic support, Pressable lets you focus on growing your blog rather than worrying about your hosting all the time.

2. Set Up a WordPress Website

WordPress is a content management system (CMS). A CMS is a platform that makes it possible for you to manage your website without having to know any coding. Using a CMS is a must, and WordPress is one of the best options on the market.

Why use WordPress?

The simple truth is that WordPress gives you the best mix of flexibility and user-friendliness.

WordPress is a free, open-source platform that lets you build whatever website you want on top of it. It’s incredibly easy to install and use, allowing you to select a pre-built theme or build your own custom website using a wide variety of compatible web builders.

While there are other free or affordable options, WordPress is going to be your best bet for building an effective website that you can start using and ranking immediately. As your blog grows, your WordPress website will be able to scale with you and adjust to your needs as they change.

Installing WordPress

If you’re using Pressable for hosting, log into your account and use their simple WordPress installer.

For other hosting providers, each one has their own way of installing WordPress, so you’ll have to log into your account and follow the given prompts to install it. If you can’t figure it out, contact support and they should be able to guide you through the process.

Selecting a theme

Themes on your WordPress website dictate what the website looks like, how users interact with it, and establishes the general vibe of your blog. You can build your own website or choose a pre-built theme to get started.

There are some free themes available on WordPress. You can also choose a theme from Envato Market if you want an affordable option with more customization potential and a better overall design.

Install your chosen theme through the WordPress dashboard.

Publish Your First Post

Got your WordPress site all set up? Great!

Now it’s time to publish your first blog post. Craft your perfect post, choose a dazzling featured image, and hit that publish button to put it up on your site.

Once your first post is done, plan out your next one—and your next one, and your next one . . .

3. Promote Your Blog Online

Blogs only grow if they get traffic. Be proactive and start marketing your blog online. I recommend beginning with a strong SEO strategy and an active Pinterest account.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search Engine Optimization, or SEO, is one of the most powerful tools for drawing traffic to your blog.

SEO relies on writing content that will appear higher up in the results pages for search engines like Google or Bing. The higher your content appears on the page, the more traffic you’re likely to get from it.

The good news is that the basics of SEO are simple.

SEO best practices

Here’s a quick overview of some of the ways you can implement SEO in your blog posts.

• Using targeted keywords: Go to Google Keyword Planner and make a list of specific words and phrases that people search which are related to your blog content. Use these keywords and key phrases at the beginning of your content and throughout it in noticeable places, such as in subheadings and beginning paragraphs.
• Writing appealing, unique titles: Titles are what convince a person to click on your content from a search results page. A solid title makes your content more clickable by giving people a convincing reason to visit your page.
• Uploading optimized images & media: Page load speed is an important factor in SEO. If you’re using images, videos, or other media in your blog posts, make sure you optimize them to reduce their size and help them load faster.
• Publishing helpful, relevant content: Write content that addresses what people are searching for. This is the smartest way to improve your ranking because search engines tend to favor content that directly addresses user needs.
• Linking internally: Each of your posts should include at least one direct link to another piece of content you’ve published. These internal links help search engines navigate your website while also giving a way for site visitors to discover more of your content organically.

The main focus of your SEO strategy should be to know your audience and write content that addresses what they want. If you can do this, you’ll most likely end up following a lot of the basics by default.

Besides the basics, what else can you plan to do to improve your SEO?

Long-form pillar content

Pillar articles are any articles that are more than 1500 words and dive deep into a topic. These in-depth articles tend to attract more backlinks from other websites and will naturally include more keywords people might be searching for.

Publishing a few long-form pillar articles on your blog is a great way to draw in steady traffic and give yourself easy options for linking and new topic generation.

Data-driven content

Content that provides unique, valuable data to the reader is likely to get more traffic. This can be anything from data you’ve collected yourself to compilations of third-party data related to a specific topic. 

Data-driven content gives people a quick source to reference when they need to know the facts. Because it’s a good reference point, you’re also likely to get additional backlinks from outside sources as other people link to your content.

Trending topics

Writing content about trending topics can help you capture traffic that will boost your SEO in the long term.

Trending stories make ranking easier because new topics won’t have the established competition in the blog space yet. Don’t underestimate the advantage you can get by publishing content on trending topics before anyone else!

Long-tail keywords

When you’re looking for keywords to use in your blog content, look for longer, more specific phrases. These are known as long-tail keywords and they can be a game changer for blogs.

While long-tail keywords often don’t have the same huge volume as simpler keywords, they point to very specific searches people are making. By writing hyper-focused content, you can capture a huge percentage of people searching for that long-tail keyword.

If you want to learn more about improving your SEO, check out these articles:

1. How to Leverage Reddit in Your SEO Strategy
2. How to Adjust Your SEO Strategy Post-AI
3. Is Bing SEO Worth It? 5 Reasons to Optimize for Bing

Pinterest

Although it’s technically a social media platform, Pinterest acts more like a search engine and content curation platform. With more than 482 million active monthly users, it’s also a great place to be found by new people who have never interacted with you before.

A lot of the content on Pinterest revolves around highly visual topics like DIY, events, and food, but there’s plenty of room for creativity in any industry.

Here’s a quick guide to getting started on Pinterest.

Create a business account

You can use a regular Pinterest account to promote your blog, but you’ll be limiting yourself for no good reason. Personal accounts can be converted to business accounts for free and then used to access more business-focused features, both free and paid.

Pinterest business accounts have access to a lot more features and data, including analytics data, ads, rich pins, and promoted pins.

With a business account, you can also claim your website. It’s as simple as copying a line of text into the header of your WordPress website. Follow these steps:

1. Login into Pinterest and go to the account settings page.

2. Click on the “Claimed Accounts” button on the left menu. In that menu, click on the “Claim” button under the website section.

3. This will open a pop-up that gives you 3 options to claim a website. The HTML option is the simplest. Click on the code box under the HTML option to copy the code. Do not close the pop-up or the tab.

4. Open a new tab and log into your WordPress dashboard. Paste the code into the header of your website. To do this, you’ll need to install a simple plugin to your website that lets you insert code into your website header.

5. Once you’ve pasted the code into the header through your plugin, go back to the Pinterest pop-up and click “Continue”. Copy and paste your website address into the prompt box and click “verify”.

If you’ve completed the steps successfully, the pop-up should show that you’ve connected it successfully.

After claiming your website, anything that links to your URL will automatically be linked to your account, giving you better access to analytics and engagement information.

You can unclaim a website at any time or claim additional websites.

Build your boards

A good place to start is building around 10 boards that have titles revolving around what your blog is all about. Add one additional board that’s branded with your blog name. This is where you’ll publish a lot of your blog content pins.

Use your boards as a place to pin content that your audience will love, whether it’s made by you or someone else. Make sure to give each board a relevant description and an attractive cover image that helps convey the purpose of the board.

Publishing pins

Create and publish pins in the appropriate boards. You can use content related to your blog posts or create entirely new content specifically for Pinterest. It all depends on how many marketing channels you have and how much effort you want to put into Pinterest versus other channels.

Good pins are visually appealing and eye-catching. They draw people to click and point to your website to read more. Focus on putting high-quality images in the pins with readable, attractive headlines.

Make it automatic

To make Pinterest marketing a breeze, you can set your account to automatically post new pins on specific boards when you publish new content on your website.

WordPress has plugins that can make it super simple for you, like Pinterest Automatic. All you have to do is set it up and tell it where to take the data from on your blog posts. Every time you publish content on your blog, the plugin will automatically create and publish a pin for you.

You get a lot of options to customize what you’re posting and how it’s displayed. This makes it much easier to keep up with posts on your Pinterest account.

Pinterest is a complex, unique online ecosystem. There’s a lot you can learn to help you fully optimize Pinterest marketing. Get started with this powerful, free Pinterest marketing course.

Social Media

Using social media to market your blog can be an effective way to build a community and bring long-term traffic to your site. However, social media platforms are also highly saturated with users and require a lot of consistent effort for you to be successful.

If you want to use social media to market your blog, choose 1 or 2 platforms to post on regularly. Make content that’s easy for you to do consistently and that fits well with the type of blog you’re running.

Social media can be great for building a community and diversifying your content. You can draw people in with a wider range of content, build your reputation as a reliable source, and have conversations more directly with your audience. Create an air of authenticity with your accounts.

However, contrary to popular belief, social media is not a reliable avenue for gaining new traffic. Social media communities take a while to build up, which won’t help a lot with traffic in the early stages of your blog.

The bottom line with marketing your blog is you shouldn’t put all your eggs in one basket. Plan to market your blog in at least 2 different areas online to increase your chances of growing a stable audience and limit your losses if one traffic source dies out.

How to Monetize Your Blog

If you’re looking at starting a blog to make money, you need to plan out how you’re going to do it. Blogs don’t just make money on their own. You need a monetization strategy that’s built into how you run your blog from day 1.

Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing gives you a small commission when people use your specific links in order to go and buy a product online. Since your blog provides information around a specific topic, it’s usually easy enough to talk about products related to that topic.

Affiliate blogs have long been one of the most consistent ways of monetizing a blog. Throughout search engine updates and changes in how people use the internet, affiliate blogs have still been a steady resource for making money.

There are a few ways to get started with affiliate marketing. You can work with large ecommerce platforms or specific companies.

General affiliate programs

Working with ecommerce platforms gives you the most options for different products. You can recommend a wide range of products and may even get a commission if related products are purchased after your link is clicked.

Amazon is the most common general affiliate program, but there are a lot of other choices as well. Other general affiliate programs include:

• Target
• Etsy
• Walmart
• AliExpress
• eBay
• Kohl’s

Another option if you want to access a huge product range is to join an affiliate network that has partnerships with a lot of different brands that may not offer individual affiliate programs. Big names in this space include:

• CJ Affiliate
• FlexOffers
• ShareASale
• Awin
• Rakuten Advertising
• ClickBank

Affiliate networks can give you a better commission rate than Amazon on many name-brand products. It’s not always the case, but it’s worth looking into.

Depending on what products you’re recommending, check to see what kind of commissions are available from different affiliate networks or ecommerce platforms. Find the best one for your niche and go through the registration process.

Specific company affiliate programs

Some niches work really well for affiliate programs with specific companies. If you’re going to be recommending a specific company for products or services in your niche, you can check to see if they offer their own affiliate program.

This is a great option if you’ll be recommending online service companies in your content. These companies regularly offer affiliate programs with better rates than affiliate networks.

Choose individual companies that fit well with your blog’s niche. The best companies to sign up with are those that you feel great about recommending to your audience. A good rule of thumb is that if you wouldn’t feel comfortable recommending the company to a close friend, don’t work with them as an affiliate.

Read more: Sarah Faraj Teaches Others How Affiliate Marketing Can Make Them Six Figures

Digital Products

Selling directly to your audience is the most straightforward way of making money from a blog. It may take more setup effort on your end, but it can be worth it for higher margins and greater control over what you’re selling.

Digital products are your best option since they’re more scalable than physical products and don’t require packaging, warehousing, or shipping.

Here are a few examples of digital products you could sell through your blog:

• Ebooks
• Printables
• Workbooks
• Software
• Images
• Music
• Research or data
• Tutorials
• Web elements
• Digital art
• Courses (more on this below!)
• Video game mods
• Templates
• Design elements

Depending on your niche, you’ll have a lot of different options for digital products to sell. It’s not a one-size-fits-all scenario. Choose digital products that you can make well and sell naturally in your niche.

Online Courses

Although courses are a type of digital product, it’s worth taking a closer look at how online courses work. Since they’re information-based, courses are a fully digital product that you can sell in a variety of ways.

From webinars to informational videos and workbooks, online courses can be as simple or expansive as you want. If you’re focusing on selling courses, create courses that are highly targeted to a specific need in your niche that you’re able to address directly.

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Starting a blog can be a great way to make money online in 2024. Take the steps to get started now so you can reap the rewards as soon as possible!