Below is a step by step guide for making a blog from scratch. This article is designed to take a beginner through the complete start to finish process of getting a blog set up and ready to receive visitors from Google.
People start them for all sorts of reasons, but recently there’s been a lot of media coverage of people whom are making good money on the side, while still working their day job. Even an extra $100 per week can be generated from the integration of Google Adsense advertising on your blog. Many will only spend a couple of hours per week on such a project and will potentially set up a recurring income of just a few dollars to right up to $100k a year (there are more of these than you’d think).

Step 1: Buying a domain name

The first thing we have to do is set up a domain name. This is the web address people will type in to access your blog. You want to make it memorable and ideally linked to your key topic. If you’re planning to write a blog that centres around gardening, then you should call it something like www.gardeningbyjess.com, for example. To set one of these up, you’ll need to head to a domain registrar. I use www.crazydomains.com.au. Once you get the confirmation email, go into the domain control panel and change the domain nameservers to ns1.dreamhost.com, ns2.dreamhost.com and ns3.dreamhost.com. Hit save and you’ve completed this step.

Step 2: Set up your hosting account

Your blog is made up of files. These files have to reside on a web connected server. Shared hosting is the easiest and cheapest way to do this. Head to www.dreamhost.com and sign up for their $9 per month hosting. Enter the “MCWEBDESIGN” promo code to receive a $10 discount on your first year. You’ll be asked if you “already have a domain name”, you should click this and then enter the domain name you purchased in Step 1.

Step 3: Install your blog

At the end of Step 2 you’ll be taken to the hosting control panel. From here you’ll find “one-click installers” in the left menu (you’ll have to scroll down quite a bit) – click it. Now you’ll see a logo with a big ‘W’ in it. The text next to this logo should read something like “Wordpress…” – Click it. Ok, now follow the prompts and select your domain name from Step 1. The rest of the options can be left at their default.

Step 4: Set up WordPress

Ok, Dreamhost will tell you it’ll take 10 minutes for them to finish setting up your WordPress installation. So grab a drink and then enter your domain name – the one you set up in Step 1 – in your web browser. You’ll be taken to the WordPress setup page. Enter the name of your blog (you can change it later) and enter a username and password. You’ll then be taken to the login screen, which will expect you to add the username and password you just created.

Step 5: Add your first post

You blog is set up and already live on the web. You should go to the “posts” link on the top left of the screen. You’ll see there’s a post called “Hello World”, you can safely delete this. At the top you’ll find a “Add Post” button, click this and start writing your first post. Once you hit ‘publish’ on the right, your post will be visible to the world!

Step 6: Change the look of your blog

Ok, so the default theme is pretty ugly. We can change it to something more appealing by clicking the “appearance” link from the left menu of the administration area. You’ll see a list of available templates, scroll through them, find one you want to try out and then click “Activate” next to it. If you then go to your domain name, you’ll see the whole look of the site has changed. In a more advanced article, you’ll learn how to upload your own theme that you found on another website.

Helpful hints

To login to your blog, you need to go to your domain name and then add ‘wp-admin’ to the end. So in your browser you’d type “www.yourdomain.com/wp-admin”, you’d then have to enter your username and password.

All done – Start blogging!

I hope you liked this article and video, contact me if you have any questions or you need any help. I wish you all the best with your blogging and sincerely hope you manage to set up a blog and start earning some income!

If you’d rather have me set up your blog, or make you a full website, just head to my contact page and let me know you’re interested.