How To Start a Blog 2024: Your Own Blog in 5 Steps

You're thinking about starting a blog, but feel unsure about where to begin or what you need? You’re in the right place.

We'll walk you through the process of creating a blog step-by-step — and reveal how you can make money as a blogger.

There are many ways to start a blog and lots of things to consider. We've broken down the journey into five key stages, highlighting your software options and what to keep in mind along the way.

Creating a blog only makes sense if you have something to say. You probably do, or you wouldn’t be here. Still, it’s worth thinking about what topics you care about and what you want your blog to achieve.

You could treat your blog like a diary and write free-form. However, unless you're a literary genius, most people won't be interested, and your audience will likely be limited to friends and family (if even).

To reach a larger audience and run a professional blog, you need to choose your subject matter carefully. Start by asking yourself a few questions to define your niche and develop a concrete plan:

If you struggle to answer these questions, you might want to take a step back and rethink your basic idea and goals. Once you have a clear vision of your blog and the content you want to publish, you’re ready to move forward.

Every blog needs a home. First, select a blogging platform to bring your blog to life. This will provide both the technical foundation and the digital space (web hosting) for your blog.

You have several options, each with its own pros and cons:

The easiest way to manage a blog is on a publishing service like Medium or Substack. These platforms help writers quickly and easily publish content without worrying about technical aspects like hosting or maintenance.

Because monetization features, such as paid subscriptions, are built into these platforms, they're popular with journalists who already have a following. They offer a way to earn money directly and immediately, 100% reader-funded.

Publishing platforms are a good choice if you:

If you want to create your own blog and exercise full control over its design and features, consider the next two options.

For more control over your blog's design, structure, features, and monetization options without dealing with technical aspects, website builders like Wix or Squarespace are great alternatives.

These platforms allow you to design a website using a visual editor, requiring no coding or web design knowledge.

Website builders give you everything you need to design and run your blog in one place: You can design your site with a beginner-friendly, visual editor, write articles directly in the editor, and manage blog posts from a central dashboard.

Website builders are a good choice for your blog if you:

If you need even more flexibility and control over technical aspects and would like extensive customization options, consider self-hosting your blog.

Self-hosting your blog gives you maximum control over all its aspects – from its technical infrastructure to its design. This option requires the most technical knowledge but offers the greatest flexibility and independence.

Self-hosting involves running a website on your own server. You’ll need:

Self-hosted blogs are a good choice if you:

What do The Points Guy, Pinch of Yum, and Money With Katie have in common? They all have unique, recognizable names that quickly reveal what their blogs are about.

A great name isn't a prerequisite for a successful blog – many bloggers are simply known by their legal names – but it can significantly help with branding.

It's crucial to find a name for which a domain is available. Your website's domain is its unique name and part of its web address. For example, a book store called Books4Ever might have a domain www.books4ever-publishing.com.

Once you've chosen a platform, picked a name, and registered a domain, you can start setting up your blog.

First impressions matter. Good writing isn't enough; your articles need to look appealing, too. Invest some time in designing your blog's website, homepage, and layout. How you do this depends on the blog platform you chose:

Website builders make it easy to design a blog with pre-made templates, AI tools, and drag-and-drop editors. Each platform works a bit differently, but you always need to follow these steps:

Step 1: Choose a template

First, pick a template that will serve as the visual framework for your site. It provides a starting point that you can further customize with the editor's design tools and fill with content.

Most providers group their templates into categories. If you choose a blog template, you won't have to manually add a blog to it. We recommend picking a template that closely matches your vision. This saves time and effort because you only need to make minor adjustments in the editor and fill it with your content.

Step 2: Customize the design

Next, customize the global design of your blog's website. This includes general design settings like its color scheme and fonts, which are automatically applied to all of your site's pages.

Step 3: Set up pages & menus

Decide how you want your blog to be structured. Do you need just a homepage that lists all your blog posts, or do you want a more extensive website with multiple sections?

Use page settings to create new pages and configure their position and visibility in the navigation menu. If your chosen template lacks a blog, you'll need to add a blog page to house your posts.

Step 4: Customize content in the editor

Once you're satisfied with your design and have added the pages you want, focus on your website's static content. This includes all text, images, and elements that aren't blog posts, like your “About Me” section or homepage.

This is where your website builder's visual editor comes in. Use it to directly edit your content in a kind of live preview of your website's frontend, using pre-configured content blocks, page templates and many other design tools.

Step 5: Publish your blog

Once you're satisfied, publish your blog. This is usually done with a click of a (hard-to-miss) button. If you haven't selected a domain yet, this is also a good time to connect it to your blog.

Of course, each website builder has a unique interface and works a bit differently. We've prepared detailed step-by-step tutorials for some of the most popular website builders for you.

If you host your blog yourself, things are a bit more complicated — but still manageable, don't worry. Here's how to do it with WordPress:

Step 1: Install WordPress

First, you need to install WordPress on your web space. Most hosting providers make this step easy and offer one-click installations that practically automate the initial setup.

With Kinsta for example, simply click “Create Site” under “WordPress Site” to start the process. Once you specify a site title, admin name, password, and desired server location, Kinsta takes care of the rest. Other hosting services make it just as easy.

Step 2: Configure basic settings

If you host your blog yourself, there are more technical aspects to consider. Hosting services usually make configuration easy, with many settings pre-configured. However, ensure you check the following:

Step 3: Find & install a theme

WordPress themes provide the basis for your website's design. Navigate to Design > Themes in the WordPress admin area. You can now choose the right theme from thousands of available options. These are sorted by type, features, and layout.

When you find a theme you like, you can open a live preview. After you've made your decision, click “Install” and then activate the theme in the list under Design > Themes to start using it.

Step 4: Customize your theme's design

Use the WordPress Customizer (Design > Customizer) to configure your color scheme, fonts, and layout options, applying them globally to personalize your website.

Step 5: Install plugins

Plugins are one of WordPress's biggest advantages since they allow you to expand your website's functionality.

To browse the plugin marketplace, go to Plugins > Add New. Here, you can search for plugins by name or functionality. Popular plugins include SEO tools like Yoast or All in One SEO, performance enhancers like W3 Total Cache or WP Rocket, and even builder plugins like Elementor or Oxygen, which combine the flexibility of WordPress with the ease-of-use of a drag-and-drop editor.

To install a plugin, find one you like, click “Install Now” and then activate it. This will add new features and options to your WordPress dashboard.

Step 6: Create content

Your website is empty at first — you'll change that with the Gutenberg Editor, WordPress's default editor. Use it to visually design and arrange content with special tools and content blocks.

Every WordPress website consists of static pages – like a homepage or the “About Me” section – and dynamic posts, which are displayed in reverse chronological order or sorted into categories. The latter are ideal for blog posts.

Start by focusing on static pages, since they define your blog's basic structure. Create all the pages you need in the Pages section. If you want to present all blog posts on the homepage, one page is enough. Otherwise, you should create at least a homepage and a blog page.

When you add a new page, you're taken to the Gutenberg Editor. There you'll edit your page with content blocks, just like in a website builder:

Step 7: Define page structure & navigation

Once you’ve added your pages, you'll need a menu to organize them. Go to Appearance > Menus, give the menu a name, and set it as the “Primary Menu.”

We’ve prepared a more detailed step-by-step guide to WordPress for you here:

Finally, the fun part: Once your blog's website is set up, designed, and accessible under your registered domain, you can start blogging!

After all these instructions, we don't want to keep you from writing any longer. After all, blogs thrive on authenticity, and yours should reflect your unique personality and style.

Still, here are a few tips to help you make your articles more effective and attract more readers:

Running a successful blog is a continuous challenge. You need to regularly publish new articles, stay on top of trends, and maintain a positive relationship with your community. If you also want to make money from your blog, it can quickly become a time-consuming part-time or full-time job.

Here are some tips on how to professionally and effectively manage your blog:

Consistently delivering high-quality content is key to building and maintaining a loyal readership. This is easier if you have a professional workflow. A well-structured editorial calendar can help you plan topics and ensure that new content goes live regularly.

It doesn’t have to be a rigid calendar with strict deadlines. Even a simple to-do list or a flexible planning tool can help structure your blogging activities.

A good project management tool can help with all this: Use it to add tasks, track progress, and clearly define your priorities.

We’ve reviewed eleven popular project management tools. Many of them have free versions that support simple to-do lists and calendars:

Even the best content is useless if no one finds it. With hundreds of millions of blogs on the Internet, you can't expect your blog to attract readers on its own.

You can actively promote your blog on different channels:

If you want to earn income from your blog, there are several ways to do this:

You can also combine different approaches to diversify your income streams.

Starting a blog is easy. If you already know what you want to write about, all you need is an account on a blogging platform (like WordPress with hosting or website builders like Wix), a catchy name (plus a domain), and a well-designed website to share your thoughts with the world.

Most blogs don’t fail because of technical issues but due to a lack of commitment. Running a successful blog requires a lot of work. You need to regularly provide your readers with high-quality, original content while managing everything else, from SEO to monetization.

Plan your blog carefully from the start, set clear goals, and always remember that good content is the key to long-term success. Anyone can start a blog, but only a few can sustain a successful one over the long term. Good luck!