How To Start A Blog and Make Money

How to start a blog and make money online is easy with our free guide to setting up your blog and practical advice on how to monetize it.

Our posts may contain affiliate links, but all opinions are our own. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.

If you want to escape from the hamster wheel, achieve financial freedom and spend more time doing what love, you need to set up your own website, grow it and work towards multiple sources of income.

Let’s dive into the hows, the whys, and other practical info to make money with your blog.

Why Set Up Your Own Blog To Work From Home?

Starting a blog is an excellent way to make money online and maintain a certain kind of freedom. You can spend time with your kids and combine it with homemaking to lead a more satisfying life instead of running on the corporate hamster wheel and working for a boss who decides how much you earn.

  • You get to choose your own hours and develop a routine that works for you.
  • You can choose to home school your kids and work that into your schedule too.
  • You can set up multiple sources of income and become financially independent.

How to start a blog

The easiest way to start a blog is to grab a domain name and hosting package from a good hosting provider. You don’t have to be a geek to set up a site, but even if you struggle, most hosting providers offer scripts that install a WordPress site in just a few minutes!

Should you use a free blogging platform to start a blog?

You can start a free blog on WordPress.com or Blogger, but we certainly don’t recommend it. It’s like building your house on someone else’s land.

You don’t own the site and you are restricted by the rules of these platforms that can close down your blog any day. WordPress.com for example only allows for a few ways of monetizing your blog, which prevents you from growing the way you want to.

Setting up your own WordPress.org blog on the hand allows you to do whatever you want. You can set up a shop, a membership site, or monetize with the advertising network of your choice.

A domain name costs less than $10 a year and you can get started with a cheap hosting plan for less than $5 a month. As a beginner, this is good enough and you can upgrade when your site grows.

While setting up your own site sounds scary it’s really easy even for non-geeks. And we can make it even easier with our step-by-step workbook that you can download for free!

What Type Of Blog Should You Start?

Ideally, you would start a blog in a niche you’re an expert in or at least passionate about. If you’re passionate about a niche that you only just started to learn about, consider setting up a blog that takes your reader on your journey with you!

Some popular blog types include:

  • Food and cooking log
  • Travel blog
  • Homeschooling blog
  • Homesteading blog
  • Lifestyle
  • Parenting
  • Crafting
  • Finance or frugal living
  • Organizing

Pick a niche that people are interested in because without readership it will be hard to monetize a website.

Choosing a Domain Name

Domain names can be a little confusing, but it’s important to pick the right one because it will be your web address. You want it to be easy for people to remember and find, so do some research before you choose. There are a few things you’ll want to keep in mind when making your decision:

  • The type of website you’re creating.
  • The name must be easy to spell and remember.
  • Whether or not it’s available as a domain.

How To Make Money With Your Website:

There are many ways to monetize a website, but we’ll discuss the most popular ideas here.

Advertising PPC or RPM

Advertising is when you earn money based on the number of times your ad is clicked on or viewed. This is done through programs like Google Adsense or Media.net.

RPM, or revenue per thousand impressions, is another way to measure advertising income. Popular advertising agencies like Mediavine track your advertising and pay you based on the number of people who view your ad.

Direct advertising is also an option, but your need a lot of readers to attract advertisers, so this is not for beginning bloggers.

Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is a way to earn money from a website by referring people to other sites they want to purchase products or services from. Some examples of affiliate programs are Amazon, Skimlinks, ShareASale, and Commission Junction. The latter 2 are affiliate networks that house thousands of interesting companies that will pay you a commission when your reader buys their products through your affiliate link.

Making money with affiliate marketing is relatively easy and it’s something you can start with right away.

Sponsored Posts

Sponsored posts are an excellent way to make money online. Companies pay you to promote their product through a blog post. The amount of money you can make with sponsored posts depends on your readership and your social media following.

More page views and a large social media following mean you can charge more for a sponsored blog post, but keep in mind that this is not a strategy to start with right away.

Products and Services

Offering your own products and service on your website is one of the best ways to monetize your website. You could sell courses, be a coach or create eBooks in a certain niche. There are many possibilities and we have made a list of digital products to sell to inspire you!

Conclusion

Starting a blog and making money with it is not as difficult as it may seem. There are many ways to monetize a blog, and with a little effort and perseverance, bloggers can start generating income from their blogs. So, what are you waiting for? Download our free workbook and start blogging today!

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