HOW TO: Start Blogging
I may have already shown you how to boost your blog traffic, but let’s go back a step. How do I even start a blog? What is involved with maintaining a blog? What do I need to know? These are all questions that run through the mind of someone looking to create a blog for their first time. I hope to tackle these issues in this latest how to. If you are reading this and want to start a blog, you’re in for a treat. If you already have a blog, stick around and you might learn something new.
Why Blog?
There are many reasons why you might want to blog. Blogs have come a long way from their typical definition as online diaries. Blogs are now viable sources for tech news, informative articles and other captivating content. My blog started out as curiousity about blog software, such as WordPress, and has evolved into a way for me to share my knowledge while learning from the comments of my readers. It also has the nice benefit of getting my name out there (self-marketing), which will hopefully come in handy when searching for a job in the near future. Heck, I have even been offered jobs before after people have seen what I have done with this site. Sitepoint has a brief explanation of the main reasons for blogging; personal, topical and marketing.
Before You Get Started
Now that you want to start a blog, you should start thinking about what you will be blogging about. You might already have a general notion of what you want to talk about, but try to get a better idea of what a typical post would be. As I mentioned in my traffic boosting post, it is a good idea to find your niche. I can’t really expand upon that too much; it’s all you now. If you blog about anything that strikes your fancy, whether it’s tech news or gardening tips, you are not as likely to gather as many dedicated readers as if you had just stuck to one topic.
Hosted or DIY?
Hosted
At this point you will need to know whether or not you would like to start off with a hosted blog solution such as TypePad, Blogger or WordPress.com or go for a do-it-yourself approach. There is a trade-off when it comes to each choice. If you opt for a hosted solution, you are not as open to modify your theme or use that new plugin you found. You are in a fairly locked-down environment, however the upshot of using a hosted solution is that you don’t have to worry about setting up anything or configuring databases - it’s all done for you.
A free, hosted solution is great for the absolute beginner to get their thoughts together and determine whether blogging is for them. I recommend spending at least a month on a hosted blog until you finalize your niche and get the hang of it. If then you are serious about it, upgrade to your own webhost using some of the software listed below and get a domain name.
DIY
WordPress, Movable Type, typo, Expression Engine, Textpattern, Pivot - there are a lot of choices when it comes to setting up your own blog. While you may have to do some nitty-gritty stuff like create a database and edit some config files, there are many advantages to doing it yourself. You have complete control - you can edit the themes, create your own themes, use any plugins, etcetera. However, the chance of something bad happening is much higher. You need to keep frequent backups of everything on the server in addition to timely database backups. Maintenance is a bit more strenuous, but by using new-user friendly blog software such as WordPress, famous for its 5 minute install, you are in good hands. If you ever encounter any problems during setup or maintenance, each piece of blog software has its own community with forums or even an IRC chat room where you can easily ask for help. If you want to learn a whole lot more about WordPress, Expression Engine, Movable Type and Textpattern check out the Blog Design Solutions book.
Here’s a quick break down of the more popular blog Content Management Systems. Then read Mike Rundle’s comparison of WP and MT.
WordPress - massive community, many themes and plugins, easy install, need to know PHP to edit themes
Movable Type - takes a weekend to install, based on Perl, don’t need to know PHP because MT uses simple template tags
Textpattern - not too sure about this, ask Natalie Jost or Nathan Smith
If you choose to go with doing it yourself, you have several tasks before you can start blogging. You need to find a webhost that supports the requirements of the blog software you have chosen (with the exception of the Ruby on Rails-powered typo, most content management systems require PHP and MySQL support), as well as a domain name. Just to give a few tips about this process, I recommend GoDaddy.com for a domain name registrar. Once you purchase a domain name from them, they give you a call just to make sure everything is okay. When it comes to webhosting there are tons of choices. I obviously prefer Media Temple, but to be unbiased here are a few of the other competitors: DreamHost, Bluehost and A Small Orange.
The way it works is that a domain name is essentially paired with your server’s IP address via the use of a DNS or domain name server. When you register a domain name with GoDaddy, you can change the DNS. There are always at least 2 domain name servers, a primary and secondary. Let’s say you purchase some webhosting service with Media Temple. Media Temple has their own domain name servers, so all you need to do is tell Media Temple the domain name you plan on using during the sign-up process and they will provide you the names of the two DNS servers which you give to GoDaddy, as seen in the screenshot below. Once you have done all of this, you need to wait around 48 hours for the DNS to propagate. This is the period in which the DNS servers are being updated with the IP address of your server and your domain name. Whenever you type in a domain name in a browser, your computer first contacts the DNS server to find out the IP of the server before connecting to it directly. If the DNS server goes down, typing in a domain name won’t work even if the actual server for your website is fully-functional. This is one of the reasons that you use at least 2 DNS servers, as a failsafe.
GoDaddy.com’s Domain Management system. The domain name servers are circled.
I stretched this out a bit but it really is a simple process. If you have any questions about it, your webhost and registrar should be able to help you out no problem.
Installing the Software
If you have chosen a hosted solution, skip this section. After you have server space and have a domain name working, you will want to use an FTP client to log into your server. Most webhosts supply you with the login and password you need to access your server in an email after you signup. Don’t have an FTP client yet? If you run Windows, take a look at WinSCP whereas Mac users might want to look at Transmit or CyberDuck. Linux users should consider Kasablanca or gFTP as their FTP client.
I can’t go through the entire setup procedure for each piece of blog software, but most require you to upload all of the files into your www, httpdocs, http or other public folder on your server (varies by webhost). Then you will likely be asked to edit a file and provide it with your database information. However, that requires that you make a database first. Luckily there is a fantastic site, Tamba2.org.uk, with some excellent guides for creating databases. Some of the guides are tailored towards WordPress, but the simple stuff like phpMyAdmin and MySQL info can be applied universally. If you any questions about this part of the process, feel free to leave a comment.
Now What?
Now that you have everything setup, or have just created a hosted blog, you can start blogging. I usually start off by naming the blog with something to the point. Try to incorporate your blog’s topic into the title if possible, this helps to quickly clue people into what your blog is about. Then, I generally begin making the categories that I use to organize my posts. You can also create categories with sub-categories in most blog content management systems, making it even easier to organize niche posts. Setting up site navigation early on is vital. Site organization is not something you want to figure out after several months of posting. You might want to create a category for asides, which are smaller posts usually styled differently than regular posts.
Posting 101
I can’t stress enough how important it is to have well-formed posts with proper punctuation and with at least some attention paid to spelling. The biggest turn-off for most web users is a typo-ridden website. After you have that behind you, your next goal is post regularity. Decide early on how often you are going to post and try to stick to it. If you post something every day and then suddenly don’t post for 5 days, your readers are going to wonder what’s going on. A poorly updated website is also a big turn-off and can detract from your blog’s overall atmosphere. If I can’t post something every day, I try not to let two days pass without a new post. Your post frequency will obviously vary, but some regularity is a vital part of a successful blog.
Post Titles
The use of elongated, abstract post titles is one more thing that can detract from your blog. Concise, brief and effective are all words that describe good titles. Try to summarize each blog post in the title. If Google bought McDonald’s your title should be something like “Google Acquires McDonald’s” not “Google’s at it Again.” You get the idea. Speaking of post titles, setting up permalinks is another must. Blogs without permalinks enabled come off as “amateur” to most people.
Don’t Reblog
If you’ve read this far with the intent of reblogging, then I am sorry for wasting your time. Reblogging is what’s destroying the blogosphere. Rebloggers are people (so I’ve heard) that simply find others’ content on the internet and post the same stuff verbatim on their blog, with at most a link back to the author on the very bottom. If you still want to reblog, there is a (frowned-upon) solution for you. It is alright to talk about the latest product launch, as long as you at least fit in your opinion to make it unique from everyone else in the blogosphere talking about the same thing.
Ready, Set, Blog!
Hopefully I have provided you with the basics of blogging. However, the most important concepts about blogging can only be learned through experience. So I encourage you to start your blogging career the right way, now. You have nothing to lose, except time. Blogging can get you in touch with others that share the same interests as you, teach you new things and help establish an online community. But if there is one thing to remember, don’t ever blog about stuff you may later regret - Google will remember it forever.
Bah, every time I think about writing an article like this, something crops up, like school, and then I lose all motivation etc and then someone writes it :P
Nice write up.
Yeah, this article had been a draft for a very long time and then I just decided to sit down tonight and finish it.
Looks like a solid article, very concise and to the point. You basically show a person what it takes to get started and show the various route they can travel to enter the world of blogging. If I could do it again I would have started out with a hosted website, wordpress.com being my main choice. In my opinion, a blogger should focus on content first before a flashy website becomes a concern, so long as the hosted website doesn’t have a terrible design.
Hi, Thanks for the article. Just wondering about good web hosting provider to use. I looked into Dreamhost but their plan giantic disk space and unlimited bandwidth yet with cheap price (
Sorry seems like my previous comment got cut…
Anyone has any experience with Dreamhost? Also anyone use site5.com before? How is Mediatemple? The disk space in the plan seems smallish comparing to other providers like Dreamhost.
Also another question, how does shared hosting perform like MediaTemple’s plan? How much bandwidth or processes do the provider limit? Or can it sustain a digg/slashdot effect for example?
Thanks.
The cheapest Media Temple plan may not seem like much, but they have excellent support. That’s what you are paying for, top-notch support. And yes, they can handle a digging. When I was on a shared server, I was able to get 30,000 hits in one day and the server stayed online and remained fast during the whole process.
“The n00b lord”…nice article Paul! Reblogging gets bloggers no where…
As usual, great article. I would like to suggest a couple of thing though, no offense….
I woulod have broken this down into a series of articles and spread them out over the course of the week. Understanding that you’re in Finals week, I completely see why you didn’t. I think that each of the involved steps, whether going for hosted or DIY, is so involved that it all can’t really be touched on in one single article. You did a far more exceptional job though, props to you.
The other thing that I wanted to say is that on the section where you talk about registering a domain name, I think you should make clear that that should only be done for the DIY people. I can imagine the horror of some n00b, reading your article and registering a domain name that they think they can use with Blogger or Wordpress.com only to find out that they can’t. Other than that, like I said, great article. L8tr!
Wow, reblogging. I’ve never heard that term before but isn’t that just blatant content theft? I may be way off in my legal understanding of copyright, but it seems that goes against every bit of copyright law, to purposefully copy content from some other site (or feed) and put it on your own site. Yeah, I definitely recommend not doing that. It’s the quickest way to ruin your online reputation.
Kyle, I feel the same way as you. I get around to writing the article but never do…
Anyway, it’s a nice article Paul, may help those in need that have no idea where to start out.
“However, the chance of something bad happening is much higher”. So true especially with typo as i have recently learned. Typo requires rails which is a pain in itself.
Great article, you might want to add up drupal to your list of available blogging platform. Drupal, even if it’s pretty hard to set-up and configure, gives you so much control over your blog (or whatever else you might want to turn it into), that the inconveniences of setting it up are quickly forgotten.
Personnaly, I was unlucky enough to start my blog on blogger, and I’m kind of trapped there now. I’m a victim of fame :), got 1000’s of linkback and a great page rank. Leaving blogger would unfortunately drop my PR to 0 and I wouldn’t have the courage to visit everyone that linked to me to have them change their url pointers.
Bleah.
Kiltak
If you want to run your own blog on your own server for cheap, you can get a Xen based VPS. They’re cheap, and they are pretty fast. The only problem is that you’re low on memory. The cheap xen vps solutions go for 9-15 bucks per month and come with somewhere around 64-96 megs of ram.
I’ve written up some thoughts about how to get things running fast and in a low memory environment, just follow the link above.
I’ve experience with Bluehost (that is hosting my blog on VoIP) as well as Dreamhost. Both provide excellent hosting. Dreamhost provides unlimmited domains where Bluehost ‘only’ provides six. Both provide more bandwidth and disk storage than you might ever need.
Setting up a domain is a breeze with both, and both use a one-click installer to setup wordpress. Bluehost uses the fantastico control pannel wich looks a little more polished to mee.
The price and ease of the provides wipes away to go for a hosted solution like blogger.
How about SimplePHpBlog (www.simplephpblog.com) for those people who don’t want to go through heavy database config (like getting it started in the first place). It’s a good blogger software if you have to pay extra for MySQL servers or are running it on a home server.
Hey Paul, it’s Robert Lee from CCF at Georgia Tech! I saw a link to this on Digg, congrats on being dugg! Good article, I’m sure there’s a lot of people that just need some basic help like you provide to get started. You didn’t mention however TRUE DIY, as in building your blog from the ground up with PHP and MySQL. Though doing something like WordPress by yourself is nearly impossible (at least in a reasonable amount of time haha), you can make a very simple blog from scratch in a day or two and then you REALLY have full control over it. And you can also slowly add on to it every once in a while (which is what I do… very slowly).
And BTW, cool site!
See ya around,
-Robert Lee
Paul: Get yourself a new host, or optimize your page so that it can accept more traffic… Your site can’t stand getting hit by digg. Your story isn’t on the front page anymore, but I couldn’t access it while it was.
My site is optimized like crazy. I will be talking with an (mt) server admin about server optimization very soon. The server is more than capable, I just think it needs to be tweaked properly. And I’m not too sure WP cache was doing it’s job.
Just thought you’d like to know about two other free hosting services: Blogsome.com, (runs on wordpress 1.5, alows 100% template costumization, lots of plug ins and a v. supporting community) and Freetxp.com - free Textpattern 4.0.3 (latest version) hosting (actually, you’ll have to apply for a blog, but is as certain as granted). Happy blogging!
Paul, another wonderful post. This is what makes PaulStamatiou.com one of my favorite blogs and top RSS reader feeds.
Thanks
Victor
Excellent! Neat stuff!
I’d just like to put in a comment in support of Pivot as an alternative to WordPress, MoveableType and TextPattern.
It’s a great alternative for people who have hosting but do not have access to a MySQL database. Because it is all file based it’s easy to set up and easy to keep in sync with a “development” copy on your home machine. It also support multiple users and blog, has a flexible template scheme and a great administrative front-end. As of version 1.30 RC3 it also uses HashCash to implement the strongest built-in comment spam protection I’ve seen.
Although the above is all quite gushing I have no connection with the Pivot project apart from being a very happy user.
Definitely worth a look.
Great post especially for noobs like me trying to start my blogging career…
Got a question about webhosting tho:
There is an Apache web server built into Mac OS X. Is it possible to host my blog on this server, instead of having to go to a webhosting service like mediatemple?? If possible, I would still have to purchase my own domain name rite?
It’ll be a good idea for you to start a whole educational series on blogging for newbies, or possibly even like use your own personal experience of setting up paulstamatiou.com as a case study??
Kevin, it’s funny you should bring up hosting via OS X. This is how my blog started out, on my Mac Mini. But my cable modem wasn’t fast enough and then I got some traffic and my hard drive got killed within the month.
I’ve wanted to start a blog about procrastination, GTD, Getting Real, but I just haven’t gotten around to it yet.
Ha. So I’m kidding, but I actually bought the domain, now it’s time to actually start.
Hi,
Thank you for the tips. Can you please advice me on how I can write some mathematical articles (where, typically, one finds more equations and symbols than alphanuemrals)?
Thank you,
Nagu
Foe hosted blogs I have not come across a better deal then Pete99.com’s $12.99/yr Wordpress special. Great service and an unbelievable price. So for $2.99 (Go Daddy) domain and $12.99=$14.99 and you have your won hosted Wordpress blog for a year.
Try ‘n beat that with a stick!
Wow. Stumbled across your site thorugh 9rules and LOVE it. As a struggling graphic designer myself, I am intimidated by excessive talent like yours! Wow! Love the site, the feel and the content and will stop in often! Blessings!
But does Pete’s server let you edit the WordPress files and can it stand up to a digging or slashdot?
Yeah, seriously, I don’t know how you find time to write such awesome articles.
That’s why, sadly, I’m still a recovering reblogger. (the lack of time, or perception thereof)
Great writeup though.
Reblogging? Killing the blogosphere?
Give me a break. The whole point of the enterprise is that you can write, spell, talk about and post whatever the hell you want to. It might be crap, but the idea is that it’s your own crap.
Pete’s service let’s you do whatever you want with the WP installation. They also offer oneclick installs for newbies. As for getting Dugg, well I don’t think most packages account for bandwidth generated by events like that. The average blogger will do just fine.
I am not affiliated with Pete99.com in any way but he has never let me down. I currently have five blogs running with them. Once again you simply cannot beat the price for a hosted solution.
I’d like to plug Textpattern. If all you want to do is blog, then I recommend Wordpress whole-heartedly. It’s a blogging platform through and through.
But if you want more flexible publishing options, e.g. static sites; half a static site with a blog; portfolios; etc, I’ve found Textpattern to be a better alternative because of its multiple sections feature. Think of it as a lightweight CMS. I built my church site with Textpattern, so here’s another plug (www.kaog.org.my/ph).
Conclusion, beginner bloggers should start with Wordpress or Blogger. Consider Textpattern if you’re looking for more flexibility or customisation.
Thanks for the article Paul :)
Just started blogging from March this year. I’m on Blogger.com.
This month I realise Blogger doesn’t support categorization. Have to do it manually though. I myself find it difficult to get to my older posts without categories.
Now I’m toying with the idea to setup blog with WordPress. Most bloggers I came accross seem to promote it. The question is should I try/learn the free one at WordPress.com first or just buy a domain name and paid hosting?
Good One!
I see you talk about domain name. Well, thats a whole ‘nother world and new bloggers are probably looking for the best deal with the best service.
I recommend IPower for new domain registrations, they have domains for only $2.95 each
If your gonna go with Namecheap, then use the coupon code SAVE7993, checkout price then will be about $6.
I am having misery with my 8 bloggers, and most of them are on blogspot.com which is google. Their system rarely works and there is no one to talk to.
It could take me 4 hours to publish 4 paragraphs and I have had it. I lost 2 years of my commentaries because of it being my fault and I have written blogger support 5 times and got no where.
I decided to pay a company for a blogger and I will see what happens.
My new blogger is http://www.actionsbyt.typepad.com
My website is http://www.actionsbyt.com
If you want to see who I am go to http://www.google.com
do a search on Teddy Jacobson.
I can use some expert advice, I am disgusted.
Teddy
281 565 6977 land line
I use Dreamhost to host a bunch of sites. I recently switched to Wordpress and it was simple to setup because Dreamhost has what they call a “one-click” install. Just click, fill out some form info, and violla, you’re blogging in 5 minutes.
If you want, use this coupon code for Dreamhost: LIFEHACKER. It will get you $50 off a year of hosting (which makes it uber-cheap). I highly recommend them.
Hi There,
I recently purchased Hosting for my Blog and have had some interesting issues with it that I thought I’d share. Any info is greatly appreciated.
I have been using Blogger.com for all of my blogs and hosting them there at blogspot. Recently I bought hosting from Blue Host and created all new pages in my server’s “File manager”. In my blogger account I then went to the “publishing” tab to point the blog pages to the server. The site shows up and I can navigate through it but the link URL addresses still reference the old “blogspot” addresses. I refreshed my browser, cleared the cache and even opened up a different browser and all was the same.
Oddly enough, when in the Blogger interface, I hit the “preview” button in the post window the links point to the accurate addresses. It works and looks as it should. I did go into the “Template” menu and changed the addresses to my links and republished but nothing has changed.
Last thing to point out is that when I type in the full address as it should look into my browser window the pages show up so they are there.
Any thoughts???
please email me.
lordcarlo@gmail.com
Thank you!
I’m using Angelfire — for $8.95/month I get a domain name, blog, photo album, a website and 50 MB bandwidth. Seems like a good deal, but I never see Angelfire recommended in articles such as yours. Is there some problem with Angelfire I should know about?
Angelfire is very, um, gimmicky. 50MB of storage and 10GB of bandwidth is really nothing for $9/month. At a reasonable web host you can get several gigabytes of storage and over 30GB of bandwidth as well as a fully functional PHP/MySQL server that you can FTP and SSH into with the ability to install any software you wish onto - for the same price.
Paul, thanks for the good information. One of the challenges I’m sure that I share with many bloggers is that I have little technological know-how on setting up or modifying a blog. And what little I do know, I’ve been self-taught with the help of the web and articles like yours.
For that reason, I’ve found SquareSpace.com a dizzingly simple way to get blogging. Yes, it costs a bit more than some sites but, for someone who needs the bells and whistles for a professional site, the ease of setup and use is well worth it. I also use Word Press, which I don’t find nearly as easy to use.
Karen Shanley
author, Dogs of Dreamtime
As the host of Simply Digital, a weekly podcast for the non-geek, we recently released Episode 5: Weblogs. I came across your article today and updated the show notes to include a link here.
Great article with a lot of nice detail. This is going to be my “go to link” when people want to know more than just the basics of blogging. If my Simply Digital episode is a 101 series, then this article is the perfect 201.
I’ve just got myself an account at dreamhost.com. And with their one click install, wordpress took 2 minutes to install.
You can easily find a bonus code on the net. So your first year of hosting should not cost you more than 30$.
What about publishing an article written by someone else ? An article you would pick up on ezinearticle or goarticle.
Is that considered reblogging ?
I’m starting to publish my blog less than a month ago and still struggling to increase traffics. I’ve tried blogsome, worpress, and blogspot’s free service for my blog hosting, but each service has it’s limited customization option. Recently I’m considering to use premium web server. Thanks for nice tips.
if an organization has an official website, can you describe the difference between a blog and a bulletin board where, potentially, members of an organization could submit questions and make comments about the organization, or the business of the organization, that they are concerned about? maybe they are both the same thing?
This is very good and informative guide for a newbie to start blogging from scratch i am bookmarking this article and will make recommendations to my my friends to read it :)!!
Thanks for it.
Samir.
That helps a bit; but, I am so new that even understanding the part that permalinks play is still a mystery to me. Are those the links within the content that take you to something else?
I like your writing style. Your organization of thoughts was easy to follow as far as you took it here.
I started submitting articles for Gather.com and Helium.com. because my Mom died and I wa grieving. I found that I like writing. I go back to it everyday. After a month, I wanted to understand more about blogging.
I have begun to ask people like you and I am concerned about bugging any one person because they still have a life after me. Many assume that one has a basic knowledge. I got to Blogline and Yuwie. No matter where I go, I am still confused by the even the discussion on RSS feeders.
hello guyz im jaz i want you to greet all of you first becoz this my start to share my inspirational story about blogging….
Paul,
Thanks for laying this all out. I’ve finally decided that a blog as part of my commerical website is probably the best way to get the industry specific knowledge out of my staff and “out there” for the world to see/enjoy/consume.
Wordpress turned out to be a workable solution for us, but I intend to check out moveable type as soon as I get this project underway.
for n00bs, like me, hosting is the way to go….my personal blog is a bluehost/wordpress combo…..for the commercial site, i had to have my IT guys set it up so that it would incorporate the existing UI of the site :) ….babysteps.
Hi Paul,
Thanks for the good info.
Paul, another wonderful post. This is what makes PaulStamatiou.com one of my favorite blogs and top RSS reader feeds.
Great article Paul. Seen it late - but I´ve seen it at last. Keep up the good work, I know how hard it can be to write an article like this and spending hours and even days to collect all the information.
With respect
Marco Richter
Nice article! I started a blog about 2 days ago that will soon house information, tips, and advice for independent trainers, consultants, and contractors.
I’m excited about sharing my knowledge with other consultants…I just hope I’m able to post frequently. From what I’ve read and researched on blogging, and as you’ve noted here in your article as well, that seems to be the key element to build traffic and maintain readership.
We’ll see how I do over the next few months:-)
Again…nice read!
Thank you. Nice overall
In my opinion if your new to blogging, you should start with blogger. Later as you gain experience you can migrate to Wordpress or Movable Type. Allowing to associate a domain name with blogger account has given new bloggers with low budget to get going and get some hold of the basics of blogging.
Hey Paul,
You gotta plz help me out here. I have used the Blogger Custom Publishing Feature and redirected to my2dimes.com.
I have updated my CNAME record as ghs.google.com. Also when i ping my2dimes.com / http://www.my2dimes.com it successfully does so.
But only problem is my blog doesn’t show up. The site just says my2dimes.com is parked free.
In this blog post u have highlighted changing name servers. I don’t think so you need to do it for GoDaddy+Blogger.
It’s been more than 120 hours (DNS propagate) I have updated my CNAME but my blog doesn’t show up.
Cheers,
Nitin
Just a new guy from Bali on blogging. Need more help from you….