Best Blogging Resource Websites and Essential Extras

Are you thinking of starting a blog? Maybe you already have a blog. 

How do you start a blog?

What resources will you need?

We will answer those questions along with giving you some essential extras you will need.

We have broken these resources and extras up into 10 different categories to make it easier for you. Each category will offer free, low to medium range priced and high-end resources and extras.

Planning

Before you throw up a blog you need to come up with a plan. There are some questions you need to answer in the planning stage. Questions like: who is your targeted audience, what will your blog be about –topics or niche, how often will you post, what will be your blog categories. Before you name your blog you might want to perform your targeted reader survey and the targeted reader brief. You can find those plus other resources here.

Other things to consider in the planning stage:

1. How to decide what to blog about?  
2. Type of blog posts you want to do.
3. How to use your voice in your posts.
4. Use a coach.

CMS or Platform

Content management system or the platform you use for your blog is important. There are things you need to consider when to choose a platform.

1. Are you new to blogging?
2. Do you have a basic understanding of content management?
3. Will the platform meet your needs?
4. Will you need an e-commerce platform or something that will hold videos?

Branding

When it comes to making your brand here are things you will need to consider:

1. What is your mission?
2. What benefits do your products or services give your readers?
3. Who is your targeted audience or readers?
4. What perceptions do you want your brand to present?
5. What is your style? Colors, images, and more.

Design/theme

When it comes to design or theme for your blog there are several things you must consider

1. Colors – should be kept to 2 at most 3 and should complement each other
2. Layout – there are several layout forms you will need to choose the one that works best for the type of blog you are writing.
3. Hire a professional designer – you can always hire a pro for design if you can afford it.

Hosting and domain names

When it comes to choosing a host and a domain name you will need to consider the following:

Hosting:

1. How often is the site down?
2. Does it have speed? You want your site to load quickly.
3. Is it secure? If you are going to accept payments you want things to be secure.
4. What is their reputation and how do their reviews stack up?

Domain name:

1. Is it original?
2. Is it close to another domain name that has high rankings or bad reputation?
3. Is it easy to spell?
4. Is it easy to remember?

Those are just a few things you need to consider for hosting and domain names.

Content

When it comes to content you will need to write content that is valuable, informative, and relevant.

Things to consider when dealing with content:

1. How much time do you have to devote to research and writing?
2. How often will you post your content?
3. Budget?   

Here is a list of the best writing services that suggest any writing professional help that you may need.

SEO

SEO content is another area you need to consider when it comes to your blog and blog posts. Proper SEO will help you rank higher on search engine result pages. Things to consider:

1. Are you fluent with SEO?
2. Do you have time to do SEO?
3. Should your hire an SEO specialist?

Promotion

Promotion or marketing of your blog is an extremely important stage and you need to do it correctly if you wish to convert readers to customers. You will need to make some tough choices here. There are tools that can help. Things to consider:

1. Do you have a promotional plan in place?
2. Do you know how to promote your blog and posts?
3. Do you have an editorial calendar and know how to use it?
4. Social media again do you know how to promote your blog without being considered spam?
5. Blog and webpage search engines and directories, do you have time list your blog with these sites?

Analytics

There are going to be some analytical tools you will need to use so you can gather data such as where your traffic is coming from, how long they stay, what they look at, what they do as far as conversion. Then, of course, there are tools for competitor research. Two of these tools are:

1. Google analytics
2. SEMrush

Plugins/extras

There are tons of plugins that are available some of the areas you may need plugins for are:

1. A shopping cart and payments.
2. Social media integration.
3. Share buttons such as pins, share, tweet, etc.
4. Ad integration on the sidebar of your blog for making money.
5. CSS.
6. Spam removal from comments.

There are plenty of other plugins available that do other things which may help your particular blog, first look for plugins with your platform such as WordPress. Then look for apps that will work various platforms that can be installed on your blog. 

Other things to consider when it comes to your blog

Backup – you need to choose a good backup for your blog. While most sites offer backup of your site daily it is best to also have it stored somewhere else. There is nothing worse than losing all your work, especially if you blog has been up for some time.

File transfer –while many sites will have a way for you to upload files some will only allow 5 at a time. A good file transfer program is FTP. It is also fairly easy to learn.

SumoMe –this plugin will help you grow and email list for newsletters, sales events and so on. The list will be strictly opt-in so the email holder will have given their permission to receive emails from you.

Conclusion

Setting up and running a blog takes a lot of work both prior to set up and after but there are tons of resources and tools available. Those tools run from free to low/medium price range to high end. 

If you wish to set up a blog and make money; start at the beginning and do it correctly with a plan, research, and the correct tools and you will be successful.