HOW TO START A BLOG IN FIVE EASY STEPS

No, seriously. For real this time. No more procrastinating on that idea you’ve been having for three years now. We’re gonna get up (or sit down, I guess…) and do this.

Step 1: Make that blog. You can’t post stuff without having somewhere to post it. Pick a blogging platform and sign up! Don’t stress out too much over which one to use; for casuals, they’re pretty much the same. But just in case, here’s a quick run-down of the more popular:

• WordPress.com: The biggest one. Probably the most professional. Pretty easy to use.
• Blogger: Use this if you’re happy with letting Google control literally every aspect of your life.
• tumblr: Social-oriented, super easy to use; pretty unprofessional. Beware of porn. Mostly good for visual content and you’ll reach a very… interesting audience.
• Weebly: Drag-and-drop website builder with a stupid-sounding name. People will cringe when you tell them your URL.
• Livejournal: What is this, the 00s?!

Of course, if you’re rich and/or a Cool Nerd, you can host your own domain and use WordPress.org or even better, something like Ghost or even a static site builder with like Jekyll.

Although you should consider your audience when picking a blogging platform, it’s not that big a deal. People care more about what you have to say/show than where you do it.

Why is making the blog the very first step, instead of something like choosing a theme or name? The former you probably already know; you’ve probably been thinking about starting a travel or gaming blog for years now. Plus, this is “how to start a blog”, not “how to find your lifelong interests”.

And the latter, well; just use your real life name or your Steam name or something. I don’t find it very important as long as it’s fairly unique (i.e. Google-able) and reasonable-sounding.

Step2: After making your blog look pretty as a postcard and adding some taglines, write a post!

Don’t spend too long making the backgrounds perfect or writing a neat little description of yourself; those fancy box-shadows aren’t framing anything just yet and only pretentious people talk about themselves when they’ve got nothing to show for it. Perhaps you can start off with an introductory post or fully launch into your routine. It’s guaranteed to be terrible, but just write something and put it out there.

Now congratulate yourself on finally getting started!

Step 3: But don’t congratulate yourself too hard.

Plenty of people have gotten to step 2 before. Heck, even you have. Remember that YouTube channel you had big hopes for? You didn’t get past uploading one or two videos. And what about that novel you were writing three years ago that you abandoned using an excuse of a poorly-developed plot or unrealistic characters? The truth is, you didn’t know how to keep writing past chapter one. You still keep those protagonists inside your head and eagerly wait for the time you can revive them.

What was that quote again? “The first step is always the hardest,” or something like that. Simply put, that’s bullshit. I’m sure it’s applicable in some situations, but… Many a time, it’s easy to start something, like a diet or fitness routine, but far more difficult to keep going.

SO KEEP AT IT. Don’t despair over having terrible writing or lesser-quality photos. You’ll improve and get a new camera in no time. It may be disheartening to see that you have 0 hits, but that’s fine. It’s more time for you to be able to make mistakes without the whole world holding its breath and watching.

Keeping a blog isn’t just for the viewers. Think about all the new skills you’re gaining. HTML/CSS from managing your theme (seriously, keeping margins sane is so difficult); improving your grammar, spelling, and WPM; creating more and better artwork now that you have a consistent schedule; just to name a few. Having readers is a plus, but remembering that you’re doing this thing for yourself will help you keep it steady for longer.

Eventually, it will become a habit and you won’t even have to force yourself anymore.

Step 4: Look at what other people are doing and experiment.

Good talkers listen. Good writers read. Good… uh, movie… creators… watch movies. Curse you, rule of three! Bottom line is, good creators consume.

Look at other blogs to see what new things you can do or new directions to go. See what kind of topics are popular and which styles work best. You can get an idea of what the people want. Someone may have thought of doing something you never would’ve possibly imagined in your entire lifetime. Or, the general public might actually enjoy something that you find totally mind-numbing and vain.

Try not to go into an area that’s over-saturated; if a lot other people are already doing something, they’re probably doing it a lot better than you can and that niche is pretty much fulfilled. On the other side, don’t pick a niche that’s too narrow. There might be an audience for that niche, but it’s too small for you to easily reach. Furthermore, although a topic may already be done to death, there are always areas within the topic that haven’t been explored yet, so don’t be afraid to pick something popular.

Why is this step 4? You might think that it should be near the beginning, in step 1, 2, or even 0. And theoretically, it would be. But as people are just starting out in a project, there will be difficulties. You can’t be sure what you’re good at until you’ve tried. You can think about how you’re gonna do what everyone else already does, except better, all you like, but you can’t know if you’re able to do it until you start. Nobody starts out fantastic. You’ll need to try out new things until you find something that sticks.

Be creative. Unique. Cool. But you’re all of those things already.

You just need to learn how to show that to the world.

Step 5: Tags and stuff.

Don’t forget to, like, add tags to your tumblr posts and put your Blogger posts in categories and, like, all that stuff. It works wonders. Look through all the options for search engine optimisation and read some other articles about it (these will likely be specific to the platform of your choosing, so I can’t help you with that).

This last step is so lame because the tutorial started to look like it was pretty applicable to any kind of content:

• setting it up
• starting
• burning it into routine
• doing stuff ‘til something fits

I had to put in something blog-specific so the title would be relevant again. But I guess this isn’t really about making blogs as much as it is about getting started.

For all of you still on the fence about starting a blog, creating a podcast, or making a web-series, I say to you in full meme-style: Just do it. You’ve been sitting on this for too long. Stop getting stuck on step 3.

Don’t get discouraged by your bad-ness. Yes, you are bad. Think about it like this: After a long period of doing something, you’re eventually going to become good at it, right? Go forth and create! You have so much to offer the world and if the world won’t take it, shove it down the world’s throat!

Lastly, why you should listen to me:

Am I a famous internet celebrity? NO.
Am I a funny YouTube video-er? NO.
Am I at least a successful blogger? NO.

But I believe you can be.