capone2009

Setting up a blog is one of the best ways to publish your content on the internet. It is very easy to set up and even easier to write new posts. If you want to know how to start a blog then read on and find out how you can set up your first blog without any prior knowledge in less than 30 minutes!


Step 1: Which route to go?


You have two options for starting your new blog. One would be to use a free blogging service like blogger.com and the other one would be to go with a paid hosting account and your own domain name. Let's talk about the free way first:


There are many blogging platforms that allow you to set up a free blog. What you do here is basically signing up for an account and start publishing your content. That looks quite good at first but think about it. You won't have your own domain name. Instead you will end up with something like yourblogname.blogspot.com or yourblogname.wordpress.com. This does not look very memorizable and also you will be just one of many other people that host their blogs with these platforms.


The biggest problem I have with these platforms is the fact that you actually have no control over your content. You are hosting your whole blog with a third party service for free. So you really don't have any rights. If the service provider thinks your blog is bad then they can delete your whole blog in just a second and all your content would be gone in just one day. No way for you to restore your hard work. If you are serious about blogging then I would recommend you go the other way:


Hosting your blog on your own domain (like MarysFashionBlog.com e.g.) and rent your own server to host your content files. This way you have full control over your content, have a very nice looking domain name and nobody can shut down your blog or delete your posts besides you. Just look at all the successful bloggers out there. Do you think they would risk their valuable content to a free blogging service? No way, and you also shouldn't in my opinion. If you want to go the „professional“ way then read on.


Step 2: Signing up for your hosting account


The hosting account is the place where you rent your hosting server that will keep your blog online 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. This is the place where all your content files and pictures and what not will be saved. You can get quality hosting for already less than $10 a month!


I recommend you set up an account with Hostgator. This is the biggest hosting company on the market and they have a very good customer support service. This is perfect for beginners like you because if you have a question you can just send them an email and you will get an answer most of the time within 24 hours.


Hostgator also has the big advantage that you can set up your blogging software with just a few clicks. You don't need to set up fancy databases or upload any files. It's all done automatically for you.


If you only want to host one blog with one domain then select the „Hatchling Plan“. If you want to host more than one blog then just choose the „Baby Plan“.


http://hostgator.com/shared.shtml


You can use one of these coupons to get your hosting even cheaper:


111cent111 - Use this coupon if you want to pay monthly. It will deduct $9.94 from your first bill


25percentoffbill - Use this coupon if you want to pay for more months in advance (recommended). This coupon will get you 25% off your first bill. If you go with the Hatchling Plan for example and pay annualy you can get your hosting AND your own domain for only $77.55 per year which is less than $6.50 per month. You could spend more on a single Starbucks coffee




Step 3: Setting up your blogging software


There are several blogging platforms out there but the most popular one by far is Wordpress. In my opinion it is the best and easiest one to use so I would recommend you go with Wordpress which is absolutely free by the way. (Even some of the most famous bloggers like Perez Hilton use Wordpress for their blogs.)


If you decided to go with Hostgator then this step will be very easy. I will let you know the exact steps to take right here:

1. Log in to your control panel (cPanel). You get the login information via email from Hostgator.
2. Scroll down to „Software/Services“ and click the „QuickInstall“ icon.
3. On the left sidebar click „Wordpress“ under Blog Software.
4. Click „continue“.
5. Select the domain name you wan't to install your blog on if not already selected.
6. Type in the basic blog information like your email, blogtitle etc. (You can always change that later on. Keep „Enable Auto Upgrades“ checked)
7. Click „Install Now!“

That's it! I told you it's easy After a few seconds your blog will have been installed and you can access it and log in with the username and password that has been created for you. (You will also get this information sent to your email account).

capone2009

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manson911

hi,

This will be very useful tutorial for people who want to start their first blog.

From my experiences I can say that HOSTGATOR is one of the best, I had one site with them and never had any problems. If I will need a new site with USA host I will only use HOSTGATOR.

As to blogger well its easy to set up and free, its good to try this first and see if you can achieve something. But if you have a bit cash to spend its better to get yourself a domain name and work it from there.

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adikoprcike

Thanks a lot for this info, you got any coupons or discounts for the hosting mentioned???

Working all day long on ItsCharmingTime.com

capone2009

Sure, just look at the first post, there are two coupons for Hostgator that you can use to save some money.

Best,
Capo

maddyacca

I think if you talk about price od domain then Godaddy is providing lowest price in market, it's offering $1.99 for .com domain while in market the minimum rate is $8, Source: Start a WordPress Blog with Godaddy and Hostgator under $9 also if we talk about hostgator and bluehost both aren't working as good as they were in past. People are moving from these hosting companies to new ones and migrating their blogs to small web hosting providers because load on their server are low and that's why they are faster than these too.

talfighel

Starting a blog is the easy part.

Getting good content to add to it and getting search engine traffic is the hard part. For someone new, I would recommend they go with a blog but paid ads is the way to go.

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