1. Your Blog, Your Way

2. Why Start a Blog Ready to create a blog but unsure where to start?If youre creating a blog just because someone told you to, odds are you wont be very successful. Like with most decisions you make about your business, it should be a strategic move. Without knowing why youre doing something, youre not likely to makeeffective decisions, and you might end up investing far too much time in something in something that ultimately wont work for you. After all, there isnt a one size fits all approach to marketing, so doing something just because someone else is doing it, isnt usually the way to go.So why should you create a blog?In my experience, there are two very good reasons to blog. One, you can grow your tribe. By talking about what you do and the problems you solve, people who need you will find their way to you. Leonie Dawson has a tribe of over 30,000 women and shes admitted that blogging is a huge reason for her success. When your personality really comes through in your blog, and people resonate with what you have to say, theyll want to work with you. Writing about what you know also has the potential to establish you as an expert. Building your credibility is a great way to increase your conversion rate, because people are more likely to buy from someone they can trust. 3. Why WordPress? When it comes to setting up your blog, one of the first questions youll find yourself asking is which blogging site you should sign up for. The more popular ones Ive encountered are Weebly, SquareSpace and WordPress. When asked, my recommendation is always to go with WordPress.Why?I like WordPress because of the flexibility, and the potential for growing with your business. Right now you might just need a simple blog. You can find any number of guides on getting started with WordPress and create your blog pretty easily, even withlimited technical knowledge. And yet, when you find that its time to expand your sites functionalities, say to include e-commerce or to act as a forum where you interact with your tribe, there are plug-ins available to make that happen.WordPress also has numerous themes available that you can use as is, or tweak to fit your needs. There are themes that come with options to customize your site withoutneeding to edit the CSS code. This is nice if you want make some simple changes without losing days trying to figure out which line of code youll need to change. The cost for themes varies, and there are free ones available.I recently read an article about why you should never search for free WordPress themes, which I found to be very helpful: http://premium.wpmudev.org/blog/why-youshould-never-search-for-free-wordpress-themes-in-google-or-anywhere-else/ . As with most situations, you get what you pay for, so its important to base your choice on considerations other than price. 4. Getting Started The first step to setting up your blog is to choose then register your domain name. You can visit http://www.godaddy.com/ or another domain registrar to see if the domain name youd like is available.A couple of things to keep in mind when purchasing your domain name:Keep it simple. If the name you want is taken, it might be tempting to get clever with the spelling or to add extra words to the name. However, you should keep in mind that your prospects will need to find you and if yourname is different from what they would expect, it is that much less likely that they will visit your site. Consider purchasing other versions of your domain name including any misspellings that people are likely to make. This way the people that are looking for you are more likely to find you. For example, if your company is called Market Techs, consider buying markettechs.com and marketechs.com, in case people forget the second t when typing the name. You can also buy the domain name with various endings like .co, .biz, or .me. This will prevent other people from creating pages that will be wrongly attributed to you. If these names arent available, thats okay. If they are available I would strongly suggest taking advantage and purchasing them.Once youve registered your domain, the next step is to purchase a hosting plan. Quite often you can complete these two steps together, but not always. 5. Getting Started Things to consider when choosing your hosting plan:How much space will you need? Keep in mind that the amount you need will largely depend on the file types (audio files, videos, etc.).Is there an easy site building tool? Some website hosting services offer a Do It Yourself website builder that doesnt require any knowledge of coding. However, in some cases these builders are only available as long as youre using the hosting services so if you ever decide to switch youll have to start over.What type of technical support is available? If youre a newbie trying to Do It Yourself, its important to have access to technical support when you need it including telephone support, e-mail support or online chat.Will you need e-mail? Not all hosting automatically comes with e-mail. If youre looking to have an e-mail address at your new domain make sure that option is available and that you purchase it at the same time as your hosting.What is your budget? Although it shouldnt be the deciding factor, its important to keep price in mind when considering your options. The most expensive option wont necessarily be the best, but its important to consider what an increase in your budget will mean when it comes to additional options down the line (like adding e-commerce to your website).Once youve purchased hosting, you will need to install WordPress. Heres a great resource: http://codex.wordpress.org/Installing_WordPress. Keep in mind that the steps to install WordPress vary depending on your chosen hosting plan. Some hosting providers have a one click process while others are much more involved. 6. Choosing the right theme If youre cringing at the thought of having a cookie cutter blog, the good news is, that doesnt have to be the case. WordPress has a variety of themes available and most of them come with the option to tweak the theme to fit your needs.Here are a few of my favorite resources for finding WordPress themes: http://www.elegantthemes.com/ http://www.woothemes.com/ http://www.studiopress.com/ http://www.web-savvy-marketing.com/store/Once youve selected your theme, youll need to install it on your site. 7. Installing Your ThemeStep 1: Download your chosen theme. Step 2: Log into your WordPress Dashboard and Go to Appearances, then click on Themes. 8. Installing Your ThemeStep 3: Click Add New. 9. Install Your ThemeStep 4: Click Upload so you can upload your theme file (which should be a .zip file). Select Choose File and upload your file. 10. Choosing Plug-Ins With the right plug-ins, theres a lot you can do to expand the functionality of your blog. You can create an shop on your website, include a slideshow of your work, let people schedule meetings with you online (as opposed to sending multiple e-mails back and forth), and more! My favorite plug-in has to be YITH Maintenance Mode. While your website is down you can lead people to a customized page. You can even collect their e-mail addresses so you can send out updates about your site. 11. Choosing Plug-Ins There are thousands on plugins on WordPress.org that perform a variety of functions. Some are free, some have free versions and then there are plugins which are only available for a fee. Sometimes the free plugins can meet your needs but at times it may be necessary to upgrade. As with anything else, do not let the cost be the deciding factor of why you do or do not use a plugin.Here are a few of our favorite plug-ins: Akismet: protects your blog from spamBackWPup: WordPress back upClick To Tweet by Todaymade: allows you to add click to tweet boxes to your blog postsCommentLuv: places a link to their latest blog post at the end of their commentComment Redirect by Yoast: redirects first time commenters to a page of your choiceFloating Social Media Icon: adds a floating bar with social media iconsJetpack by WordPress.com: allows you to use features generally only available to WordPress.com users 12. Installing PluginsStep 1: Click Plug-ins then click Add New. Step 2: Enter the search terms for the plugin you need. Click Install Now and then Ok.Another option is to upload a plugin that you have downloaded elsewhere (for example, a premium plugin that you downloaded from another website). Step 1: Click Plug-ins then click Add New. Step 2: Click on Upload. Choose the file to upload (which should be a zip file) then click Install now. 13. Adding Your Content WordPress uses two different types of content, pages and posts. The easiest way to differentiate between the two is that pages are static content (for example an about us page or services page) while posts are constantly updated (your blog content is usually published as posts).There are three different ways to create a new page. If you click on the icon in the toolbar that says + New make sure to choose a new page rather than a new post. 14. Adding Your Content The modules you see when creating a new page will vary depending on the theme you are using as well as any active plugins. But there are basic modules that always showup. Enter your page title here.Enter your page content here.Use these tabs to toggle between visual & html view. 15. Adding Your Content Click to preview your changes without publishing them.You can choose to make your pages private, only viewable by logged in users. You can schedule your post to publish immediately, for a future date or a past date.Click to publish your page. 16. Adding Your ContentThere are three different ways to create a new post. If you click on the icon in the toolbar that says + New make sure to choose a new post. 17. Adding Your Content The modules you see when creating a new post will vary depending on the theme you are using as well as any active plugins. But there are basic modules that always showup. Enter your post title here.Enter your post content here.Use these tabs to toggle between visual & html view. 18. Adding Your Content Click to preview your changes without publishing them. You can choose to make your pages private, only viewable by logged in users. You can schedule your post to publish immediately, for a future date or a past date.Click to publish your post.Choose the categories for your post.Enter tags for your post. 19. Your Blog, Your Way With the right resources, you can create a WordPress website thats just right for you. If you need some more help, heres a few more resources you should check out:www.wpbeginner.comhttp://wpswitch.com/www.wptavern.comwww.wordpress.tvwww.wptopics.comhttp://sixrevisions.com/