If you’ve thought about starting a blog, you aren’t alone. But, once you’ve started your blog, do you have a plan for growing that blog? I’m gathering together my top blog resources for new and seasoned bloggers. So whether you’re just starting out or looking to improve in a specific area; I’m sharing the best of the best with you.
This post does make use of affiliate links.
How to Start a Brand New Blog
These posts give you advice for starting your blog. Now do keep in mind, starting a blog can be as easy or as difficult as you make it. I’m not going to get into where you should host, but I would definitely recommend self-hosted, WordPress.
Branding is another matter entirely, however, I will also recommend that you go with Genesis framework from StudioPress for your blog. There are so many child themes out there, and I’ll add that area to this resource page soon.
- Don’t be a Blogger if You Want to be an Overnight Millionaire
- Two Reasons to Start a Blog
- Two Reasons to Not Start a Blog
Recommended Outside Resources for this Stage: How to Blog for Profit Without Selling Your Soul
How to Turn Your Blog Into a Business
Now that you have your new blog up and running, you’ll want to start thinking about if you want to keep this as a hobby or turn it into a potential money maker. Keeping in mind that blogging is not the path to overnight success and that you’re in this for the long haul; here are some posts for you to ponder.
- How to Make Money Blogging
- How to Turn Your Hobby into a Money Maker (you could make a niche blog about your hobby)
Recommended Outside Resources for This Stage:
- Elite Blog Academy (join the wait list)
- Blog to Biz Hive
I have taken both of these courses but have not written a side by side comparison, yet. I will tell you, however, that they are somewhat similar but they are also very different. It really depends on how you want to turn your blog into a business.
If you are looking to create a course as the cornerstone of your business, you’ll prefer Blog to Biz Hive.
On a whole, I feel that Elite Blog Academy is the more complete of the two programs. They both have their strengths, yes. But for me, Elite Blog Academy really helped me more with the all important aspect of developing the right mindset.
That yes, blogging is my business. And that yes, I am proud to say that.
How to Improve Your SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
When you can master SEO, or at least learn more about it, planning your content will get so much easier. You’ll learn what to do to get people to come to your blog and stick around.
When you build on a social media platform like Twitter or Facebook, you’re up against the algorithm changes. This can be such an up-down roller coaster and it really can do a number on your stress levels.
But, by building on SEO, you are building on your own platform. You are leveraging the power of targeted, long-term, and sustainable traffic.
Recommended Outside Resources for this Stage:
- Conquer, Skyrocket, and Dominate from Learn To Blog Hangouts. Conquer covers SEO, Skyrocket covers Google Analytics, and Dominate covers Search Console. Depending on what you need or would like to improve upon, I would recommend starting with Skyrocket, then progressing to Dominate, and then Conquer. Which, if you buy the three of them together, you’re saving big and also getting The Perfect Blog Post Cheat Sheet & the Perfect Landing Page Cheat Sheet.
How to Improve Your Pinterest Presence
Pinterest is my top source of traffic. I hope to improve this so it’s more spread out, or so I’m having Pinterest, SEO, and Referral as my top three sources.
Pinterest, contrary to belief, is not social media. They’ve said themselves that they are a Visual Content Engine. So how do you treat Pinterest? I tend to treat this platform in a similar manner to SEO. But, instead of just focusing on content and descriptions, I also want to make sure that my images have visual appeal and pull.
Recommended Resources for this stage:
- Pinning Perfect from Blog Clarity
- Tailwind
For creating my Pinterest images, I tend to use Canva for Work and BeFunky Plus. I love to create my collage images in BeFunky and also use it for quick photo editing. For everything else, I set it up in Canva.
Eventually, I hope to use Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom.
- Canva
- BeFunky
How to Improve Your Blog Traffic
If you’re looking to make improvements to your overall blog traffic, then I would highly recommend Traffic Transformation.