How to Start a Personal Blog & Get Paid to Blog

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If you want to learn how to start a personal blog and get paid to blog, you’ve come to the right place. You don’t need to do any more research. The tools you need are all provided right here.

Let’s start by talking about why you should start a personal blog today.

First, nobody is the same as you and your personal blog will be different, even if you cover the same niche as someone else.

Second, blogging isn’t old, it’s still just a youngin’. Blogging has been around for a little over a decade (at least serious blogging) and it’s still growing.

Finally, your personal blog is the key to your freedom. I don’t blog for money (well, not really). I do it for the freedom the money allows me.

Those seeking the ability to live a free life and support their family without going to a 9 to 5 job, which probably turned into an 8 to 7 job rather quickly, will love the freedom a personal blog can provide.

Now that you know why to start a personal blog, it’s time to show you how to do it and get paid to blog.

Choosing a Personal Blog Platform

I could list all the platforms here and tell you the differences, but why waste your time? You’re not here to compare 10 blogging platforms just to be even more confused about the direction to go. You’re here to learn how to start a personal blog and get paid to blog.

The only platform I will discuss is the self-hosted WordPress platform. You can find out about the hosting I recommend here and use my Blog Quick Start Guide here to get everything set up fast.

The Musts of a Starting a Personal Blog

When it comes to starting a personal blog, there are a few non-negotiables you must have or you will simply not succeed. These include:

• Hosting – Again, my recommendation is found here
• A domain name
• Self-Hosted WordPress
• A Niche
• A Marketing Plan

These are non-negotiables you must have or you won’t succeed. Don’t get too caught up in the garbage of choosing the “PERFECT” domain name or the “PERFECT” niche. Instead, choose them and get your personal blog going.

If you’re not sure what you might want to cover and you think it may change a few times, that’s fine. Do what I did and get YOURNAME.com. Then, if you want to go from covering Disney to covering Success to covering Blogging to covering Sewing, you can. However, it’s best to pick a niche and stick to it, and then add in other niches that complement it later.

I am also not going to recommend 5 different hosting companies for you to compare like others might. Instead, I recommend one, SiteGround WordPress Hosting. You can read my full SiteGround Hosting Review here and you can find out exactly why I recommend SiteGround for all bloggers by reading my Quick Start Guide for How to Become a Blogger here.

Writing Your Personal Blog Posts

Once you have the basic set up, it’s time to write blog posts. This may seem like a daunting task. If you chose a niche you are passionate about or want to learn about, it becomes much easier to write about.

At first, don’t focus on word count or how good or bad your posts are. Structure them in a good way for the online world and aim to provide content that will help your readers. If you get this right, you’ll be head and shoulders above most that start their own personal blog.

You can learn more about how to structure and write your posts with my quick start guide here.

How to Get Paid from Your Personal Blog

The real key isn’t starting your personal blog, but getting paid from your blog. It’s easy to find a guide to start your own blog, like mine here, but finding the right information to get paid to blog isn’t so easy. Let’s talk about what you need to get paid to blog.

Get Paid to Blog by Monetizing Your Personal Blog Properly

There are several ways to monetize a blog. When it’s a personal blog and not a news outlet or a company blog, you want to monetize with affiliate links from affiliate products. I know, I know, this sounds scary, but just stick with me for a second here.

The easiest way to monetize your blog and get paid to blog is to add in Amazon Affiliate Links for the products you use and mention in your blog posts. You don’t have to sell a single thing.

Just simply mention the products you use and love in your blog posts, naturally, and link to your affiliate link from Amazon. You can also use products found at CJ.com and Shareasale.com, which are two other huge affiliate marketplaces for physical products. Another great place to find offers and products to promote is FlexOffers.com. It’s one of my favorites and has made me quite a bit of cash recently.

If you want to promote digital products, you can use ClickBank.com and JVZoo.com. Maybe there’s a guide you’ve used from one of these sites that you love. When you mention it, you can make money by using an affiliate link in your blog post.

Of course, promoting your own product is great, but you don’t have to create a product to get paid to blog. When you start a personal blog, use the sites I have mentioned to promote affiliate offers. While you can make money promoting things you don’t use, I prefer to promote and recommend things I have used and still use today, like SiteGround Hosting, which I have two accounts with.

Monetization is Just the Start

While getting paid to blog requires monetization, you can’t make money without blog readers. You want to have readers coming to your blog and sticking around to read more than one post. You also want them to subscribe.

There are several ways to get readers to your blog, but you also want to make sure they know how to subscribe. WordPress has a built-in subscription widget that makes it easy and when you publish a blog post to your personal blog, every subscriber will get a message letting them know you have new content up.

Make sure you take advantage of this as list building is a huge key to success. I also recommend you get an account with GetResponse (I use them) and build an actual email list with an autoresponder to promote your blog posts, your products (affiliate products work, too), and more!

Marketing Your Personal Blog

The real key to starting a personal blog and getting paid from your blog is marketing. Don’t let the fools tell you that you have to write a blog post a day or even a couple a week to be successful. One a week or even two a month is plenty. Of course, you can write more if you want, but you might be trying to build a blog while working full time, which makes it hard to write every day or more than once a week.

You can write one good blog post a week and if you market that post correctly, you’ll be able to start a personal blog and get paid to blog. Success doesn’t have to be so difficult.

My Marketing Advice for Your Personal Blog

It’s not going to be the blah, blah, blah, social media marketing and pay per click advertising you may have already heard about. My marketing advice is free and so are the ways I think you should market your personal blog.

Social Media

First, yes, you should use all the big social media channels. You don’t need to do anything more with them than just share your content. If you really like one of the big channels (Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram) then spend more time building up your audience and working that specific channel.

Second, focus on avenues others don’t see or don’t use. There are hundreds of social media sites and most bloggers only focus on a few. Share your content on a few dozen and build up a few of the smaller ones. You’ll be surprised at how much traffic you can get from doing this.

Influencers

Third, create blog posts that mention influencers in your niche. Then, tell the influencers you created the blog post. While not all will share it on social media, many will. I am actually working on a post like this, which I hope to release later this month with some of the top advice in the blogging world from successful bloggers that started right where you are today.

Social Bookmarking

Fourth, use social bookmarking sites and anywhere else you can share your content for free. If you can share it, use it. It doesn’t take long to share a link to your post and you want to spend more time marketing than writing.

Forums

Finally, share your knowledge in forums. Choose 1 to 3 forums that allow signature links and help people. Put your blog in the signature as a link and just help people with their issues in your niche. You’ll get tons of great traffic from this method and it’s one of my favorite.

Take this advice and create a marketing plan. You want to know what you will do with each of the blog posts you create before you write it. Put every blog post through your marketing plan, adjust it as you see fit and keep going with it.

The Final Key to Success When Starting a Personal Blog

If you want to get paid to blog from your personal blog, this final key is vital to your success. DON’T QUIT!

Too many new bloggers have too high of expectations. I remember when I was in school for Golf and my teachers used to tell us to make our expectations realistic. I was a 15.6 handicap when I started, so I couldn’t go out and expect to shoot Par every time out. However, as I lowered my handicap, my expectations changed.

At first, don’t expect anything. Don’t expect to make a dime or get any traffic. Once you get the hang of writing, posting, and marketing, you can adjust your expectations. However, if you quit before you reach a point where you get to adjust your expectations, you’ll probably think blogging just doesn’t work.

I guarantee starting a personal blog works if you don’t quit and you keep moving forward. In fact, I believe you shouldn’t adjust your marketing plan for at least 30 days. That gives you time to see if it’s working or not and to see which sources are giving you the most traffic.

Use these tips and use this advice to start your personal blog and get paid to blog. Of course, you’ll want to check out my quick start guide for blogging here and make sure you get my How to Become a Blogger Guide to finish getting things set up and rolling in the right direction.