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If you have a passion to blog or perhaps just starting out, then you must ask yourself are you blogging with a purpose.
In this post, I will focus on “building a blog” and all the tools you may use or need to get there. I do not focus on starting a blog. Well, we all start something and it’s easy to start anything. What matters is building and completing the task.
I will give you a simple example. Let’s say your home requires some some repair to patch up drywall and perhaps some paint to make it look appealing. You walk into a home improvement store and purchase several items you think you need.
That was easy, now you just started something but were not able to finish the job. The job was to repair the patch and paint the room. This is exactly what we face when we actually start anything.
Unless we are provided with clear instructions on exactly what tools are needed to patch the drywall, how long it will take to cure the drywall, materials needed to paint the wall, the quantity, type of paint and how many coats are needed, we are not able to build and complete the job.
This example is no different that starting a blog. There are so many articles and videos on starting a blog but very few discuss the required details on how to build, the tools needed to build, what happens when things don’t go as planned and how to review your work.
Step 1: Blog with a purpose
Congratulations! You have reached the first step in taking this monumental decision that will change your life and allow you to find yourself. I assume you have at some point in life worked, had a full-time or part-time job or perhaps you even decided to quit your job.
If you did work at any point in your life, recall how you were made to work a specific number of hours, follow a specific schedule or routine and perform certain tasks every day either repetitive or random.
You will now work for yourself and in a way be the boss, the manager, the owner, the decision maker. Maybe this has been a dream for a long time. Well, your dream is now becoming a reality.
Just like any other business, you must dedicate yourself in terms of time, money and resources. All businesses require time, money and resources, your blog is no different.
- Resources: The resource is you. You are now the only person the blog reports to. Ask yourself:
- Are you able to work on your blog?
- Can you read some articles and learn new material?
- Time: You will be making decisions as to how long or how short you will spend every day, every week and every month building your blog.
- How much time can keep aside for your blog per day, week or month? Write this down.
- Money: There are some tools which are free, which we will discuss and there are some services which you must pay for which we will also discuss.
- How much money can you keep aside per week and or month? Write this down.
When you have answers for your resource, time and money continue reading on to the next step. If your not ready, no problem, take your time and come back to where you left. This will assist you in blogging with a purpose.
Step 2: How much time can you dedicate?
Time is the most important commodity in life. This simple means unlike money or goods, your time cannot be bought back or saved.
If you are passionate about building your blog or have some idea to write something and hope to expect a monetary renumeration then you must be able to set aside some time every day.
Revisit this step, if you are not ready. While ChatGPT or AI (Artificial Intelligence) are available, it is not the solution to replace your time or perhaps a short-cut to expedite any process. These tools can be used to gain some insight instead of relying solely on their purpose.
Once you are ready with your answer on how much time you can set aside please continue with the next step.
Step 3: What do you want to achieve?
Now that you have set a routine and have a plan, ask yourself what do you want to achieve by building your blog?
- It could be:
- Make money
- Share information
- Be famous
- Do something different
- Do something you like
- Be successful
- Blogging with a purpose
- Or anything else that comes to your mind
When you have an answer write this down and proceed to the next step. This process takes time and if your looking for guidance you may read my post on 7 steps to grow your small business.
Step 4: Most visited blog topics
So you made some progress with 3 Steps. Great now let’s get in to the details. If you reached this far you are determined to build your blog.
Your success lies in your niche. This is very important to understand. Allow me to explain: While you have some idea to build a blog and have some thoughts on a matter or different matters, it is very important to focus on a specific area or subject you can write a lot, discuss either on camera, audio and or in writing.
Let’s say for example you write about nursing and so fascinated with some story that came up in a hospital. While the story may be interesting it does not provide relevance to your reader. A one off story will not capture your audience’s attention enough to come back for more. You need consistent and relevant high-quality material. Your AUDIENCE is the most important reader.
This is so important that I will detail what you can write and what you cannot write about:
- DO NOT write anything about:
- Your passion
- Your ideas
- Your thoughts
- Your gut instinct
- Politics, Religion and disagreements about anyone
- DO write about:
- Any topic in the same niche (which I will explain below)
- Any topic in the subset of the same niche
- Any topic which you can share consistently and provide high-quality content
To guide you what this means in reality I will give some examples. These are not exhaustive, so the ultimate decision is on you
Your niche options in no particular order:
- Beauty and Fashion
- Product recommendations
- Makeup tutorials
- Hair tips
- Business
- Travel
- Business travel
- Domestic travel
- Family travel
- Travel
- Education
- Lifelong learning
- Special education
- Test preparation
- Celebrity Gossip
- Focus on film industry
- Focus on music industry
- Focus on sports industry
- Finance
- Debt management
- Retirement savings
- Financial independence
- Mental Health
- Couples and Family Therapy
- Therapeutic modalities
- Substance abuse and addiction
- Interior Design
- Space-planning
- Budget-friendly decors
- Custom ideas
- DIY
- Tool recommendations
- How-to guides
- Home renovation
The above list is an idea to give you some context. When your focusing on your niche you can write on a subset niche such as Debt management and or loans but don’t go to far off and write about obtaining a corporate loan if that is not what your blog is about.
In the same way if you start writing about interior designing do not switch over to debt management. Even though there are finances involved what happens is your audience comes to you for what your niche is.
When you go over or outside the sector you are removing a follower and at times just lost a subscriber. Always stay focused on your niche no matter how hard you want to discuss other topics.
Step 5: Make a decision
Remember you are blogging with a purpose and with that purpose in mind you must make a decision. (If yes and you have answers to all 4 Steps proceed, if not stop and revisit when complete)
So you made it past 4 steps. If yes, you get to move on. If no, there is nothing wrong and please do come back.
There is nothing worse than rushing through or going unprepared. This is no different than going on vacation but forgetting everything you planned and needed. Was it worth it? You get the idea, or I hope so.
Step 6: Choose your hosting provider
Now we get to the fun part. Choosing your hosting provider is the most important decision you will make as all your content will be hosted by this provider. I recommend Inmotion Hosting who I have been using for all my domains for almost 10 years.
While there are lots of hosting providers to choose from what stands out with Inmotion Hosting is their:
- Onboarding and management: Easy to use tools for launching your website
- 24/7 Live support: I have received excellent customer support even at 2am. Inmotion Hosting has lots of articles to walk-you through information and explain complex matters in simple language.
- Some of their services are:
- Various hosting solutions:
- Shared Hosting
- VPS hosting
- Dedicated hosting
- Essential wordpress
- Dedicated servers with several plans and durations to choose from
- Register your domain
- Transfer your domain
Inmotion Hosting is offering a limited-time sale up to 70% off, with shared hosting plans starting at just $2.24 / month. New customers will get to enjoy 3 months of shared hosting on Inmotion and this sale is up to May 29th 2025.
Step 7: Create a domain
Inmotion hosting helps you to find your desired domain name, check domain availability and secure your new domain with the whole process completed in a few minutes.
- Their domain checker search is easy to use and does not require any technical skills.
- You have access to 24/7 support available by live chat from real people to help you with any queries on your domain or DNS (Domain Name System).
- Access to Domain privacy to protect your identity from the WHOIS directory lookup
- Access to options such as automatic renewal for your domain to protect your online assets and domain names.
Step 8: Sign up for creative tools
If you made it this far congratulations on completing 7 steps. No matter how much time you took to reach this step, you always want to plan for long-term.
These are some of the tools that I use for my domains and social media in no particular order. You might have a preference for some other tools and that is fine. You must be comfortable in using various tools, that are efficient.
As I stated in Step 2, time is the most valuable commodity. Keep optimizing and find ways to improve your process.
Canva
I use Canva for a lot of my designing, banner, profile, background artwork etc. An example: I create designs for my Face book, Twitter, Linked In, You Tube and blog post using Canva.
Canva offers a free version which you can accomplish most of your requirements and also offers paid plans if your looking for premium content.
Adobe
Adobe is another outstanding tool that provides you with an exceptional digital experience. The beauty of Adobe: it has an array of products and services that can assist you on a personal or business requirement.
Adobe Creative Cloud
Adobe Creative Cloud provides creative tools to unleash your creativity and imagination. Whether your a student, designer, presenter or artist it has something for all wrapped with many tools you can find. In your membership you get tutorials, updates and free templates. Adobe Creative Cloud even provides savings for students and teachers.
Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom and XD
Adobe photoshop enables you to create beautiful graphics and artwork. This is a necessity for any creator or artist. Adobe XD creates stunning UI/UX designs. If your a creator, Adobe Lightroom will empower you to make phenomenal photos from professionals to creators. I have detailed three images showing haze adjustment, editing on your tablet, laptop, mobile, or simply going for that rustic feel with black and white tones.
Adobe Acrobat
I am sure you would have come across a PDF file. You can manage your PDF’s with Adobe Acrobat as part of the Creative Cloud. This is exceptional as it enables you to connect to your documents and PDF’s. I use it for business, it is amazing to fill, send documents and sign electronically without printing. As a business you save paper and can save your documents electronically. Perfect for combining, reducing file sizes or adding comments.
Adobe Stock
Adobe Stock provides you with high-resolution, royalty free, stock assets. This will help you enhance your creative project.
Try it out and find out what works for you. I wish you the best in your business and your designs. Keep your creativity alive and remember your design is your business.
Among my favorites with Adobe, I love the Adobe free logo maker. This tool is just amazing where you can content, style, and ideas just the way you want without having to pay or consult with any designer. You can even create transparent images to use as your site logo, site icon and other digital assets.
I created AJM Canadian site logo and site icon using Adobe free logo maker and I enjoyed it. The entire process can be completed in under 30 mins or you can take your time with your color theme and icons to your liking. Your files are saved online and you can come back to where you left. I spent $0 on my logo and I love it. Well it’s a start and I am happy to make changes as and when needed. The focus is on my content and the audience.
OBS Studio
This tool is a free open source platform that provides video and audio capturing, screen capturing, window capturing to allow you to video record and live stream from your computer.
OBS stands for Open Broadcaster Software and yes it is absolutely free. I will be making video tutorials on how I use Semrush and InMotion Hosting for my business.
Semrush
I absolutely love this platform and will detail why you can use it to achieve your SEO (search engine optimization) and SEM (search engine marketing) needs.
I will make another post detailing the tools of Semrush and for now will highlight an overview and its benefits to assist you in getting your blog from the shelf to the market.
In summary: Semrush can help you optimize your website by providing information on what is working well and what you need to improve on.
Some of Semrush’s key features are:
- Keyword research
- Competitive analysis
- Site audits
- Backlink tracking
- Position tracking
So how does it all work: I will be making a video version on how to use Semrush as I see tremendous value in what I achieved and I am sure anyone reading or watching may feel the same or I hope so. I welcome your feedback.
The value of Semrush
I will detail how it helped me save valuable time in research and analysis which is critical for any post.
I initially created the post name: How to build a blog in 2025? My intention was to write several steps that is vital and needed instead of just stating how to build a blog (more on this title in a moment). I felt there was something missing and starting a blog is not the concern. What I found missing was:
- How to optimize photos?
- How to structure your blog?
- What tools to use?
- How to choose a title?
- How to get visitors to my site?
I’m sure you get the idea. My point is starting a blog is really easy, you can create a domain, write something or anything you like or you think others would like. The real question is who are you writing for and will you get an audience. After all you want your hard work to be recognized and have an impact and that is why you are blogging with a purpose.
This is where Semrush comes in. You have a tool that provide you insight in what people want to know. Semrush helps you in your research and analysis. I mentioned earlier how I initially wanted to choose the post title: How to build a blog? Well the image below details this title has a keyword difficulty of 87% for the keywords: “build a blog”.
Thanks to Semrush, I really saved a lot of time and effort in focusing on the right keywords.
With Semrush you can find the right keywords for your niche and effectively work towards your goals
Step 9: Learn how to optimize and create content
The best part of having Semrush is you are provided with audit tools to understand how your site ranks, operates and what needs improvement.
By identifying key concerns in a timely manner, you are saving valuable time and able to focus on what you need to do best, which is providing valuable content for your audience. I have provide a site audit screenshot from Semrush on my site and it helps me understand what I need to work on.
Step 10: SEO long term strategy
You might be thinking why should I learn SEO or I will just get someone else to do it. This process is as important as your business.
You must have a SEO long term strategy to help improve your website visibility in search engine results pages (SERP) with the goal of having organic traffic from search engines to your website.
By improving your ranking it makes your website more relevant which brings in more traffic.
Three main strategies to improve your SEO:
1. On-page optimization
This involves optimizing website content and structure by producing valuable content and provides an answer to a search query in a meaningful and insightful manner.
2. Off-page optimization
This involves building links from reputed sources, encouraging other websites relevant to your industry and niche to link to your content to build trust.
3. Technical SEO
This involves improving your website speed, mobile and desktop usability.
Step 11: Create accounts with Google Analytics and Google search console
Google provides excellent support in how to set up Analytics for your website and how to get started with search console. You may review this source for more information.
Step 12: Keep reviewing your work and keep optimizing
This is an ongoing task and not to be kept aside at all. In simple words your website and SEO is not a quick fix. You must invest your time and consider it a long-term strategy.
This will enable you to achieve true results, improved traffic, improved ranking, brand exposure and recognition.
Step 13: Blogging mistakes to avoid
Do not change your trajectory
No matter how much time has passed, or how little time has passed, you have spent valuable time in your initial idea and plan contained in Steps 1 to 5.
All your efforts, time, money and tools used will take time. Do not expect instant results or overnight success. If this is your expectation, you are only setting yourself up. Be realistic in your goals and plans.
Do not change your pace
Go back to Step 2 and review your notes on how much time you planned to dedicate. Ask yourself if anything has changed:
- If yes: why, what happened? Write it down and review what you need
- If no: review your pace, did you achieve your plan? Are you on track to move to the next step?
Be true to yourself and your goals.
Believe in yourself and the analysis
Now is the time you start using your analysis and tools available:
- Google search console:
- Google analytics
- Semrush
These tools will provide you real reports on your website and valuable data that you can use to improve and optimize.
Listen and accept feedback
You will receive feedback and comments. This is your time to sit back and listen. Listen to the customer. Someone has taken the time to visit your site and provide you some comment.
This is so valuable and its free. It is up to you to use this information to find out what is working well and what needs improvements.
Your customers, clients will ask you for more
If something is working well, your customer will want more. They will ask for more. Be prepared to offer more. The “more” is your valuable content.
Do not plagiarize, do not use AI, do not copy other’s work. Be sincere and be true to your work, it will pay off and will show in your work.
Do not sell any products, expect any money or have an expectation.
If this is your first website or blog that you intend on starting, my suggestion is to focus on your content and niche. Provide high-quality content. You may have at least 50 to 100 posts on a variety of categories in your niche.
Once you have achieved these posts, review your metrics and find out your website traffic and user behavior.
While there is no golden rule, if your website traffic is going down and user behavior such as how long your visitors stay on your pages and which pages are working well or not working well, focus on optimization and improvement before anything else.
If your website is well optimized and your site audit via Semrush and google analytics shows you good results with continuous traffic increase and high usability you can consider monetary sources of revenue such as introducing products to sell or applying for google adsense as an example.
Remember this process is different for all depending on how much time you have, your niche and the trust you build. The entire process could take 3 months, or 6 months or 2 years. Manage your expectations accordingly. Do not forget most importantly that you are blogging with a purpose.
I hope you enjoyed this post and I sincerely wish you the best in your journey, if you just started or perhaps started some time ago and coming back to revisit the world of blogging.
Kindly provide your feedback on what you like and what you want to read. I look forward to the next post. Thank you for your support.
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Author
Adrian Menezes is the Founder, President & CEO of IT’S ONLY HONEY INC., which provides management consultancy and helps people and businesses to be more efficient. Adrian writes about financial education on Dollar Entry and discusses Canadian things on AJM Canadian.
