How to Start a Successful Blog in 2025 and Beyond!

Now is more of a better time than ever for you to start a successful blog.

For several hours, we watched TikTok shut down due to government rulings. Those who built up their entire brand and platform lost everything in the blink of an eye. Even though TikTok came back on, it doesn’t mean it’s here to stay, and those creators could lose everything again, but permanently.

This proves that social media is nothing more than rented space and that building on it alone presents significant risks to your brand and business.

However, if you start a successful blog, you own the database, and no one can take it from you. Social media is like renting an apartment, whereas blogging is like owning your own home. The great thing about blogging is that it is inexpensive and easy.

In this guide, I’ll show you everything you need to know to start a successful blog in 2025 and beyond and make money with it – let’s get started!

How Much is it to Start a Successful Blog?

It’s free, but it’s not free.

Listen, with blogging, you get what you pay for, but you also get amazing software for free, too. The domain name, web hosting, premium theme, and premium plugins all have a price tag, but you’re getting stuff that will last. But the software you use to blog, WordPress, is 100% free and so good that it powers over 43% of all websites online.

You have to spend a little bit of money to start a successful blog that makes money.

There’s good news about the cost of starting a blog, though. A good domain name costs about $20.00 max (per year), and basic web hosting services cost about $150.00 (per year). You can install WordPress for free, and there are plenty of free themes and plugins to choose from.

Just make sure you aim to start earning some revenue. Eventually, you’ll have to upgrade your hosting plan, and that will require more money.

You can go to DreamHost, where I host my blogs, and take advantage of this great offer. For under $5.00 a month (if you pay for the whole year), you get everything you need to start your blog, plus a free domain name. My link is an affiliate link, so buying from it will earn me a commission, but it won’t impact your price.

Start owning your brand today and start a successful blog that you can host on your own website.

 

Why Start a Successful Blog in 2025 and Beyond?

Aside from being able to own your content, unlike you do on social media, there are many reasons why you would want to start a successful blog in 2025 and beyond.

If you love to write and create content, your blog is the perfect platform for that, but you can use it for other types of content as well, such as photography and videos. If you want to grow your authority and reputation in your niche as an expert, a blog is a great way to make this a reality. And, of course, if you want to earn a living from the internet, a blog is a great way to start making money online, and I’ll show you how to do all of this in this guide.

Don’t feel like I’m telling you to ditch social media and just start a successful blog, and that’s it.

Social media is still important, even for bloggers. Your blog should be your main platform because you own it and can do anything you want with it, but social media is still a great tool for improving your blog. Use your social media platforms to grow your audience, build a community of loyal followers, and promote your blog and posts to them.

Blogging and social media can complement each other if you use them correctly, and I’ll discuss that more later in this guide.

 

12 Steps to Create a Successful Blog in 2025 and Beyond

Follow the steps below to start a successful blog now and take control of your business or brand without fear of it being shut down.

 

Step 1 – Determine Your “Why”

Why do you need a blog?

You need to ask yourself why you want to start a successful blog before you create your successful blog. Do you just want a blog to post articles to and nothing else? Or do you want a full website with a blog attached to it?

WordPress can either be a standalone blog or a full website with a blog attached to it too.

It’s important to have a strategy before you start your blog. An important part of your strategy will answer the “why” of having your blog in the first place. You need to answer the question and determine why you need a blog.

Once you determine the “why” of starting a blog, you can move to step 2.

 

Step 2 – Determine Your Blogging Niche

Your blog needs a niche before you launch it.

A niche is the topic on which you will focus your blog. For example, this blog’s niche is “blogging tips,” as I give blogging tips in all my posts. It’s important to choose one niche for your blog; otherwise, you’ll confuse everyone about what your blog is about.

Choosing the right niche depends on your passions and hobbies.

Your niche should be a topic that you’re extremely passionate about.      I have a hiking blog because I have been going hiking every weekend for the past eight years and love everything about hiking. If you choose a topic that you know nothing about, you’ll become overwhelmed trying to grow your blog against bigger bloggers who are passionate about the topic.

Sometimes, the niche you choose might be too broad, and it will be harder to grow your blog because it’s too generic.

The niche “Hiking” is way too broad, and there are thousands of blogs about hiking. So, I narrowed down my niche to cover hiking in my specific area because there wasn’t that much competition, but the audience was still there. Make sure that as you narrow down your niche, there is still an audience present to consume that content.

Choose a niche that you can see yourself writing about for years to come without getting bored of it.

 

Step 3 – Determine Your Audience and Monetization

Now, you need to determine your target blog audience before you start a successful blog.

Your target blog audience is who you will be creating content for. You should know who this is before you start a blog. If you don’t know who your target audience is, then you’ll be aimlessly creating content without knowing who you’re creating content for, which is a great way to burn yourself out from blogging.

Create an avatar of your target blog reader.

An avatar or persona is an example of the perfect reader of your blog content. To get an idea of who they are, you’ll determine their age, gender, needs, wants, and pain points. You’ll need to research the demographics of your target audience and study these people on social media, forums, other blogs, and the internet to know them and their toughest questions precisely.

You also need to make sure you can monetize your blog.

Take some time to determine and plan how you will make money with your blog. You need to make sure your target blog audience has buying behavior or at least a need to better their knowledge through paid products and services. Then, determine how you will monetize your blog, whether through advertisements, affiliates, products, services, or even a mix of all these things.

It’s best to develop your own products and services to maximum profit.

Google AdSense and affiliate ads pay you pennies to the dollar because the service does most of the work and takes most of the profit in the process. If you create your own product or service, you’ll have to do all the work, but with that being said, you can earn the full profit without having to pay a middleman. However, you can still create your own product or service and still utilize ads and affiliates to maximize your revenue streams.

While owning your own products and services is important, making money with a blog usually happens if you diversify and multiply your revenue-earning streams.

 

Step 4 – Choose a Lasting Name for Your Blog

Now, you need to choose a name for your blog.

You want to choose a name that describes what your blog will be about. However, it needs to be a name that you’ll be happy with for years to come because changing your name in the middle of your blog can have some serious consequences in terms of search engine optimization and even with your readers and followers. The name of this blog is “Serious Bloggers” because I write to an audience that takes blogging seriously and wants to learn every aspect of it to make money online.

Your blog name should match your domain name.

Once we get into the installation process of your blog in this guide, you’ll want to make sure your domain name is going to match your blog name. So, you should use a service like Name Cheap to search for available domain names based on your blog name unless you have a budget to buy a domain name for sale. You might have to keep coming up with different blog names until you find one that matches a domain name that you can register.

Choosing a domain name that matches your blog name is important for audience recognition as well as branding.

 

Step 5 – Domain, Hosting, and Installation of Your Blog

Now it’s time to register your domain name and get web hosting for your blog.

After you determine your blog name, you’ll want to get a domain name that matches it. If possible, you’ll want to find a .com domain name, as they are the easiest domain names to remember, but if you have to get a .net or even a .blog, that’s fine as well. There are many domain registrars to choose from. Still, I personally like to keep my domains and hosting all in one place for easier organization and payment tracking.

You’ll also need to get some web hosting for your new blog.

For now, stick with shared hosting that allows you to install a WordPress blog because that’s all you’ll need when you first start out. As you start growing your blog, you might need to eventually upgrade to a Virtual Private Server or even a Dedicated Server, but that shouldn’t happen for a while. However, understand that when you do have to upgrade eventually, it will cost more money to do so.

After you set up your domain and hosting plan, you can move on to installing your WordPress blog.

Most hosting services have a one-click installation feature for WordPress, making installation very simple. Alternatively, if you’re comfortable installing it on your own, you can follow the simple instructions provided by the WordPress team. Installing WordPress typically takes 10 to 30 minutes at most.

After you finalize your WordPress installation, you’ll be ready to start a successful blog and take it above and beyond.

Step 6 – Select a WordPress Theme

Now, it’s time to choose a theme for your WordPress blog.

The theme is the overall style of your blog and how you and others will see it. It is a part of your brand and should reflect the style and colors that you want to be associated with it. You should choose a good theme and stick with it because once you change the theme, it will completely change your overall brand, which people may already be used to.

Select a free, premium, or custom WordPress theme.

There are thousands of free WordPress themes to choose from, and many let you customize them to match your brand. You can choose a free brand by looking them up on your WordPress and installing them right from your own blog. If you have some money, you can purchase premium themes like DIVI, or if you have more money, you can hire someone to create a custom theme that only your blog will be able to have.

Choose a theme that emphasizes the user experience.

You want to make sure your WordPress theme is as friendly as possible because a theme that makes the blog hard to use will only result in a loss of readers. I like to choose themes that are extremely simple, clear and have minimal colors. You also must make sure that the theme is 100% friendly to mobile devices because mobile readers will be your biggest audience no matter what niche you go with.

Choosing the right theme is very important if you want to start a successful blog, so I suggest spending some time on this step.

 

Step 7 – Adjust Your Basic WordPress Settings

After you install WordPress and choose the perfect theme, you’ll need to adjust some settings to start a successful blog properly.

The first thing you want to do is go to your General Settings page and adjust the following settings:

• Site Title – This is the name of your blog (e.g. Serious Bloggers)
• Site Slogan – A short description of your blog (e.g., Turning Your Blog Into Profit)
• Timezone – Choose the time zone to reflect your time
• Save Changes

Now, head over to the Discussion Settings page and adjust the following settings:

• Untick ” Allow link notifications from other blogs (pingbacks and trackbacks) on new posts” because pingbacks and trackbacks are mainly used by spammers and don’t really benefit bloggers anymore.
• Save Changes

Okay, let’s change your Permalinks Settings now:

• For Permalink Structure, choose the “Post name” option. This will make the URL slug the name of your post or page. This will help create friendly or pretty URLs which can help your content rank better on Google and other search engines.
• Save Changes

Feel free to go through all the settings and adjust them how you want them. I suggest learning about what each setting means for WordPress to make you more efficient with the software. The better you are at using the software, the easier it will be to tend to issues you may encounter further down the road.

Now that you’ve completed the hard part (even though it was easy), you can move on to the more fun steps of starting a blog.

 

Step 8 – Make Your Basic Pages and Choose Blog Categories

You’ll want to make some basic pages before you start a successful blog using WordPress.

Do you want a custom homepage, or do you want your blog to be your homepage? Answer this question and make the necessary changes to reflect your needs. If you want to keep the blog as your homepage, you don’t have to do anything in your settings.

If you want to create a custom homepage, you have a few extra things to do.

For starters, you need to create a custom homepage and add what you want to it using the WordPress editor or another editor that may come with custom themes. After that, you’ll need to head over to your Reading Settings page and choose “A static page (select below” as Your homepage displays option at the top. Choose your custom homepage as the homepage, and you can choose a custom blog page if you have made one of them, as well.

The next thing you want to do is create some basic pages that every blog typically has.

Create an About Page that tells your readers more about your blog and who you are as a blogger. Create a Contact Page that shows readers how to get in touch with you, such as through a contact form or by sending you an email. You should also create a Privacy Page using the WordPress Privacy Policy tool because privacy is important to your readers.

After you create these basic pages, you need to create some categories for your blog.

Categories are topics within your niche that you will be creating content about. I suggest creating 2 to 3 categories focusing on the cornerstone content of your blog, which is the content you should focus on the most to be seen as an expert in your niche. You can also create sub-categories of each main category, but I suggest keeping those to a minimum, as well, as your categories can become overwhelming.

Once you establish some basic pages and blog categories, you’ll be ready to start creating some awesome content.

 

Step 9 – Start a Successful Blog with a Consistent Content Strategy

Before you start a successful blog and create some awesome content, you need to strategize a little bit.

You need to create a content strategy that best fits your niche and audience. You should always write new posts that meet the needs, wants, and pain points of your target blog audience based on the cornerstone content categories of your chosen niche. You should also determine the content format you wish to post, such as listicles, how-to posts, guides, and case studies. You might even find it appropriate to post a little of each format.

You’ll also want to strategize on how consistent you plan to be with publishing your content.

You don’t have to post a new blog post every single day, but you should be organized on the days of the week and times you post in order to be consistent. I post once a week on this blog consistently every Wednesday at 10:00 AM CST. By being consistent with your posting schedule, you’ll earn more reader loyalty because they’ll know when to expect fresh content from your blog.

Remember, for the best results, your content strategy and consistency should reflect the needs and wants of your target blog audience.

 

Step 10 – Create Content with SEO, Quality, and Value in Mind

Now it’s time to start creating content on your blog, but you also need to learn the basics of SEO and why it’s important.

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. It is a practice where you optimize your content to have a better chance of ranking on the first pages of search engine results for keywords that you’re targeting within your blog post. Most searchers do not go past page 1, so getting on that page is something that most bloggers prioritize through proper SEO tactics.

The first thing you need to understand is keyword selection and research.

Select a keyword based on the intent of your target audience, such as from questions they ask or the help they require about your niche. Then, select a longtail keyword that has a low competition percentage (meaning fewer bloggers are targeting it) and a higher search volume (meaning more people are searching for it). You want to choose a longer keyword because the single-word keywords are the highest competition out there and will be extremely difficult to rank for, especially with a new blog.

Use the tools available to help you with your SEO.

You can use plugins like Yoast SEO or Rank Math to audit and rate the SEO tactics for each of your blog posts and pages. You can use services like Uber Suggest, Keywords Everywhere, Ahrefs, and SEM Rush for easier keyword research if you have the budget for it. However, search engines also provide free tools such as Google Search Console, Keyword Explorer, and Google Trends to help you find the best keywords for your blog content.

After you determine your keyword, you’ll want to implement it into certain areas of your content, including:

• The title of your blog post or page
• The URL slug on your blog post or page
• Your H1 header (you should only have one H1 header)
• A few more of your H2 and H3 headers (you can have as many H2/H3/H4 headers as you want)
• The ALT tag of an image on your blog post or page
• The first sentence of your blog post or page should include your keyword
• Mention your keyword a few more times throughout your post as long as it makes sense when reading it

Don’t feel like you need to add your keyword a lot of times throughout your content because you don’t need to. Adding your keyword too much can actually hurt your ranking because search engines see it as Keyword Stuffing. Most of the time, I’ll have my keyword repeated about 10-15 times throughout my post or page if it is 1,500 words or more, and I have no problem ranking on the first page of search engine results.

Finally, create your content with quality and value in mind.

You need to write the best content possible on your blog. Each sentence should be valuable and of a high quality that answers the needs, wants, and pain points of your target audience based on your extensive research. Make sure you edit your blog (I use Grammarly to make this easier) and ensure that you aren’t adding words as fluff to make your post longer. That will only make people not want to read it.

As a general rule, write your next blog post with the goal of being better than the last one you wrote. Keep your content in your own voice and packed full of value.

 

Step 11 – How to Promote Your Blog and Content

To get more readers, you need to know how to promote and market your blog and its content.

Social media is a great way to promote your blog content. You need to select the platforms where your audience is the most and focus on growing a community of loyal fans by being friendly, helpful, and as engaging as possible. Once you get a good, consistent following on social media, it will be easier to promote your blog and the content you publish on it.

You should also try to build backlinks to your blog to improve your chances of appearing on better result pages on search engines.

The first method of gaining backlinks is to create content that is of so much value and quality that other bloggers and websites in your niche want to link to it. You should also conduct guest blogging, where you write for other blogs. In exchange, they let you have a “Do Follow” link to your blog or to a post you’ve created. Finally, do collaborations on social media, with other bloggers, and through podcasting to earn more backlinks.

Word-of-mouth is still a really good way to promote your blog content.

Take advantage of word-of-mouth when promoting your blog and its content. Do offline word-of-mouth promotion, such as telling your friends, family, co-workers, and even strangers about your blog and its content (e.g., passing out business cards for your blog). Use online methods as well, such as promoting on your newsletter, online community, and discussion forums.

Please don’t spam; otherwise, you’ll do more harm than good to your blog.

 

Step 12 – How to Monetize Your Blog and Content

The last step to starting a successful blog has to do with making money with your blog.

Everyone should want to make some kind of revenue with their blog. If you’re not looking to make a profit, at least try to make enough to let the blog pay for itself so that nothing has to come out of your pocket, especially as your blog grows and you have to pay higher server costs (I pay $200.000 a month now). However, you can use blogging to earn a lot of profit if you want to work for it, whether it turns into a full-time job, or you want to keep it as a side gig.

Focus on creating your own product or service for maximum profit generation.

By offering your own product or service, you can get the full potential profit of your earnings, but that means you have to not only create these things but also do all the work. The best thing to do is focus on digital products such as courses, membership communities, paid newsletters, and even apps if you can create them. For services, you can offer things like consulting, specific service providing, or even public speaking gigs.

It’s a good idea to diversify your revenue generation by using multiple income streams.

Consider the smaller paying income streams to help you earn additional profit in addition to your own products and services. These streams could be using an ad network like Google AdSense or affiliate ads like Amazon Associates. You could also ask for donations using something like Buy Me a Coffee or create your own Patreon Account.

Just make sure your main products and services reflect the main needs, wants, and pain points of your audience so that you actually have something worth buying; otherwise, you won’t make that much money with your blog.

 

Use Today’s Tools but Stay Original

You’ll start to notice that today’s tools can help make blogging much more efficient, but they can also diminish the humanity of creating content.

I’m speaking about AI or artificial intelligence in this section because of its growing popularity, which can be really helpful to bloggers, or it can be really harmful if used incorrectly. For starters, you should use AI for ideas and even to help you edit grammar and spelling mistakes, but you should never let it write your entire blog post. You should use AI to ask questions and verify its answers but never completely rely on the information it’s providing as the accurate and updated information out there.

Letting AI do the work you’re supposed to do might result in your reputation being ruined and even penalization from search engines that are using AI to detect content solely created by AI.

 

Final Thoughts About How to Start a Successful Blog

Now that you’ve read all the great advice and tips above on starting a successful blog, it’s your turn to put it all into action. Get out there and do it.

Once you get past the technical stuff and start creating the content, it all gets a lot easier and more exciting.

Please leave me a comment below. Tell me what your blog is going to be about or what it is about if you have already made it? What’s your niche, and what are your cornerstone topics?

If you’ve enjoyed this ultimate guide to starting a blog, please help me out by sharing it with other bloggers and consider leaving me a small tip for publishing it for free.

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About the Author

Shawn Gossman has created content, blogged, ran online communities, and shared a passion for digital marketing for over twenty years. Shawn believes the best way to help content creators, businesses, brands, and marketers is to give away more than you sell. The same advice is recommended for the readers who follow this blog. Shawn also offers various services for extra help in content creation and blogging.