Hey, It’s Sophia here from The Stay At Home blogger. I’m so glad you’re here!
Blogging doesn’t have to be a big investment financially. There are ways you can avoid spending any upfront costs in the beginning and eventually grow down the line.
Starting a free blog can be beneficial if you are experimenting with different blogging topics (niches) or you are on the fence about whether you’ll even like doing it.
Eventually, though you’ll want to buy your own domain to look more professional but at the beginning you do not need to if you don’t want to.
Let’s get into it!
1. Choosing a Free Blogging Platform
There are a few options for you if you want to start a blog for free. Here are a few of the best ones (in my opinion)
Please keep in mind that with free plans on these hosting sites, you will not get a domain that is .com. It’ll be, for example, www.yourname.squarespace.com.
- Squarespace– Easy to use and design but it has limited features with the free plan like limited storage but that’s fine for beginner bloggers with small websites!
- Wix– Even the free version has basic SEO tools (search engine optimization- words that people are searching for).
- Blogger– This can be a little more difficult to design because of limited design features but it’s still a great beginner-friendly blogging platform.
- WordPress.com– it’s easy to use for beginners but has its limitations with the free plan just as all of them will.
There are of course going to be pros and cons to every blogging platform even with paid plans so make sure to take your time and compare before choosing.
2. Choosing a niche
Choose a topic that you will be able to consistently write about for the long run. You’ll get burnt out if you talk about something that you’re not all that interested in.
Get clear on your goals– do you want to make money with this eventually or is this just for fun? (My goal is for it to be both fun and profitable).
If your goal is to make it profitable then it’s wise to choose a topic that you can make money (spoiler alert, you can make money with just about any topic). The key is to build your blog around one main topic. Don’t talk about dog grooming and gardening all in one blog, unless that’s what you want to do of course but it likely won’t be as profitable.
3. Designing Your Blog
You do not need to buy a theme for your site to look great. Honestly, I have found that the free ones are the easier to use. I use free themes for both of my blogs.
Designing your blog may be a slight learning curve though, but once you get it, it’s a breeze.
Make sure your blog is easy to navigate with a simple menu, contact page, and an about me. You only need a couple sentences for your about me, you don’t need to talk about your favorite sandwich.
You do not need to be skilled in photography or have pictures of yourself. I use pictures from Canva and generate AI pictures. Maybe in the future, I will show my face on here but I’m not there yet. Mostly because I don’t have time to do that with a 5-year-old, a 5-month-old, two blogs, a book to write, and homeschooling. I’m a busy gal. Do what you can and the rest will follow when you get there. The most important thing is your content.
4. Creating Quality Content
Your content should bring value to your readers by answering a question or talking about a popular topic.
I like to outline my posts with an intro, main points, and then a conclusion. I like to keep it simple.
How to topics to write about? Do some research and see what’s trending around your topic. Look on Google, Reddit, quora, YouTube, Pinterest, etc. Look for what questions people have about it and then make a list of everything you can write about and then actually do it!
5. Basic SEO for Free Blogs
There are a few basic things to do when it comes to SEO, like Keywords in your title and creating a meta description.
How do you find these keywords? Well, you can pay for a service that helps you OR you can wing it at first.
You can use a website called Ask The Public. If you create an account you get 3 searches per day and that’s all you really need. Make sure to only search one or two words for the best results. It will show you the highest search around the words you searched. Be sure not to choose the highest searched because that will likely have higher competition making it harder to rank on Google.
6. Promoting Your Blog
I personally would not recommend counting on only Google to bring traffic to your website.
Drive traffic by bringing people from Pinterest, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, X, Reddit, etc.
I use Canva to make my pins and other things for my blog.
There are many YouTube videos and free information on how to promote your blog :).
7. Monetizing a Free Blog
Monetizing (making it profitable) may look a little different with a free blog. I have heard that it’s a bit harder to monetize if you don’t own your domain. Just because it doesn’t look as legit. Of course it it is possible though and when you’re just starting out, you won’t be making money anyway. You need a lot of eyes on your site before you can make any money with the things listed below.
How do blogs make money?
- Running ads through Google AdSense or Mediavine (requires a lot of viewers before you can get accepted)
- Affiliate marketing
- Selling digital products
- Brand deals
- Having a subscription fee for certain content
- Courses
You don’t need to spend any money when you start a blog. I know how daunting it can be to start something new especially when it costs, because how are you supposed to know if you’ll even enjoy it?
I hope this inspired you to go ahead and make that blog!
Happy blogging!
-The Stay At Home Blogger
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