How to Start a Blog in Just 2 Days: A Step-by-Step Guide

With over 10 years of blogging experience, I walk you through how to start a blog in an easy to follow step-by-step guide. Whether you’re looking to share your passion, build an online presence, or even generate passive income, this guide will help you launch your blog quickly and efficiently- and you can even do it with kids at home!

Full disclosure, after teaching friends over the years how to start a blog, I finally decided to put it into step-by-step content for you too! This post does contain affiliate links, at no additional cost to you. It is everything I recommend and use or have used, to run a successful online business.

Starting a blog can seem daunting, but with the right guidance, you can have your blog up and running in as little as two days. I walk you through the entire process, from choosing your niche to publishing your first post.

I started my blog over 10 years ago when I had my first child. I knew I wanted to be a stay-at-home mom with some form of income and outlet for myself and spent years building my blog into a full time income. There was so much trial and error I experienced, so I created this roadmap to make the experience smooth and breezy for you, plus much quicker!

Jump to:

Why Start a Blog?
Step 1: Choosing a Niche
Step 2: Setting Up Your Blog (Day 1)
Step 3: Getting Web Hosting
Step 3: Designing Your Blog and Choosing a Theme (Day 1)
Step 4: Creating Content (Day 2)
Step 5: Launching Your Blog (Day 2)
Step 6: Maintaining and Growing Your Blog
Step 7: Make Passive Income
Tools For A Successful Blog

Why Start a Blog?

There are so many great reasons to start a blog like sharing your passions and gifts with the world and learning how to make passive income. Before diving into the technical aspects, it’s essential to understand why you want to start a blog. Clarifying your purpose will help you stay focused and motivated as you build your blog. Common reasons for starting a blog include:

Sharing a Passion or Hobby: Whether it’s cooking, fitness, travel, or fashion, blogs are a great way to share your interests with others.
Building an Online Presence: For businesses and professionals, a blog can showcase expertise and attract clients.
Earning Income: Many bloggers monetize their content through ads, affiliate marketing, sponsored posts, or selling products.

Step 1: Choosing a Niche

Your niche is the specific topic or audience you’ll focus on in your blog. For example, this started out as a food blog, but you can create whatever your passions are like motherhood, easy hacks, home decor site, cat website, dog website, business website - the list is infinite!

A well-defined niche helps you attract a dedicated audience. Consider these steps when choosing your niche.

Tips for choosing a blogging niche

Passion and Knowledge: Choose a topic you’re passionate about and knowledgeable in. Blogging requires consistency, so pick something you’ll enjoy writing about regularly.
Audience Demand: Research whether there’s a demand for your niche. Tools like Google Trends, Keyword Planner, and social media can help you gauge interest.
Competition Analysis: Check out other blogs in your niche. Identify what they’re doing well and find opportunities where you can offer something unique.

Step 2: Setting Up Your Blog (Day 1)

As we dive into how to start your blog, you’ll need a blogging platform. The most popular and versatile platform is WordPress.org which is recommended for its flexibility and scalability.

Selecting a Domain Name

Your domain name is your blog’s address on the internet (e.g., www.yourblogname.com). Choose a name that’s:

Short and Memorable: Keep it concise and easy to remember.
Relevant to Your Niche: Make sure it reflects your blog’s content or purpose.
Unique: Avoid names that are too similar to existing brands or blogs.
Use domain registration services like GoDaddy, Bluehost, or Cloudways (great for higher traffic) to check the availability of your desired domain name and register it.

When I first started DMF, I used Bluehost which works for a smaller traffic site. For website hosting for high traffic blogs I suggest using Cloudways, which is what I currently use for this site now.

Step 3: Getting Web Hosting

Web hosting is where your blog’s content will be stored and made accessible online. For WordPress users, Bluehost is a popular option that offers affordable hosting with easy WordPress integration.

Steps to Get Hosting To Start A Blog

Visit your chosen web hosting provider’s website such as Bluehost or Cloudways.
Choose a hosting plan (typically, the basic plan is sufficient for new blogs).
Register your domain (if you haven’t already). I have mine with Godaddy, but you can buy it at your hosting.
Complete the purchase and set up your hosting account.

Installing WordPress To Start A Blog

Once you’ve set up your hosting, it’s time to install WordPress. Most hosting providers offer one-click WordPress installation. Also, if you run into trouble call the customer service at the hosting company to help.

Steps to Install WordPress:

Log in to your hosting account dashboard.
Find the WordPress installation section (often labeled as “Install WordPress” or “Website”).
Follow the prompts to install WordPress on your domain.
Once installed, you’ll receive login details for your WordPress dashboard.

Step 3: Designing Your Blog and Choosing a Theme (Day 1)

WordPress offers thousands of free and premium themes to customize the look of your blog. When choosing a theme, consider:

Design: Look for a theme that matches your blog’s style and niche.
Responsiveness: Ensure the theme is mobile-friendly and adjusts well to different screen sizes.
Customization Options: Some themes offer more customization options than others. Check if the theme allows you to change colors, fonts, and layouts.

Steps to Install a Theme:

Log in to your WordPress dashboard.
Go to “Appearance” > “Themes.”
Click “Add New” to browse available themes.
Install and activate the theme that best suits your blog.

Now, this will get you a basic template. You can also grab prettier templates and install those from websites like Designer Blogs, Feast Design Co. which has optimized templates specialized for Food Blogs (again, I use them:).

Customizing Your Blog

Once your theme is installed, you can customize it to reflect your brand.
Key customization areas and where and how to start:

Header: Upload your logo and set your blog’s title and tagline.
Menu: Create a navigation menu that links to your blog’s key pages, such as “About,” “Contact,” and “Blog.”
Widgets: Add widgets to your sidebar or footer for easy navigation, social media links, or email sign-ups.
Colors and Fonts: Adjust the color scheme and typography to match your brand identity.

Use Canva and Pic Monkey - free for photo edits and visuals. Canva has tons of templates to create headers, social media images like these on Pinterest, and everything you need to seamlessly design the look of your images. Picmonkey is what I use to edit images and resize them. When uploading images to your website resize blog post images to 1200 pixels wide and low resolution, make featured images 1200 x 1200 pixels wide which you can do easily in PicMonkey. Another popular image editing program is Adobe Lightroom.

If you are new to both of them start your Canva account here which is free for basic features, and Pic Monkey account here. I use the paid Canva version and suggest that if you need advanced features like removing backgrounds.

Essential Plugins

Plugins extend the functionality of your WordPress blog. Here are a few essential plugins to install and most of these you can do a search under Plugins within the dashboard of your website to upload them:

Yoast SEO: Helps optimize your content for search engines - the ultimate SEO checklist when writing blog posts.
Jetpack: Provides security, performance, and site management features.
Akismet: Protects your blog from spam comments.
WP Super Cache: Improves site speed by caching your pages.
Contact Form 7: Allows you to add a contact form to your site rather than putting your email address in there for spammers to get.

Steps to Install Plugins:

Go to “Plugins” > “Add New” in your WordPress dashboard.
Search for the plugin by name.
Click “Install Now” and then “Activate” to enable the plugin.

Step 4: Creating Content (Day 2)

We just learned how to start a blog and get it going, now it is time to get started writing your amazing content! Your content is the heart of your blog. Start by brainstorming topics that align with your niche. Aim to provide value to your readers, whether it’s through how-to guides, opinion pieces, reviews, or lists.

Content Ideas:

How-to Guides: Provide step-by-step instructions on a topic related to your niche.
List Posts: Create lists of tips, tools, or resources that your audience will find useful.
Product Reviews: Share your honest opinions on products related to your niche.
Personal Stories: Share your experiences and insights to connect with your audience.

Writing Your First Blog Post

With your content ideas ready, it’s time to write your first blog post. Here’s how to structure it:

Introduction: Grab your reader’s attention with a compelling opening. Explain what the post will cover and why it’s relevant to them.
Body: Break the content into sections with subheadings. Use short paragraphs, bullet points, and images to make it easy to read.
Conclusion: Summarize the main points and include a call to action (e.g., encourage readers to leave a comment or share the post).
SEO Optimization: Use relevant keywords in your title, headers, and throughout the post. Add a meta description that summarizes the post in 160 characters.

Steps to Publish Your Post:

Go to “Posts” > “Add New” in your WordPress dashboard.
Enter your content in the editor.
Add a featured image that represents the content.
Preview the post to check for any errors.
Click “Publish” when you’re ready to go live.

Creating Essential Pages

In addition to blog posts, your blog should have a few essential pages:

About Page: Introduce yourself and explain what your blog is about.
Contact Page: Provide a way for readers to reach you, whether through a contact form or email.
Privacy Policy: Outline how you handle visitors’ data, which is essential for legal compliance.

Step 5: Launching Your Blog (Day 2)

With your blog set up and your first post published, it’s time to start promoting it.
Promotion Strategies:

Social Media: Share your blog posts on platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Use relevant hashtags to reach a wider audience.
Email Newsletter: If you have an email list, send an announcement about your new blog. Include a link to your latest post.
Guest Posting: Write guest posts for other blogs in your niche to drive traffic back to your site.
Networking: Engage with other bloggers by commenting on their posts, joining blogging communities, and participating in forums.

Analyzing Your Blog Traffic

Use Google Analytics to track your blog’s performance. Key metrics to monitor include:

Pageviews: The total number of pages viewed by visitors.
Bounce Rate: The percentage of visitors who leave after viewing only one page.
Traffic Sources: Where your visitors are coming from (e.g., social media, search engines, direct links).
Audience Demographics: Understand who your readers are based on age, location, and interests.

Steps to Set Up Google Analytics:

Sign up for a Google Analytics account.
Add your website and follow the prompts to get your tracking code.
Install the Google Analytics plugin on WordPress and paste your tracking code in the plugin settings.

Step 6: Maintaining and Growing Your Blog

To grow your blog you have to treat it like a business, consistency is crucial. Set a regular posting schedule, whether it’s once a week or multiple times a week, and stick to it. This will help you build an audience and improve your SEO rankings.

Step 7: Make Passive Income

Now that you have the blog started you want to make passive income, you'll need to get traffic to the site. You can start small with Google Adsense. Once it reaches 30,000 you can connect with Mediavine Publishers and once it hits 100,000 monthly pageviews you can work with Raptive. Ok if those numbers scare you don't let them. You can totally do it. Just be consistent. Other ways are adding affiliate links within your blog and when people click on those links you make commission. Make sure to always disclose that to your readers and build a know, like, and trust you relationship with them.

Tools For A Successful Blog

Here a few tools to use in blogging to help it grow:

Semrush: To look if you are ranking for keywords and strategize.
Convertkit: Building an email list so valuable. Make sure you have this started so people can start signing up to get your new blog posts!
RankiQ: Want to take your blog to the next level and see how quickly you can rank for you blogging content which means more traffic to your site? This is fantastic for SEO and writing blog posts so the topics are covered and headers are written correctly for maximum exposure.
Semrush: To look if you are ranking for keywords and strategize.
Link Whisperer: This is for finding relevant links within the site to help boost SEO. I love this plugin!
Nerdpress: My friends at Nerdpress are my blog's lifesavers. Anytime I have technical issues or just want to rest assure my site is functioning properly and is backed up daily- this is what they do.

Also be sure to share on social media and utilize Pinterest. Pinterest is a search engine and great way to draw traffic to your new website.

Follow along with me on Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter for a feature and more inspiration! And don't forget to leave a comment below.

I hope you find all this content so valuable for how to start a blog from scratch. They online world may seem oversaturated, but there is always room for more. After all, this world is abundant:). Shoot me a comment below or feel free to email me if you have questions. I offer 1:1 coaching if you need help.