How To Launch A Blog For Instant Success: Blogging 101 | Ben Hill | Skillshare
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How To Launch A Blog For Instant Success: Blogging 101

teacher avatar Ben Hill, Entrepreneur, Web Design, Doctor

Watch this class and thousands more

Get unlimited access to every class
Taught by industry leaders & working professionals
Topics include illustration, design, photography, and more

Watch this class and thousands more

Get unlimited access to every class
Taught by industry leaders & working professionals
Topics include illustration, design, photography, and more

Lessons in This Class

    • 1.

      Intro

      1:00

    • 2.

      Why Build A Launch Plan

      3:10

    • 3.

      Set A Launch Date

      2:45

    • 4.

      Choosing A Blog Name

      1:22

    • 5.

      Hosting

      2:18

    • 6.

      Email Subscribers

      4:40

    • 7.

      Landing Pages

      3:44

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About This Class

For some, blogging has always been a matter of creating a website and posting right away. If you didn't know better, this is probably how most people get into blogging. This is a HUGE mistake! Just like any other business venture, starting a high traffic blog requires careful planning before you officially launch.

In this course, I'll run through some of the most basic and fundamental aspects of starting a blog. I'll also share the #1 most important aspect of your blog that you must implement to be successful.

In this course, we'll cover:

  • Creating a launch for your blog plan
  • Setting a launch date
  • Choosing the perfect domain name for your blog
  • Hosting: Paid vs. Free
  • Collecting emails and why this should be your #1 priority
  • Setting up the perfect landing page to capture subscriber leads

Creating a blog is easy. Creating a buzzworthy blog with an audience before you launch takes some effort.

Meet Your Teacher

Teacher Profile Image

Ben Hill

Entrepreneur, Web Design, Doctor

Teacher

Ben is a fervid freelance digital content creator. He's always anxious to create new digital designs and websites. More so, he absolutely loves inspiring others to do the same.

For as long as he can remember, he's been building computers, creating websites, and producing videos. He's a true entrepreneur, having started numerous businesses, both online and in the world. He loves the challenge of figuring things out on his own and then doing it better than anyone else around. Not because he has something to prove, but because he loves to learn.

The greatest satisfaction he gets in life is helping others. He's spent years working with Wordpress and Photoshop and would love the opportunity to show you how to make some really incredible material.

See full profile

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Transcripts

1. Intro: So you're really passionate about something and you've decided that you want to start a new block. Perhaps you want to start a block to build an audience or create a business around it. That's fantastic. And you should absolutely follow through with that. In fact, you might be tempted to create your block and start writing posts right away. But I'm here to tell you that that is a huge mistake. Hello. My name has been Hill and welcome my course how to launch a block for instant success. I created this course to show you that by launching your block the right way, you'll be much more successful. Knowing how to launch a block will give you a definitive advantage in the blogging space and set you apart from the rest. In this course, I will show you the proper steps to getting started with your block from conception to the official launch day. This step by step guide to starting your block is easy to follow an implement. So if you're ready, let's get your launch plan started 2. Why Build A Launch Plan: all right again. I wanted to welcome you to the class is gonna be a really great experience for you because I'm going to help you take your blogger your website, and show you how we can create a plan in order to successfully launch your site. Now you might be asking yourself why is it that I really need a launch plan? Why is it that I can't just go in and create a website and immediately start posting to it and then invite all your friends and family? And I got to tell you from experience, I've done that a lot of times I've created a lot of different websites and blog's, and I've had varied success with each one of them for various reasons. But one of the things that I've noticed a trend with all of them is the amount of time that I've actually put into it before I even launched really determined how well the website did overall. And if I didn't do that, I found that I had to backtrack. A lot of times I have one particular website that it really didn't actually start getting ground after about a year of being online, and I found that I had to go back and really change a lot of the elements of the site in order for people to really grasp onto it and for it to get some traction. And so you might be asking yourself, OK, what is it that I need to do to launch this website or this Blawg? And here's ah, quick little outline of several reasons why you want to do that. The first is you want to actually get to know who your audience is. You have to have an audience for your blog's or your website, where else you're never gonna get off the ground at all. And so doing the proper research, Finding out who is actually interested in the content that you have to offer is a really important part of that. Also, you know, launching your website with a bang and creating some buzz worthy news about it would be really important. Otherwise, you're if you just do a soft launch, where you just up and put your website or your blawg out there is gonna really fall flat, and I've had that happen so many times to me. So by launching the right way. You'll actually get people talking about your blogger website. And then finally, you know, if you actually have a difference between having a small audience and no audience at all could be huge. Think of having a at least a small audience as the rocket fuel to actually launching your blawg. You know, if you don't have anybody there to actually read the content that you have right off the bat, it could take a very long time for you to get going. So I really want you to you to think about think about the plan. We're gonna go through all the different steps of planning your website where your block, what are the necessary steps that we need to take in order to get it off the ground? And that's what this class is all about. And I'm really hoping that it's gonna be very informative for you. And the biggest thing that I would say is that you need to be patient with the whole process. Okay, Instead of just jumping in there, you have this huge idea and you just have to get it out there. I understand where you're coming from, but trust me on this, follow these next few lessons and it's gonna make all the difference in the world 3. Set A Launch Date: the first step in creating your blog's is to pick a launch date that you might be asking. Why is it so important that I pick a launch date? Setting a day is incredibly important because your blood, just like any other business, requires a timeline, something that you can follow and get prepared for your eventual launch. Now think about it for a moment. If you had this incredible idea of starting a restaurant, could you just simply go Lisa space, get some food and start that restaurant the same day? There is no way that you could do that. Any restaurant takes incredible amount of planning. You have to get the right staff. All the training down get all the food preparation menus together. It takes a lot of time for you to do that. And just like a restaurant or any other business that you're that you're gonna be serious about, you're gonna want to actually set a date to launch that. So when it comes to a blawg, how far in it in advance should you actually set a date? I recommend anywhere from 1 to 3 months in advance. Now, anything more than three months I think is just kind of I think you would be procrastinating at that point. So 123 months is a very good time line where you can put together all the information some content for your blawg. If you're gonna have some giveaways you can make get those lined up. And also any kind of pdf's e books, anything like that they're going to create for people to opt in. You can have that all created as well, and that will give you a better timeline. The only thing that I do suggest is that you avoid holidays launching your your block around any holiday Christmas, you name it. Most people are pretty busy around then. And if you're trying to generate a lot of buzz and get people to visit your site, it's not as likely that they're going to visit at that time. And plus, if you do it right and successfully Ah, you're gonna be pretty busy trying to step with your blocks. Do it when you're gonna have a little bit more time. The third thing that I would say as far as setting a day is to make sure that you hold yourself accountable as well. If you set a particular date one month from today, make sure that you tell somebody that's going to hold you to that. All right, eso whatever that requires on your part. Whether it's Hey, I'll pay you 50 bucks if I don't make this day or write it down on a calendar, look at a daily, do something that is gonna hold yourself accountable to that, and so it'll keep you motivated. It'll keep you laser focused and you'll be able tow launch successfully. So these are a few tips that I want you to dio just set that date. Stick to it and don't waver. 4. Choosing A Blog Name: now, nothing makes your block more official than choosing the domain name. And that's step two in this whole process. And I have to tell you that choosing your domain name is an incredibly important part of this because that's what you're gonna be forever be known as from here on out. And so I put a lot of thought into What is it that you want people to know you as I created a block post and I want you to take a look at it as simple content creation dot com I wrote a block post called Five Rules for Choosing a Stunning Domain name, and I highly suggest that you take a look at this block post because I outlined some of the best tips that I know off to choosing a good domain name. And some of those will include, you know, including keywords and your your domain name or keeping it really shortened. Simple, as short as you possibly can. Ah, with the amount of domain names out there, it's it can be incredibly difficult. I also suggest cutting a dot com name, and there's a few other really great tips here. You definitely don't want to encroach upon anybody else's name out there. And so that would be something else that you want to research. Is there another Web cider blogger out there that's similar to yours And just make sure that you don't cross past very simple step, but creating your domain name is gonna be something that you're going to be very proud off , and it's gonna make your block official, and that's a good start. 5. Hosting: now, the third step in getting your blog's started is to choose your hosting. Now there are actually free hosting plans, and there are paid hosting plans. And I want to talk to you about the difference between the two with free hosting. That would be like wordpress dot com and the dot com is important. Wicks dot com Blogger There's a lot of other platforms out there that are free, and whenever you get free blogging platform, I want you to think about it. The difference between reading your home and owning your home when you're running like, for instance, with these free hosting sites. Basically, it's very confined. There's not a whole lot that you can do to it. You know, when you rent your unable to change the wall colors, you're unable to change things with the house. There's a lot of restrictions to it, and you never really own it Now the difference between that and paid hosting, for instance, with wordpress dot org's or blue hosts or a lot of other hosting companies is the fact that you'll actually own your website, and so there's a lot more that you can do to it. It's a lot more customizable, although it does cost a little bit of money to keep it up. Ah, the ability to change and do what you like with it, in my opinion, is so much more important than simply putting up a free website. Plus, the amount of credibility that you have with your own site is in my opinion, ah, lot more than would be otherwise. So I absolutely encourage you to go ahead and pay for some hosting. I, for one, actually choose Blue Host. They're very reasonable. They have really good rates. I've never really had a lot of downtime with them, and also they have a lot of if you want. They have dedicated servers that can increase the speed of your website, which is a little bit more money. Actually created another block post on simple content creation dot com that you can take a look at. It's called How to insult Word Pressed with glucose and five clicks. It's ah, very quick tutorial that will guide you through if you so decide to actually have your hosting with them how to actually get that set up with wordpress dot or gets very simple and take a look at that. But ultimately, it's your choice as far as how you want your blocks set up. But I definitely suggest that you take the paid hosting route. 6. Email Subscribers: Now when it comes to your block, if you do one thing and one thing Onley. This is the lesson that I want you to pay attention to because it's going to make the most difference for the success of your Blawg. Okay? And what is that that I want you to do? I want you to actually focus all of your attention on e mails. That should be the number one priority of your website. Is collecting e mails and you might be asking yourself, Why is it that you want e mails so badly? And I want to give you a list of reasons why you should build your email list now? The first is when people subscribe to you. They're actually giving you permission for you to contact them, and that is extremely valuable. Think about how hard it is to get somebody's attention. If you cold called somebody, do you appreciate that, or do they appreciate it? No, not really. But in this case, they have accepted you and they want to hear from you. So collecting email for that is really important. E mails also create a relationship. Think about anybody that you've subscribed to in the past, you've subscribed to them because you want to hear from them, and I personally subscribe to only a few people. But when I receive their email, it's almost as though they're having a conversation with me. Now I know it's on auto responder, but the content there is something that I'm very interested in receiving, and in most cases I'll read most of what sent to me. Also, your emails can actually have a bigger impact on your audience. I mean, think about how often you will visit a website compared to how often you actually check your email with, you know, with my phone. I'm constantly getting emails, and I'm constantly checking those or reading what comes to me. But if I visit a website, that won't happen quite as often. Also, if you're collecting emails, those emails air yours to take unlike any kind of social media like Twitter or Facebook. If you lose those followers because you go to a different platform, you'll lose them permanently. But with your email list, you can take those wherever you are, and you can continue to contact those people. Now also is traffic on demand, meaning that any time that you create a new block post, you can instantly send them exactly what you want them to see. And so that's very valuable. If you have something that you feel would increase your sales by having emails, you can send them something instantly and have an audience and get traffic to your site. So very, very cool. Also, it's the easiest way to do market research. For instance, if you want to know you know what they want to hear about, you can simply just ask. You know, you don't have to do a whole lot of research on different sites. Keyword planner with Google or Cora or any of those other sites. You don't have to do that. You can simply just ask them What is it that they want to hear? And that could be, ah, big boost to your blog's overall Now to get started with any kind of email client, there's a lot of possibilities out there. I, for one, actually use mail. Chimp mail. Chimp is a good that have a free plan where you can have up to two or 2000 subscribers, and they also have a lot of auto responders. Eso I think they're a good start. Also, A Weber is a very good company. I really like a lot of the templates that they have. They make it incredibly simple. You do have to pay a little bit more money for that. And also there's constant contact. Is is another big name that's out there. So a lot of different possibilities and ways that you can actually collect these emails. I highly suggest that that is, that that's something that you should be doing constantly is focusing your blogging website to collecting these emails on. Don't do it in a span the way where you're having something constantly somebody's face. But when you're planning the overall function of your blogged, you know, have that in the back. Your mind of how is that? I can set up this blawg so I can collect the most emails because it's incredibly valuable to your growth, especially once you start going into mawr of sales on your website. Sales are directly proportional to the number of emails that you have, so the more they can collect, definitely, the better you're gonna do overall. So take this advice and look at your blawg and see how you can implement 7. Landing Pages: you might be asking yourself what is the best way that I can collect emails? If that is our top priority for our block, and I suggest that you create a phenomenal landing page. Now there are a lot of different styles of landing pages out there, but I'm going to show you a few key elements of what makes an effective landing page. So first off, you want your message to be very, very clear. The moment that somebody lands on your landing page, you want it to be very clear to them exactly what it is that you're offering. The second thing is, you have to have an opt in form. Of course. Like I said, the purpose of the landing pages for people to subscribe, so have a compelling offer. An opt in form for them to give you their email make it very, very simple. Also, you want to outline the benefits. What are they going to get from signing up for your list? Make it something compelling. Make it something that they will want and out one exactly what the emails will help them achieve. Use the language your target market uses and find um you know, find that through your research. Also, give them a brief description about you. This isn't necessary, but to make it a little bit more personal and intimate if they're coming to your block, tell them just briefly a little bit about you. What gets you excited include a unique selling proposition. A USB Your landing page should have a sentence or two, Um, briefly just describing what it is that makes you a little bit better than, say, the competition or other blog's. You know what is so unique about you? And then, finally, if you are going to do this prelaunch before your blog's even starts, make sure that you include a launch date. There are different plug ins and that you can have like a timer on your blawg, just something that will let them know when you're actually going toe launch and give them something toe. Actually, look forward, Teoh. And so here's a quick example of a landing page that I thought was pretty good. I just found this really quick on the Internet, So first thing up here, you can actually see you know who this is for. For people who want to make an impact on line, but don't know where to begin. So that is the sole purpose of this entire landing page right here. After that, they show you. Hey, how are you gonna benefit? So this is a totally free program for increasing your online visibility and leveraging social media down here. Of course, we have our opt in form. Okay? It's very, very clear. A big bubble sign up. All right, That shows you exactly what you should be doing on this page. And you have to lead people to what you want them to, dio. And so this is just a really quick example of a landing page, is it? Yours will probably be very different, but there are certain elements that you definitely want. Include, you want to put too much on the page. Too much riding. You just want it, allow them or give them the option of subscribing to you or not. It's a yes or no decision, and there shouldn't be a whole lot on there to distract from that decision. So there you have it. This is a class on how to launch your blawg and create a lot of buzz around it. These are just very basic steps here, and I hope that it's gonna be very helpful for you. Just remember that it should be over a course of several months of planning or released a few weeks. Give yourself a chance to actually establish a foundation of your future business. Blawg, I really want to thank you again for taking this. If you have any suggestions, please let me know. But otherwise I look forward to reading your blogged.