Blogs are part of the World Wide Web since its creation. In the beginning they did not have a defined name, but their purpose was more or less the same as that of contemporary blogs. Here is a list of the first blogs:

• Dawn of Internet: Tim Berbers-Lee at CERN begins keeping a list of all new sites as they come online.
• June 1993: NCSA’s oldest archived ‘What’s New’ list of sites.
• June 1993: Netscape begins running it’s ‘What’s New!’ list of sites.
• January 1994: Justin Hall launches Justin’s Home Page which would become Links from the Underground.
• April 1997: Dave Winer launches Scripting News.
• December 1997: Jorn Barger coins the term ‘weblog”.

What is a blog?

There are numerous definitions and explanations for a blog ranging from broad to highly technical. But it would be better to explain the concept of blog in a detailed manner rather than at a peripheral level before jumping directly into the details of how to create a blog. Generally blogs are writings done by a single person and updated almost regularly but sometimes a group of people maintain blogs. The process of writing in blogs is called blogging and the person who writes is called a blogger. Each piece of writing in a blog is called blog post or simply post. Blogs can be of any topic and often a particular theme is selected for blogging but not always. Some people blog just because it’s their passion but blogs are also a great source of income. There are various professional bloggers around the world who rely only on blogging for their living. Blogs can also said to be websites but they show significant deviations from the characteristics of a normal website. If you know how to create a blog, you will surely be aware of the differences also. The primary difference is that the content is added in a sequential order. There is usually a regular updating of content in a blog unlike that of a website. There is an option for the readers to post their comments. It is also possible for the other bloggers to interact with the help of ping backs and trackbacks. Blogs are liable to constant evolutions and as the internet is dynamic in nature, the scope and nature of blogs too change. Thus is will surely be unjust if blogs are restricted to any particular single definition. The definition obviously keeps on changing with the passage of time. There are a lot of purposes for creating a blog and it depends on those who create it.

Why should you create a blog?

If you are aware of how to create a blog, then there are no hassles at all. If you are interested in writing about a specific topic or just jot down your views blogs are the best means you can rely on. It this is a hobby for you, things are much simpler and you also enjoy it. The good news is that if your blog starts grabbing enough traffic, you can use Google ad sense to earn. Else you may even get advertisements from any local business if you succeed in fetching great number of visits to your website. This is the view from just an angle and the significant reason for creating a blog comes to light if you are indulged in any online business. In such a case you will surely be conscious of the vitality of a blog and how to create a blog.

For any business mere existence doesn’t do any special favor, it’s actually the visibility which counts. For this SEO matters a lot. Blogging helps a lot in this regard by improving your rankings in search engine results. Blogs helps you in targeting specific keywords in your posts. With a company blog, you get an identity for your business. This also allows you to communicate with your customers in an informal manner. This paves way for frank feedback from the customers and helps in improving your business strategies. Blogs help in keeping the followers, usually your customers with updated information and news. The establishment of fruitful relationships can also be initiated by a company blog. If you get connected to other members of the same industry, you may do guest posting and get the same in return. This help in link building and this helps a lot in optimization.

WordPress vs. Blogger.

How to create a blog is not that much a big deal but the main thing to ponder over is which platform should be selected. The platform which you choose has great influence on the success of your blog. There always exists confusion among the bloggers regarding which platform to choose for their blog. There are two platforms which you can use- either the WordPress orblogger. Which platform you choose is a bit relative matter but even then, it would be better if WordPress is preferred more.

WordPress is capable to avail more than enough customization which you would love to have for the blog. There never is any shortage for plugins and themes and they are plenty. But the same is not true for blogger. Even though there are some beautiful and cool themes in blogger, generally they are not customization  WordPress has around 18000 free plugins and also a vast pool of premium plugins which are greatly useful for bloggers.

Security is another matter which you need to be careful about even before inquiring about how to create a blog. As Google itself holds the responsibility of Blogger, it is obvious that blogger is secure. No one will be able to steal data or files from your blog. But another problem arises here and it a bit serious. Google has a strict team for checking spam and such cases are punished severely by Google. If knowingly or unknowingly spam intrudes into your blog, Google may just delete your blog even without any prior notice. If you know how to create a blog in WordPress, it would be far better option, as there are no risks at all as the blog is yours only it’s always safe.

WordPress.com blog or a self hosted blog?

The content management system chosen for the blog has a great influence on the blog. Majority users are moving towards WordPress.com blog because of great features it offer. No matter you are an experienced blogger or a newbie, at one point of time you will be confused regarding which one to select for your blog- WordPress.com or self hosted blog. Taking a decision in this regard is vital for all those who are tensed of how to create a blog efficiently and which CMS should be chosen.

The basic advantage of choosing WordPress.com is obviously its free availability. You need not have to pay a single penny. If you are not looking for any profit from your blog, this is the best option you can have.  But if you are serious about blogging, you should purchase domain and it should be renewed every year. Another thing is that using a self hosted blog makes the URL length short and thus the name is easy to remember.

The URL of blog fits with ease to the business card if it’s short. You will be restricted from using certain plugins or themes if you are using WordPress.com blog even if thousands of options are there to choose from. Till you have to make some customizations by your own, everything is smooth. But when tweaks becomes, inevitable choosing for a self hosted blog is the only option left to you. Some codes may not work on WordPress.com site which can turn out to be biggest among the curses of not choosing a self hosted blog. If you are not much expert in the technicalities,

choosing a self hosted blog may bring hassles but when necessities are there, you have to make the way out and equip yourself with enough knowledge to deal with.  How to create a blog and which CMS should be chosen are the things which every blogger must be aware of. Choosing self hosted blog will be constructive to any blogger who keeping blogging professionally and write to earn.

How to choose a niche for your blog?

You should invest great care in selecting a niche for your blog. It is always advisable to do niche blogging than posting on random subjects. There are some criteria which should be kept in mind while choosing your niche for the blog. How to create a blog based on the niche popularity must be seen. If you make a decision on how to create a blog deciding which niche to be selected is the very next step. Always remember that blogging is not just about writing and writing only. It is a technique and you need tactics to make your blog a crowd puller.

People usually spend time on numerous topics and few of them are the latest gadgets, business ideas, apparels, life style etc. More popular the niche is more will be the competition. Competition is everywhere but if you are not too much popular in the writing world, it would be good to select a niche with low competition. If you try out a niche with high competition, you will have to invest more money and time to market you blog for increasing its popularity. Another thing in regard of how to create a blog based on niche is to analyze your skill, taste and knowledge. You should have an in-depth knowledge about the topic and the niche you decide to write on. You should be able to enjoy your writing and have enough research skills so that your writing never gets confined to the peripheral level. Try to contact the people who are successfully blogging in the same niche which you opted.

Choosing a domain name for your blog.

Choosing an apt domain name for the blog is not an easy task as it always seems to. It is the name of domain which makes you distinguished and recognized in the community of blogging. Blogging has started very much earlier and every newbie entering into blogging is a latecomer and the domain names you are looking for may be already taken. But this never means that you can’t get a good answer to your inquiry how to create a blog with suitable domain name. Branding is the key to consider getting a perfect output for the question how to create a blog successfully with a domain name. There are also other ways which will surely be a help to how to create a blog using an apt domain name. If you can’t get the exact domain name of your name, it will not be a harm to choose slight variation of your name. It sounds unique even if the information about content in the blog is not known. As having keywords in domain name helps a lot in SEO,getting domain names rich in keyword will help a lot in how to create a blog with profitable domain name. You can find that in search results, websites having keywords in domain rank higher.

Selecting sweet and short names as domain name is a nice idea as such name persist in mind and it’s always easy to memorize them. There are some don’ts you should avoid if your quest of how to create a blog successfully with domain name turns in your favor. Use should never use names which are copyrighted as you may have to face legal consequences later on. Using of excessive hyphens repels the gracefulness of a domain name. Avoid using awkward characters and if possible don’t use numbers also in the domain name.

How to choose the perfect theme for your blog?

How to create a blog with perfect theme is becoming more complex with the increase in number of themes day by day. You should consider whether the theme is to be purchased or will you get it for free. The free themes are not as better as that of paid ones. Which option you select depends on the important the blog is for you. If you wonder how to create a blog in an efficient manner with good theme never fall just for the sake of looks the theme offers. Some theme designers are just concerned regarding the grace of themes and don’t care much about the usability. Heavy graphics design increases the website loading time and this is never acceptable in the web world where the user can easily move on to other similar sites. The demo of theme should be checked before it is taken. Check whether you will have to customize the theme and also if needed up to what level you will have to customize.

When there are many themes which aptly fit your need, it is obvious that wasting time on ridiculous themes will seem nonsense. But still it should be possible to customize the themes in case any needs arise in future. You can alter the color theme, back ground image and some themes even allow altering the number of columns. Such themes help in case of your eagerness regarding how to create a blog with suitable theme. Some themes demand the awareness of HTML even for making minute changes and if you are not that much compatible with tech stuff, avoiding such themes would be the better option. It is important that themes must be checked for browser compatibility. Even though most designers test the themes on all possible browsers, some of them may not bother for the same.

How to choose a web host for you blog?

Blog is the basic need to any professional who is aiming to sustain and successfully develop his career as a writer.As explained previously if you are bothered about how to create a blog which can help you earn, selecting self hosted blog is a must rather than depending on free services. It is necessary that you host your blog on web server to make it visible. This will allow all businesses and individuals to access you blog through World Wide Web. Space on the server is provided by a large number of web hosts. How to choose a web host is equally important to that of how to create a blog.

You should know the web host which absolutely suits your requirements. There are a diverse range of parameters which you should consider before choosing the web host. The disc space, reliability, bandwidth, security and speed are few among the parameters. Security is necessary so that your data is never lost and your site doesn’t get hacked by harmful intruders. But despite choosing the best hosting companies, hacking may occur.

The site needs to be brought back to the original phase at the earliest. But many times it is seen that if a mishap occurs to your site and you try to contact your web host service providers, a delay beyond toleration has to be witnessed. Some may even never respond back. The result of this is really adverse on your reputation as you can’t update your blog. Also your ranking may also be lowered in the search results as regularly updating is vital for SEO. So, it must be assured that the customer service will be up to the mark. Other things to be noted are the price, FTP access, site builder, control panel, client base and popularity. It should be remembered that nothing can be a substitute for experience and so giving preference to an experienced hosting service would be good.

Install your blog.

No matter you are well skilled on the issue of how to create a blog in a graceful manner, without knowing to install it properly would be a worse thing to happen. You should be proficient in installing the blog as well. Installing WordPress can be done manually. The very first step is to get domain name. After that, hosting is to be done and the process is really simple. You just have to login to your account and follow some easy steps. Then you should get the FTP account information. Creation of MYSQL database is done after that. Then you have to the install the files of WordPress. Now the process is almost over and you can login to the web hosting. The WordPress folder has some files and you should place that files on to your server. Then you can install WordPress. You can now login to your WordPress dashboard with username and password. The process of how to create a blog by installing WordPress seems little tough as it demands some technical knowledge.

Another easy method illustrating how to create a blog which doesn’t require any technical knowledge is the usage of Fantastic  Firstly login to the c-panel account of your website. Scroll down till you see WordPress in the Blog section. Some information will be there at the right regarding the WordPress version. Assure that it is updated and if things are okay, click. You now have the option to decide to which folder WordPress has to be installed and provide some other information of the blog. After determining the installation location, you should choose username and the password for accessing the panel of WordPress admin. Then the base configuration and email account configuration is done. When the blog information is completed, there is an Install WordPress button which is to be clicked. After verifying the correctness of information, click the finish installation button. After the completion of process you will get confirmation with the installation details.

Customizing your WordPress blog.

There is not any written rule about how to create a blog or it is never suggested that customizing blog is mandatory. But the thing which must be understood is that, the impact of a customized blog will turn positive if done efficiently and will help you in gaining more new visits and to retain the loyalty of your existing visitors.

Using custom gravatar will help in building brand consistency and this fact is actually a proved one. The comments by authors must be styled in a different way than that of the readers. Thus the replies by author will be projected more and this will benefit those who are willing to hear only from the author. This will really be helpful if there are huge amount of comments as the chances for the author’s reply to get submerged are high. Signifying and highlighting the comments from authors reflects that you respect the writers of your website. This will invite more guest posts to your blog.

How to create a blog with superb and beneficial customization is a tactic and those who know the same really succeed in the niche where new bloggers bud up rapidly.

Professionalization aspects get more respond and so when you write about you, give a detailed and professional yet friendly face to the visitors. You should let your visitors to know more regarding your background, qualifications, specializations, interests etc.

How to maintain and promote your blog?

No magic wand is there to help you maintain or promote your blog. But if you are willing to take effort and spend some useful time, there are certain tips which can fetch good results. Maintaining and promoting the blogs; both are connected with a fairly tight bond. For promoting your blog, maintaining it is essential no matter the effort you put on how to create a blog was immensely high.

Maintaining the blog in simple words is keeping the blog active always. Never fail to update you blog and keep on posting regularly. If you have a tight schedule, hiring efficient guest bloggers will be a good option to choose. You may get paid services or you can get guest blogs in return to links if your site has a decent PR. Exchanging links is also helpful in promoting your blog. Beside blogging, find time to put valuable and genuine comments on other blogger’s post in the same niche. Join the relevant communities and always stay active in them. Keep your friends updated about your new posts. Send mails and never hesitate to say ‘welcome’ and ‘thank you’. These two words can make a huge change and the result will be positive as this reciprocates respect to the visitors. Intimate yourself to other bloggers in your niche.

The scope of social media sites should not be underestimated. Nowadays Facebook is known to child, youth and the aged. So, creating a Facebook page will help a lot a promotion. Share the blog post in your Facebook page. Whoever liked the page will get these posts on his wall and this is a great source of traffic. Starting a twitter account will also be helpful. Delicious, StumbleUpon, Redditt etc are few of the other feasible options to exploit the scope of social media for promoting your blog.

Related posts:

1. How to Create Google+ Brand Page for Your WordPress Blog
2. 5 Simple Yet Excellent Design Tips To Make WordPress Blog User Friendly

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