Countersignature Blogger Information Made Easy

Countersignature blogger information

back in 2010 I quit my corporate job to stay home with my first son and I fell into this world of blogging I started blogging I started wanting the blog I started all the things and I fell down a rabbit hole every time I googled how to start a blog or how to do this with a blog or how to do the half of the blog so if that is you you're wondering how to start a blog you're wondering like what the first steps are this is the video for you and we're gonna get into it in just a second hey howdy hey my name is Jessica Stansbury and I am pumped that you are here on this channel I'll give you the tips and tricks and tools that I have used personally to create a life on purpose to live life by design and to live life on my own terms cuz I don't like rules just sayin if that sounds like something you are interested in make sure you hit the big red subscribe button below this video and come back every single week for more tips and tricks to do just that now like I mentioned in the beginning of this video I started blogging way back in the day in 2010 when my first son was born I actually quit my job to stay home with him because I really wanted to be home with my baby and in the process I kind of learned what blogging was I fell down a rabbit hole of all the things that had to do with blogging what did you need how did you do it how did you make money all of it and its really interesting because back in that day there was no information on the internet that taught anybody how to start a blog and it was very hard to find like 1 2 3 4 these are the things you need to start a blog right now so as I have grown and as I've grown my business as I've grown my online presence I've continued to blog throughout the years it just looks different so in those beginning days I was blogging as like a mommy blogger I had no intentions to make money with it I had no in thing it was just kind of like my creative outlet and a fun thing to do then I kind of morphed through the years I've started blogs for my businesses I have blogged for teaching you guys things here on YouTube all the blogs have happened over here in the hey Jesse HQ and it's pretty standard across whatever reason you want to start a blog like whether you want to be a mommy blogger whether you want to start a blog for your business whether you want to start a blog about that awesome hobby that you have it doesn't really matter all bloggers really need the same few things to get started so today I'm going to give you those things that you need absolutely hands-down regardless of your category of blog to really get started with blogging okay so in full disclosure some of these things are tactical tangible like things that you need and some of them are strategies so on that note let me start first with a strategy that every single blog needs and this goes for business this goes for whatever you're wanting to start a blog for now if you are starting a blog with no intention to ever make it any kind of income generating anything or you never want to make it a business or any of that first of all awesome second of all though blogging is a lot of work it's a lot more work than you think it is so if that is the case I'm not sure that this is the right creative Avenue for you maybe you want to just start an Instagram account or just start a YouTube channel but if you go full in on blogging it's a lot of work to 1 get it started and to be consistent enough to actually pick up traction so you want to be really like in it and on that note to be in it to make money to really take off to have a following you need a niche now you may say that niche I do not I am NOT fancy like that I say niche but you need a niche that goes with anything with business with blogging with whatever you have to be niched down to be able to find the right category of people who want to follow you now let me also say as someone who has been in this injury industry for a very long time I have seen myself do it I have seen other people do it once you have niched down and kind of gotten a following you can then start to broaden out so if you're like I don't just want to niche and be this type of blogger or this type of blogger or whatever because it feels constricting to you if you will hang tight and do it for a little while you can then start niching out so at first though you need a niche are you going to be the baking mama blogger are you going to be the hot mess mama blogger are you gonna be the blogger who talks about blogging are you gonna be the blogger who talks about Instagram are you gonna be a fashion blogger like where where is your special niche in the world and again you can take that a little broader and a little broader as you grow an audience but to really grow an audience you need to be really niche specific and have people find you because they're looking for specific things then they come into your ecosystem they learn to love you and then you can kind of start branching out a little bit okay so first thing you need to start a blog is a niche second thing you need also a strategy is a consistent posting schedule now with YouTube as with basically anything in this life social media business podcasting youtubing blogging or whatever and I might have just said with YouTube a second we go instead of with blogging but you know what I'm in you have to be consistent you will not make it very far you will not see success you will not have people coming and finding your blog if you are not consistent there's a lot of reasons why one the most important thing is that when you're consistent it proves that you are consistent to the people coming over so if they see that you've plugged every single week on Tuesday for the last six years then they're gonna want to follow you because they know that consistently you're going to show up and give them the things that they want so it's building a trust and a rapport with your readers or followers or whatever you want to call them now the other piece of this is with a blog a big part of strategy is SEO and if you don't know what SEO is its search engine optimization it is what Google uses to be able to show your blog in search results so someone is searching for how to start a blog I'm going to do everything I possibly can to make sure that my content is what is found if that is possible okay so we can't make our content be what's found we can't rig the system it is totally up to Google however there are some things you can do to make that your chances better one of those things is that Google likes consistency so if they see that you are consistently blogging once a week for you know a couple of months and then you release a blog post that hits on a key term and your blog has been consistent and this other blog hasn't they're gonna show your content above this other blogs content so not only does it build rapport with your readers or your followers but it also shows Google that you're serious and you're in this for them to be able to show your content as far as building rapport with your readers the way I always reference this is think about something like a TV show you know you start watching a TV show and you're like oh my goodness I love this show so much and they're then they're like well the next episode will just release whenever we feel like it you're not going to hang around and pay attention to win that next episode releases but if they say every Tuesday at 9:00 on CBS you're gonna be there every Tuesday at 9:00 on CBS so it's the same with your blog all right the next three things I have for you are more systems and tactical tangible things than they are strategies and the first of those is you need a way to blog you need a website and the best website and I'm telling you this from years and years and years and years and years and years of experience in the blogging world in the SEO world in all the things I started as a blog designer I have done all the things I promised coming from someone with a lot of experience the best platform you can use to blog is word now WordPress for whatever reason likes confuse people and if you Google or if you go to wordpress.com you're gonna find some like free blogging platform that you do not want what you want is you want a hosting account and you want to install WordPress on it and you want to install a wordpress design now the way I explain this is that your hosting account is like the gas in your car so we're like the web site is your car right it's all the pretty bells and whistles when you go to someone's website you see that they have like automatic windows and their cars purple and all the things but that website wouldn't be running without the gas behind it and that's what your hosting is and then WordPress is kind of the the look of the site and the way it works so when you go to a website and it works a certain way and it does certain things it looks a certain way that's because they have a certain WordPress theme installed now that being said there are other options besides WordPress that you can use probably the most common one in the blogging world other than WordPress would be Squarespace again not my favorite because of the SEO benefits that WordPress has over Squarespace but WordPress I will say is a little harder to set up so I would highly recommend either doing a lot of research figuring out what this looks like for you I have a lot of videos on my channel I'll try and link them below on like what WordPress is how to set it up all those things are kind of old fair warning but they're they're do a lot of research and get that done or hire someone to set up your blog for you because then it'll be done right and you won't have to think about it again but you do need a place to blog those free blogging services like blogspot if that's still a thing blogger that was a thing back in the day the free wordpress all of those there okay and that they might be a good place to get started but they are not going to take you further and further and further along and again the same with Squarespace if you really feel overwhelmed by WordPress I would highly recommend Squarespace over any of the other options but if you can get in on the WordPress floor I would all right number four on how to get started with blogging is that you need to go ahead and get set up with affiliates that you can now I've done a lot of videos on affiliate marketing in the past and a couple of them will be popping across the screen here is I talked about it but then the rest of them will be linked below in a playlist but bloggers make their money from affiliates sponsored sponsorships and ads is really like what it comes down to so if you are starting to blog there is no reason why you shouldn't be going ahead and getting what affiliate accounts you can approved so you can include those in your blog post for instance let's say one of your blog post is going to be about how to potty train your kids and that is something that you love to talk about and you want to write a whole blog post about it and you used a certain type of I don't know sheets or reward system or stickers or something from Amazon if you're set up as an Amazon affiliate you can go ahead and link those in even though you have nobody following your blog right now the really powerful part of this is you're probably not gonna make a lot of money up front because you're brand new but let's say that post goes viral or let's say in two years you have built up a following and then they're coming to you for new content but they always reference back to that old content that blog post could be making you money for years and years and years to come so if you will go ahead and get set up with what affiliates you can get set up with it's going to put you ahead of the game Amazon is the natural first step but there are tons of others you can do as well and again I will link videos above and below on affiliate marketing because it can be hard to understand exactly where to get started there and and like what companies you should reach out to and all the things so if you're wanting to know more about that there's there's videos they they pop and round just say okay the fifth and final thing that I think you need to have to get started with a blog is you need to go ahead and set up have it ready your Google Analytics now this one seems like a weird one and it's probably not one that anybody else is telling you you need to have to start a blog but it's imperative because again going back to me most people who start a blog want to make money from it right if you don't know the numbers behind your business if you don't know like how many people are coming to your website or how they're getting there or what social media platform is sending them in the most or what links they're clicking on the most it's going to be really hard for you to approach sponsorship deals or to approach partnerships within your blog to then make the money so it's a really good thing to have and you're going to need it later on down the road and right now is the perfect time to install it and get it set up because you don't have any traffic and it's not hindering anything let's say that in six months one of your posts goes viral on Pinterest or something and you have all this traffic that is coming to your website and then you're like oh my gosh I can see in like WordPress that there's like a hundred thousand people coming to my site and you go and you go to get set up with some affiliate or some sponsorship deal or even an ad network and you go to setup with them and they're like we need proof that you are getting this many viewers can you add us to your Google Analytics account because that's what they asked for or they asked for a report and you can't and then you have to wait a whole nother month to get set up with them it could really be costing you some money so go ahead and get it set up now I'm going to recap the five things I talked about because I think they're also so so important obviously there's more things that you need when starting a blog you need to be present on social media nowadays used to you could start a blog and just be a blogger now we need to have the social medias but that's a blog or a YouTube video before a different day so essentially you need a niche you need a thing that you're gonna be known for at least for a little while you need a consistent posting strategy you need a way to blog / website you need to go ahead and get set up with affiliates and you need to go ahead and set up your Google Analytics account so that you're all squared away when it is time to make more money if you have any questions or comments or anything to add to this go ahead and leave it in the comments below and again until next time make sure you hit subscribe so I don't want you to miss any tips and tricks with me each week by off