How to Start a Blog Outside Steemit (or Why you should NOT to)

So you've been blogging on Steemit for some quite time and you finally realize that you want to start a blog outside Steemit, so what do you do?

Your Options

1. Start with a FREE blogging platform
2. Invest some money
3. Continue blogging here on Steemit

Now here's what you should consider:

FREE vs. PAID

I know most of you have heard of the blogging platforms like Wordpress, Blogspot, and Wix. And these are some of the completely FREE ways of starting your own blog, but there's a catch: you have a subdomain under these websites. For example, if you want to start a blog with a subdomain paolospeaks, you will get paolospeaks.wordpress.com, paolospeaks.blogspot.com, or paolospeaks.wix.com depending on the blogging platform you picked.

As you can see, with a free blogging platform, you will get a subdomain under its main domain name. While if you invest for your own domain name and hosting, you may get a custom domain name with a .com, .net, .info, and much more.

Whether you will use a free blogging platform or a host your own domain is your choice. There are lots of bloggers who test the waters by going into free blogging platforms first then invest in it once they see that they would like to continue it.

Create Content

Content is King.

Some may disagree with me but believe me, content is still the king. When creating content for your blog, always remember that quality is better than quantity. When starting a blog, it is advised to create ten high-quality blog posts then publishing them all at once.

Blogging at an early time is more about promotion. So when you have ten articles in your blog and you promote one of it, there is a high chance that your readers will also view your other articles. Unlike when you only have three articles to begin with, your readers might be hungry for more information and your blog can't fulfill that hunger. This may lead them to another blog with lots of content.

After the early stage, you will have to write articles consistently. Create your own blogging schedule and write once every two days, or even once a week.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Now here's the technical part. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is how your website will rank in the Search Engine Results Page (SERP). This is what most bloggers are competing for. The better their SEO is, the more traffic they can get.

To give you a clear idea of how it is, think of this. Let's say you browsed something online. Have you ever wondered how these search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing is ranking the websites? Of course, all website owners want their website to show at the top spot of the SERP. Now, this is what SEO is for, to rank websites.

SEO has two kinds: on-page SEO and off page SEO. On-page SEO is the optimization you do within your website. The most important on-page SEO you can do is keyword research.

In a keyword research, you will search for keywords with a high number of monthly views and low competition. So whenever you create an article, you should mention these keywords at least twice per article. You should also include your keywords under the tags section, and even in your title.

On the other hand, off page SEO is the optimization you do outside your website. This is done by building backlinks to your blog. A backlink is a link from another website to your website. This is mostly done when a blogger uses your blog post as a reference to their content. Search engines will then find your blog trustworthy and will show you in a higher SERP rank.

However, if you choose to continue blogging on Steemit, your works are already presented to hundred thousands of readers. Not just ordinary readers, but readers who always engage.

Monetizing your Blog

There are lots of ways to monetize your blog, but I will only focus on three: ads, affiliates, and paid content.

Ads

This, I think, is the most common way to monetize your blog. By putting ads on your website, you can earn every time someone clicks it (pay-per-click), every time someone views it (pay-per-impression), and every time someone does something after clicking it (pay-per-acquisition). The most popular one is Google AdSense.

Affiliate Programs

Have you ever seen a product review online? If you bought that product by clicking on their link, then you just gave the blogger some commission for the product you bought. That, my friend, is called an affiliate. You get a percentage whenever someone buys the product through your affiliate URL.

Paid Content

These paid content can be a webinar, an ebook, a course, or anything else you can think of. If your readers are liking your posts, and they trust you with what you have to say, then selling paid content is what you should do. Try giving your readers more value by offering paid content.

Why You Should Stick with Steemit

There is no monetary investment required. On Steemit, you may or may not invest in Steem Power when you start. You don't even have to pay for the monthly hosting fees and the yearly domain name fees.

Your articles are also presented to thousands of people right away. You don't have to worry much about SEO to gain traffic. You just have to engage with other people by commenting on their posts as well.

You don't have to worry much about monetization. Monetizing your blogs through ads and affiliate programs may take you a month before you can withdraw your earnings. They also have these minimum earnings required before you can cash it out. Here on Steemit, all it takes is one week to transfer your earnings out.

As of now, I'm a newbie here on Steemit, learning the process and all. So far, I'm loving it! And I have no reasons to leave it. :)

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Did you like this post? Do you have more questions about blogging? If so, just leave it in the comments section below and I'll do my best to help as much as I can. :)