Have you ever been curious about starting a blog? Perhaps you’ve wondered if you could earn money as a professional blogger, or are intrigued about blogging for fun and sharing your thoughts with the world.
In this comprehensive guide, I’ll walk you through every aspect of the blogging business, from choosing your niche and setting up your site to growing your audience and making money from your content.
I currently own three blogs that are monetized through ad networks: BENSA Bacon Lovers Society, Happy Simple Living and this website.
I feel extremely fortunate to make money doing something I love! Whether I’m writing about bacon, simple living, easy recipes, saving money, or easy gardening, I get to connect with readers, share helpful content, and earn a living doing something I’m passionate about.
Plus, I love working from home with my sweet office mate, Hazel!
Over the years, I’ve learned so much about what it takes to build and grow a successful blog and I’m excited to share everything I know with you.
I’ll share my real-life tips, the tools I actually use, and lessons I’ve learned from running multiple blogs. My goal is to give you a clear, honest look at what it takes—and how you can create a successful website, too.
So grab a cup of coffee and settle in! This guide is packed with the information and inspiration you need to get started on your own blogging journey.
Note: Some of these links are affiliate links, from which I may earn a small commission. I never recommend products I haven’t personally tested or vetted. Please review my disclosure and privacy policy for more details.
Choose Your Niche
The most important decision you’ll make as a blogger is choosing your niche—the main topic you’ll write about. Your niche helps you attract the right audience, and will also play a big role in your blog’s potential to grow and earn income.
Start by thinking about what you genuinely enjoy. What are you passionate about? What topics do you find yourself researching for fun? What do friends and family ask for your advice about?
A successful blog is often a combination of your interests, your expertise, and what people are actively searching for online.
Once you have a few topic ideas, it’s time to do a little research. Tools like Google Trends can help you see if interest in your topic is growing or fading.
You can also browse Pinterest, YouTube, TikTok and Instagram to spot trending topics and see what’s resonating with audiences. Researching your market will also help you choose a niche with profit potential. (Show me the money, right?!)
Find Your Readers
How do you connect with the people who will actually read and engage with your blog? Finding your audience—those ideal readers who are genuinely interested in your content—is key to growing your business and building an enthusiastic community.
Here are some actionable steps to help you get started:
Identify who you’re writing for
Get clear on who your ideal reader is. (Some bloggers even find a photo of a person in a magazine or online to represent a typical reader.)
What topics are they interested in? What challenges and problems do they want to solve? What kind of content would help or inspire them? The more specific you can be, the easier it becomes to create blog posts that resonate and attract the right people.
Start an email list right away
Even if your traffic is small at first, begin collecting email addresses with a simple opt-in form. (See more information in the “Start Your E-Mail List” section below.) Your reader list will become one of your most valuable assets over time.
Engage with your readers
You might ask a question or ask for feedback at the end of your posts to encourage interaction. Try to always respond when someone comments on your blog.
Consider running a poll (Google Drive has a free survey application) or invite feedback through your email newsletter. Engaged readers are more likely to return, share your content, and become part of your blog’s growing community.
Use Search Engine Optimization (SEO) to get discovered
Learning basic search engine optimization (SEO) can help your blog posts get found on Google.
The landscape is changing rapidly for search, so to stay on top of the changes I listen to the excellent webinars hosted by Top Hat Rank.
Choose a Hosting Company
Once you’ve chosen your niche, it’s time to build your website. Choosing the right web hosting company is an important step, especially if you want a blog that runs smoothly, loads quickly, and can grow with your traffic over time.
When you’re just starting out, you can go with an economical shared hosting plan if you like. With a shared plan, your blog and many others will share a server. The upside is that the cost is low. The downside is that sometimes shared hosting can result in slow loading times, downtime, or site speed variations.
As your site grows, you’ll want a dedicated hosting plan so that you have total control and don’t have to share resources with other sites.
There are a lot of hosts out there, and I’ve tried several over the years. The two I personally use now and trust are BigScoots and Cloudways.
BigScoots offers exceptional customer service and fully managed WordPress hosting, which is perfect if you want a fast, secure site without having to handle the technical side yourself. Their support team is friendly, responsive, and quick to help with anything. This website is hosted with BigScoots.
Cloudways is another excellent option, especially if you’re a little more tech-savvy or want a host that offers more customization and flexibility. Cloudways’ hosting fees are reasonable, and their customer service team is also very fast and responsive.
As your blog grows, you can easily increase your server size at Cloudways (I’ve done it twice already!) so that your blog remains fast and reliable. BENSA Bacon Lovers Society and Happy Simple Living are both hosted at Cloudways.
Choose Your Blog Design Theme
Your blog’s design will influence how visitors experience your content. A clean, well-organized layout makes it easier for readers to navigate your site, stay longer, and come back for more.
The good news is that there are many excellent themes that can help you create a professional, polished look.
I personally use the Generate Press theme on all three of my blogs, and I love it. It’s incredibly fast, lightweight, and highly customizable, which makes it perfect if you want full control over how your site looks and functions.
If I didn’t use GeneratePress, my second choice would be a theme from Restored 316. Their themes are beautiful, fast, and ideal for bloggers who want an elegant, feminine aesthetic. Many of my blogging friends use Restored 316 and love how easy it is to create a stunning site without needing to touch any code.
Another great option is Feast Design Co., which offers a suite of high-performance themes built specifically for food bloggers and content creators. Their designs are simple, fast, and optimized for SEO, accessibility, and Google’s Core Web Vitals—so you get a beautiful site that also performs well behind the scenes.
Plugins
WordPress is the world’s most popular blogging platform—and for good reason. It’s powerful, flexible, and user-friendly, which makes it an excellent choice whether you’re just starting out or growing a well-established site. One of the biggest advantages of WordPress is its ability to use plugins—small software tools that add extra features and functionality to your blog.
Plugins can do everything from boosting your SEO to optimizing your images, improving site speed, protecting your content, and more.
At the same time, you’ll want to be selective. Installing too many plugins—or ones that aren’t well-coded—can slow down your site or cause conflicts.
I recommend starting with the essentials and only adding plugins that truly enhance your site’s performance or user experience.
Here are the plugins I personally use and recommend:
- Akismet Anti-Spam – One of the realities of blogging is that there are tons of spammers and bots who will try to leave spammy comments on your posts. Askimet helps block spam comments and keeps your comment section clean.
- Alt Text A.I. – Uses AI to generate helpful, descriptive image alt text for accessibility and SEO. This program helps you write a short description of each image on your site so that visually impaired readers have information about the photo.
- Contextual Related Posts – Automatically displays “related posts” at the end of your articles to keep readers engaged.
- Hubbub Pro – A powerful tool for creating and managing engaging social media previews. I primarily use Hubbub to make it easy for my readers to share our content on Pinterest and Facebook.
- ShortPixel Image Optimizer – Compresses and optimizes your images without sacrificing quality, which helps speed up your site.
- UpdraftPlus – Backup/Restore – An essential tool for backing up your site regularly and restoring it if anything goes wrong.
- WP Recipe Maker – A must-have for food bloggers, this plugin adds customizable recipe cards to your posts. The printable recipe cards on my three sites are all created with WP Recipe Maker.
- WP Rocket – A premium caching plugin that improves site speed and performance with minimal setup.
- Yoast SEO – A widely used plugin that helps you optimize your posts for search engines, with easy-to-follow suggestions.
Photos and Graphics
The visuals you use in your blog posts are just as important as the words. High-quality photos and graphics not only make your content more engaging but also help it stand out in a crowded digital space.
Resources for Photos
For photography, you have several options. Taking your own photos will give your blog a personal touch and help you stand out. I take most of the photos for my blogs, either with my iPhone camera or my Nikon Z50.
When I need a professional stock photo for a post, I use Deposit Photos. Another blogger shared a tip with me that AppSumo usually offers a great deal on Depost Photos bundles during Black Friday, so that’s when I usually buy credits.
There are also free photo resources available if you’re just getting started and need to keep costs down. Sites like Unsplash, Pexels, and Pixabay offer beautiful, high-resolution photos that are free to use, even for commercial purposes.
Just be sure to check the license for each image and give credit when required.
While these sites are wonderful for filling visual gaps, keep in mind that free stock photos are widely used—so original images will always help your blog stand out.
Hiring a professional photographer is another great option if you want truly unique, very high quality photos that reflect your blog’s personality.
Creating Graphics
When it comes to graphics—like creating eye-catching Pinterest pins, Facebook posts, or blog post illustrations—Canva is an excellent tool for beginners.
It’s user-friendly, offers a wide range of templates, and allows you to create everything from social media posts to infographics with minimal design experience.
When you’re just starting out, you can use Canva’s free program which offers many of the same design capabilities as the paid Canva Pro program.
Blogging Tools
When you’re starting a blog, there are some simple tools that can help you grow your audience and get your blog posts in front of more people.
These are two tools I use every day. They take the guesswork out of figuring out what to write about, and later tracking how your blog is doing in search engines and whether your posts are being clicked and read.
- Keysearch – This is an easy-to-use tool that helps you find topics people are actually searching for online, so you can write blog posts that are more likely to get noticed.
- SERPRobot – This tool shows you where your blog posts show up in Google search results, so you can track your progress and see what’s working over time.
You don’t need to be a tech expert to use these tools—they’re beginner-friendly and incredibly helpful once you start creating more content and want to grow your reach.
Start Your E-Mail List
One of my biggest blogging regrets is that I didn’t start creating an e-mail list of readers sooner. This is a step you can take as soon as you’re publishing posts.
The wonderful thing about growing your email list is that it’s your direct connection with your readers. You own and control the list, and unlike social media and search platforms which are constantly changing their algorithms, your email list is stable.
Choose an Email Marketing Platform
To create opt-in forms, collect email addresses, and send out newsletters, you’ll need an email company.
When you’re just starting out, one of the best options is the free version of Kit (formerly ConvertKit) to collect your email addresses and send newsletters. As your list grows, you can graduate to the paid plan which has many more benefits. I use Kit to manage Happy Simple Living’s email.
Another alternative is MailerLite, the e-mail provider I use for BENSA. It’s a little less expensive than the paid version of Kit, and the trade-off is that the customer service is not quite as good.
To learn more about e-mail marketing and how to grow your list, Matt Molen at Email Crush is a great resource.
Start Sending Newsletters
Along with writing blog posts, your email newsletter is one of the most effective ways to connect with your audience. I was intimidated about the process in the beginning, but starting a newsletter was easier than I thought.
I suggest you start by subscribing to the newsletters of bloggers you like and admire. Study their formats and think about what you like. (You’re invited to sign up for BENSA‘s newsletter Bacon Bits and Happy Simple Living‘s Easy Times newsletter. Our newsletter signups are on the home page of each site.)
Next, take some time to read or watch your email provider’s tutorials, and learn the features and design options for your newsletter. Start building your template for your first newsletter.
Once you’re set up, you can start sending regular emails to your subscribers—even if it’s just once a month. Share your latest blog posts, personal updates, and anything you think will be valuable to your readers.
You can also send a simple email each time you publish a new post or recipe, or automate the process if your email provider offers an RSS feed option.
The most important step is to just do it! This is your chance to find your voice and build a connection with your audience.
Over time, you’ll learn what resonates with them, and your newsletter will become an invaluable tool for growing your blog and engaging with your community.
Figure Out How You’ll Manage Social Media
Social media can be a powerful way to grow your blog—but it can also quickly become a major time suck if you’re not intentional. As a new blogger, it’s important to figure out early on how social media will fit into your overall strategy.
We can’t be everywhere at once—especially in the beginning—so I suggest choosing one or two platforms where your audience is most likely to hang out. Start showing up there consistently, engaging with others, and sharing your great content.
If your readers are active on Pinterest, create pin-worthy images and join group boards. If they hang out on Facebook, share your posts in relevant groups (where allowed). .
To avoid burnout, I’ve found it’s helpful to create a realistic plan I can actually stick to. That might mean scheduling an hour once a week to plan and batch posts, or using a scheduler.
I use SmarterQueue to schedule many (but not all) of my Pinterest, Instagram, and Facebook posts. I like SmarterQueue because you can use their a la carte pricing to build a plan that works for you and the platforms you want to schedule.
MiloTree offers a pop-up that you can set for the social media platform you want to grow. When I was just starting out, I used it to increase my Pinterest following.
My advice is to start sharing your work and connecting with your readers now on your favorite platforms. Enjoy the process without letting social media dominate too much of your time.
As your site traffic grows, you may opt to hire a VA or a social media management company to take over these tasks so you can focus on bigger priorities.
How to Make Money Blogging
One of the most exciting aspects of blogging is the potential to turn your passion into profit. Once your blog starts gaining traction and steady traffic, there are several ways to begin earning money. Here are the most common monetization strategies—and how they work.
Advertising
Display advertising is one of the most popular ways bloggers earn passive income. Once your site meets a certain threshold of monthly sessions or pageviews, you can apply to a premium ad network.
These are some of the more commonly used ad companies. They’ll automatically place ads on your site and pay you based on views and engagement.
- Raptive – Known for excellent customer service, helpful blogging tools, educational resources, and some of the highest ad payouts in the industry. You’ll need at least 100,000 monthly pageviews to apply.
- Raptive Rise – Raptive’s entry-level network requires 50,000 monthly pageviews to apply.
- Mediavine – A favorite among lifestyle and food bloggers, Mediavine requires 50,000 sessions a month to apply. They offer a user-friendly dashboard and helpful educational resources for optimizing your income. Mediavine is the ad company for BENSA Bacon Lovers Society.
- Journey – Journey is Mediavine’s entry-level ad network. To apply, you’ll need 10,000 monthly pageviews. (This site uses Journey for ads.)
- SHE Media – A lifestyle-focused ad network designed to support women content creators. SHE Media is a good option for bloggers with at least 20,000 monthly pageviews.
- Ezoic – A beginner-friendly ad platform that uses AI to optimize ad placements for higher earnings. Ezoic accepts newer sites with lower traffic requirements.
Affiliate Relationships
Affiliate marketing is another effective way to earn money by recommending products or services you genuinely use and love. When someone clicks on your affiliate link and makes a purchase, you earn a commission—without any additional cost to your reader.
- Amazon Associates – Amazon’s affiliate program is easy to join, and offers a wide range of products. You earn a small percentage from any qualifying purchases made through your unique links.
- Affiliate programs with retailers – Many retailers and online companies offer affiliate programs either directly or through platforms like ShareASale or Impact. If you write about cooking, home, or lifestyle content, these programs can be a great fit.
- Products you personally use and love – Think about the tools, services, and gear you already use for your blog or hobbies. If they offer affiliate programs, that’s a great place to start.
Sell Products
Another way to generate income is by creating and selling your own products. This can include digital products like eBooks, printables, online courses, or templates.
I sell bacon-themed t-shirts, aprons, and other items through my Bacon Lovers USA Etsy Store.
I’ve also written a number of cookbooks that I promote in my newsletters and online. Instead of physical books, some bloggers create and sell e-books on their sites. The great thing about creating and selling a book is that it can continue to bring in income long after you create the product.
Selling your own products gives you full control over pricing, promotion, and profit, and can be a great way to supplement advertising income.
Sponsored Content
As a blogger, one of the most effective ways to generate additional income is through sponsored content. Sponsored content is when a brand or advertiser pays you to create and publish content that promotes their products or services in a way that resonates with your audience.
Unlike traditional display ads, where revenue is generated on a per-click or per-impression basis, sponsored content involves a direct, negotiated payment between you and the brand. This payment is typically a fixed, upfront amount, agreed upon before the content is created. The fee you can charge will depend on factors like your blog’s audience size, engagement levels, niche, and the value you can provide to the sponsor.
Over the years I’ve worked with various brands for sponsorships, including event promotions, product reviews, and giveaways. Some of these were hosted directly on my site, while others were promoted through my social media channels.
When considering sponsored content, you’ll want to focus on brands that align with your values and fit well with your niche and audience’s interests. Clearly labeling sponsored posts will help your readers know when content is a paid partnership. This builds trust, and will reassure your readers that your recommendations are authentic.
How Much Do Food Bloggers Make?
The amount of income a food blogger can earn varies widely, but if you want to be super inspired check out the quarterly income reports from Midwest Foodie Blog. Kylie is crushing it, and I’m always grateful for her transparency in sharing her income and expenses to help other bloggers.
Final Thoughts
There are many different ways to make money as a blogger, and what I love most is that you can choose the strategies that feel like the best fit for you and your audience.
Whether it’s running ads, sharing affiliate links, working with sponsors, or creating your own products, you don’t have to do everything at once.
I started small and learned as I went—and over time, those efforts have grown into a business I truly love.
If you’re inspired to start a blog, I’ll be right here cheering for you and wishing you every success along the way!
~ Eliza