Daily Cup of Tech

When you are new to blogging, the task of setting up and running a blog can seem to be either extremely easy or extremely difficult.

If it seems extremely easy, you are probably in for a really rude awakening.

If it seems extremely difficult, then you are ready to make an educated decision about setting up, running, and maintaining a quality blog.

Regardless of where you, the fact that you are thinking of starting a blog has probably lead you here to this page. There are a lot of things to do to get ready for a quality blog. While this is not a comprehensive list and there are probably things that I have missed, I hope that this provides you with a good list of things to at least thing about when you are setting up your blog.

In the interest of full disclosure, some of the links below are affiliate links. These are services that I use and I recommend them without reservation.

Research

1. Pick your niche area. Write about what you know and love.
2. Research your niche.
3. Discover similar blogs.
4. Know your audience and what they want to read about.
5. Pick a great domain name and register it.
6. Decide whether you want to host your own blog or go on a blogging site.
   • Wordpress.com
   • Blogger.com
   • LiveJournal.com
   • Others
7. Select a blog host.

Monetizing

1. Decide if you want to monetize your blog or not.
2. Know when to monetize your blog.
3. Find ways to monetize your blog:
   1. Pay per click ads (Adsense)
   2. Pay per post ads (PayPerPost, ReviewMe, LoudLaunch)
   3. Flat rate per month ads (Text Link Ads)
   4. Pay per thousand impressions ads (Feedburner)
   5. Donations
   6. Subscriptions
   7. Sell merchandise (CafePress)
   8. Other
4. Select appropriate channels for generating income.
5. Select ways to receive money
   1. PayPal
   2. OneBip

Design

1. Select blogging software (server and client side) to standardize on.
   Server Side
   1. Wordpress
   2. Movable Type
   3. TypePad
   4. Community Server
   5. b2evolution
   6. bblog
   7. blog:CMS
   8. blojsom
   9. Blosxom
   10. NucleusCSM
   11. Pivot
   12. Serendipity
   13. SPIP
   14. .Text
   15. Textpattern

   Client Side (Thanks to Wordpress for the list)
   

   1. blog2go
   2. BlogDesk
   3. BloGTK
   4. BlogJet
   5. Blog Writer
   6. DashBlog
   7. Deepest Sender
   8. Drivel
   9. Ecto
   10. Elicit
   11. Flock
   12. Gnome Blog
   13. JBlogEditor
   14. Journler
   15. MarsEdit
   16. Mo:blog
   17. Plogit
   18. Post2Blog
   19. Post2Blog Express
   20. Qumana
   21. RapidMetaBlog
   22. ScribeFire
   23. Semagic
   24. Vagablog
   25. w.bloggar
   26. WB Editor
   27. Windows Live Writer
   28. WordPressDash
   29. WriteToMyBlog
   30. Zoundry Blog Writer
2. Become familiar with the software and how to customize it.
3. Become familiar with basics of web design such as PHP, SQL, Java, HTML, etc.
4. Select an appropriate theme for your blog.
5. Customize your theme to make it your own or make your own.
6. Add a favicon or make your own.
7. Decide on other services your blog will supply:
   • Forums/Bulletin Board
   • Gallery
   • Wiki
   • Link Voting
   • Groupware
   • e-Learning
   • Web Operating System
   • Other

Getting the Word Out

1. Make sure your blog has an RSS feed that is easy to find and subscribe to.
2. E-mail your friends about your new blog.
3. Write appropriate comments in other blogs that you have relevant content in your blog.
4. Set up to ping Technorati and other blog cataloging sites. Make sure you claim your blog.
5. Make a free business cards and hand them out.
6. Sign up for Google Webmaster Tools.

Work Ahead

1. Have a number of posts ready to launch as soon as your blog goes live.
2. Resist temptation to blast all of the posts out at once.
3. Plan series and weekly features for your blog.

Monitor Your Blog

1. Decide on a proper tracking system.
2. Watch specific information about visitors to your site:
   1. Daily visits
   2. Daily pageviews
   3. Average pageviews per visit
   4. Daily RSS readers
   5. Inbound sources
   6. Popular content
   7. Entry pages
   8. New vs. returning readers
   9. Countries readers from
   10. Web browsers readers using

Maintain Your Blog

1. Make appropriate changes to better suite your audience.
2. Keep content fresh so that readers keep coming back.  Update at least a few times a week.
3. Respond to comments on your posts.

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