One of the great things about creating and maintaining a blog is that it doesn’t cost much to get started. For example, WordPress, the best blogging tool in my opinion, is free. Here is a list of some blogging resources you can use to become a better blogger.
Web Hosting
While you can use a blogging site like WordPress.com, I recommend you create your own separate website with your own domain for your blog. It’s more professional looking and you’ll have much more flexibility and control over your site.
To begin with, you’ll need a domain name and web hosting. The good news is that many web hosting companies will include a domain when you purchase your hosting plan. The other good news is that quality web hosting plans are now very affordable. Here are a couple of my favorite web hosting companies having great sales.
InMotion Hosting – Get 56% off
iPage – Get 80% off
WordPress.org
WordPress.org software is free and is included with most web hosting plans (if it isn’t, look for another hosting company). WordPress is very easy to install and can be customized quite a bit with various plugins and themes. WordPress.org also has a great support forum that you can use if you have any questions.
Visit WordPress.org
StudioPress
Although you can get many nice free WordPress themes directly from the WP repository, you may find after a while that you prefer a more customizable or flexible theme. While there are also many places to purchase WordPress themes, StudioPress is one of the most highly regarded theme providers among the WordPress community.
StudioPress uses the Genesis Framework together with child themes to provide a professional looking and functioning interface to your website. Among their selection of themes are some for photography blogs, foodie blogs, and news or magazine types of sites.
See Examples of StudioPress Themes
Moz
Once you get going with your blog, you’ll need to concentrate on increasing your audience. Creating good content is critical. But, there are also many other factors involved—primarily among them, SEO. Moz is a site/company that specializes in providing tools to help you improve your search engine optimization.
Moz provides tools that can assist you with SEO, link building, content marketing, social media, and branding. You can even try out their services free for 30 days.