If you are blogging for dollars without using your own domain name, you are putting yourself at a disadvantage.
The reason is having your own domain name means you are in control of your blog.
Having your own domain name can mean the difference between failing and succeeding.
Having your own domain is not only easy, but its inexpensive also.
You can but a domain for around $9 a year, and get hosting for about $5 a month.
Why do you need your own domain? Well having a business is partly about branding.
Let's say you already have a WordPress blog but it is hosted free on WordPress.
Your domain name would look something like YourBlogName.
WordPress.
This means WordPress owns you domain name, not you.
If you register your own domain you could have something like YourBlogName.
Then you have more control over your blog, and it starts making you look more professional.
Also setting a blog up on your own domain is as easy as pushing a few buttons and answering a couple of easy questions.
You can have a blog setup on your own domain in about 5 minutes, it really is that easy.
It's also easy to change the look of your website by adding what are called themes, and adding additional features with things called plugins.
Both of these allow you to adapt your website the way you want it, and there are thousands of each that you can download for free.
So now that we have some basic information out of the way, let's talk about the three main stages of blogging for dollars: Stage 1 - Find a Niche A niche is nothing more than a market.
You need to find something to blog about.
The most successful blogs are targeted to a niche.
When looking for a niche you want to find a topic that people are spending money on.
So lets say you want to blog about weight loss.
Is that going to be a good topic? Yes.
You don't even need to do any research to know that people spend money on weight loss.
There are pills, diet plans, fitness programs, and more.
You can't turn on the TV without seeing several commercials related to this niche every night.
So find a niche where people have a need for something.
You also want people in that market to have a desire to spend money to satisfy that need.
When you find that combination, you have your niche.
Once you select a niche, you only blog about that topic.
You don't blog about other things.
What do I mean? If you blog about the weight loss niche, stick to that.
Don't start talking about taking vacations in one post, and about what you dog or kids did in another post.
People are not there to see that.
They are there to read about the weight loss information you post about.
If you start getting off topic, you will loose readers.
Stage 2 - Blogging for Dollars Now that you chose a niche, you need to find way to make cash with your blog.
There are a couple of ways you can do this.
One is to set up Google AdSense for you blog, the other is to sell affiliate products.
AdSense is a code that you can paste into your site.
It is not that hard really.
There are blog themes that are already setup to display AdSense on them, all you need to do is put your code in and Google does the rest.
The code is easy to get also.
All you do is sign up through Google and they give you the code.
Before you ca sign up though, you have to have a domain name already to list in the sign up form.
This is because that is part of how Google knows where to look to make the ads work properly on your site.
Affiliate marketing is just selling other peoples products.
Basically all you have to do is talk about a product or service related to your niche.
Explain how it benefits the readers, and provide a link for them to learn more about the product.
You provide good free content on your site and then mix in product reviews and recommendations every few posts.
The free info you provide, as long as its quality info, will gain the trust of your readers.
Then when you make a recommendation, your readers are more likely to check out your recommendations.
So to find affiliate products for your niche, you do a search on the internet for products that your niche is interested in.
Let's take the weight loss example again.
To find affiliate programs for that market you would search for "weight loss affiliate program.
" Then find some that you think are good and sign up.
A good affiliate program will provide you tools to help with your blog promotions.
Stage 3 - Setup Your Blog Once you have your domain name and hosting like we talked about above, your host company will provide you with something called a Cpanel.
A Cpanel is a area that has a lot of ways to control your site.
This is where you can set up different email addresses, view how many visitors you've had, and there is a section called Fantastico.
Fantastico is a link you can click on it has a smiley face icon with it that is usually light blue in color.
Click that and it will take you to a screen that has different programs and scripts you can install on your website.
One of these on the left side of the screen will say WordPress.
Click that and it opens an install window for you.
Then all you have to do is fill in a few lines of information it asks for, like your domain name and email address.
Then you click a couple of buttons and your blog is installed.
To start blogging for dollars you need to set up your blog the right way from the beginning.
These 3 steps will ensure you get it done right.
From there you need to find a training program that will explain in more detail how to build that blog into a 5 figure a month business.