How To Set Up Your New Blog

Ingredients Of A Good Blog:

Here are some of the main ingredients that will help to make your blog a profitable functioning fun blog:

Your Own Domain Name, Heading and Description, RSS Feed Subscription Buttons, Widgets, Autoresponders, Affiliate Widgets like Amazon, Chitika and Google AdSense, Ping Buttons or Links, Tag Clouds, Donate Buttons, FeedJit Widgets and a WebRing Banner.

Recipe For A Profitable Blog:

You will want to have your own domain name. Having your own domain name will help you to build credibility and establish your reputation as a serious writer and blogger. People are more likely to respond to advertisements with TheBlogName.com as the Url than to a long free blog Url. A domain name is an important investment in blogging and it only costs about $10 a year. If you have a free Blogger blog you can arrange for your visitors to be redirected to your Blogger Url.

Try to think of a name that describes your blog but is not too lengthy. If you are using a free blog service that name will be put before the name of the blog service. If you have a Blogger blog it will be put before blogspot.com. Shorter domain names and Urls are easier to work with. They are also easier to remember and type. After you have decided on some suitable names search for them on a domain registration website. They may be available as dot com or dot net websites.

Think about your blog's heading and description. You will be using the same keywords in your blog, your blog heading and the description. There is plenty of space at the top of your blog for an interesting heading and an elaborate description. Remember you want to get and keep your readers' interest and attention.

At the top of your blog or in the sidebar you will probably place an RSS Feed button. That is one way readers will subscribe to your blog's RSS feed. You could also put some Autoresponder buttons or links at the top of your blog. You could have your RSS subscription buttons and autoresponder buttons at the top of your blog or in the sidebar.

The sidebar is a place where you can also place your widgets. You can also put a blidget of one of your other blogs there. You will probably also place Amazon, Chitika, AdSense, Bidvertiser and other affiliate widgets there to help monetize your blog.

You may also have some blog directory buttons in the sidebar that show your ranking in the directory. Visitors can click the buttons and vote for your blog or increase your ranking. FeedJit has widgets you can place on your blog that show traffic statistics. There are also traffic map widgets that show there the traffic is coming from. You can also put popular pages and recommended reading FeedJit widgets on your blog. These widgets show your visitors the more visited pages and pages similar to those they're viewing.

You may also place a ping button in your sidebar to ping when you update your blog. Every time you add a post or change your blog you should ping. You can put a link to a ping on your blog.

You may have some links you want to place in your blog. You can arrange them together alphabetically or another way as a Link List in your sidebar. Blogger has a Link List feature you can use to manage your Link Lists.

Another interesting helpful feature is a tag cloud. A tag cloud shows your visitors what people are looking at on your blog. Tags shown in larger letters are being looked at more. You can place your tag cloud at the top of your blog or in the sidebar. You can also place tag clouds from your other blogs or swickis there to attract readers' interest.

If you have affiliate banners you want to put on your blog you can place them after the main body of your blog, the posts. You can also add any feeds you think your readers will like. After the banners and feeds you can put some donation buttons to help monetize your blog. You can put Amazon Honor System donation buttons and PayPal Donate buttons there. You can also put those buttons in the sidebar or at the top of your blog.

At the bottom of your blog you can place your WebRing banners. If you look at WebRing directories you can find a WebRing for your blog. After you join the WebRing you will get some code to put on your blog.

Now you are all set to start making money with your new blog. You will make more money if your post to your blog frequently. Try to remember to post to your blog every day and ping every time you update your blog. You should also advertise your blog.