My First Attempt at Blogging.
Initially I wanted to build a blog from scratch because after all a blog is nothing more than a website. So built here is how I got started:
Posted on 01-01-08 - The Timeline and Technologies Used to Create TommyBlog.com
I decided to create my own blog rather than using a one of the free blog services because I want to complete control over my blog. Since I am not a lawyer and do not read all the technology disclaimers that come my way I decided to do it myself from scratch. The good part is that you can be as creative as you want to be. The not so good part is that it takes longer than you expect. Once the blog has been designed and is place then you can concentrate on the content. Remember when creating a blog Content is King! Before doing anything have a plan. Set reasonable mile stone deadlines for your plan. Here are the steps I used to create TommyBlog.com:
- Decide on the content you want to discuss. June, July, August and September 2007 kept thinking of what type of content I could offer. September 6th 2007 decided to write a blog about “making money while teaching others to do the same.” The content was now decided.
- Decided to purchase domain name. September 7th 2007 purchased TommyBlog.com domain name from www.GoDaddy.com for five years at a cost of $44.75.
- September 14th through November 11th I developed a plan that consisted of the topics I wanted to discuss. The plan was to have a basic blog built by January 1st 2008 and start blogging daily on how I drive traffic as well as ad revenue to the site.
- Purchased Microsoft Expression Web Professional Design Tool from Office Depot for approximately $275.00. This is the website design tool I used to create the website. I like this product because it allows me to setup a website template and make changes to the template propagating the changes throughout the website.
- November 17th 2007 drew on paper how the site would flow from one web page to another. Began building the website.
- December 23rd 2007 I purchased Deluxe Windows hosting service for one year from www.GoDaddy.com at $75.46.
- December 29th signed up for Google Adsense, Kontera.com and Amazon affiliate advertising programs. Also decided to add Tommy Blog Ad Sponsorship. This requires opening a PayPal.com account to create the currency button and accept payments.
- December 30th signed up for Google Analytics to help me see what people are most interested in reading. Added the Google Analytics java script code to my web pages.
- December 31st 2007 tested for broken links and spelling errors.
- January 1st 2008 logged in to the GoDaddy.com hosting service using File Transfer Protocol (FTP) and uploaded the entire file in the website to the hosting server.
What I didn’t realize at the time that I wasted a lot time, energy and money. After blogging for three months with my custom built blog I learned there is an easier way that costs next to nothing. In my next post I will describe how to setup a custom blog in less than hour with little or no money.
Subscribe to the TommyBlog.com RSS feed so you do not miss any of the future posts.
Thank you,
Tom
