A blog can become a side project, a hobby, or even a part of your business. If you have been doubting whether you can pull off a blog, it’s time to stop hesitating and try it yourself. You don’t have to be a professional to start — everyone can create a blog, especially in 2025, when there are so many convenient tools and programs that will make this process a piece of cake. With a free website builder, you can launch your blog right now. Site.pro offers everything you need for a blog — beautiful templates, AI features, SEO tools, and one of the cheapest domains on the market.
However, even with the most advanced tools, you still should plan your blog beforehand. Follow these simple 9 steps to launch a successful blog and avoid common mistakes.
Step 1 — Find Your Niche
Before you start thinking about technical stuff, you need to decide on why you want to write for a blog. You can use a blog as an extension of your business, to tell people about your journey and share your experiences. A blog can also be a great way to connect with your clients.
Think about what sparks your interest, ask yourself: ‘What am I passionate about?’ But also, consider your readers. Who are they? What are they interested in? Why should they read you and not anyone else? Find your niche, something that makes you unique. While you’re on it, brainstorm ideas for your future posts and try to come up with a name for your blog. Your theme will determine the design of your website, so be precise and write down the vibe you want to go for.
The name of your blog will likely also become a domain name for your website, so think carefully. It should be memorable and original so your blog won’t be mistaken for anyone else’s.
Step 2 — Find a Blogging Platform
Depending on the purpose of your blog and your type of content, one platform might suit you better than another. Right now, you can either join a social media platform with blogging features or create one of your own. In 2025, the most prominent microblogging platforms are Threads, Twitter (now X), Facebook, Bluesky, and Tumblr.
Social media and microblogging platforms
The main advantage social media platforms have over building your own blogging website is their algorithm system. If you follow a specific set of rules, adapt your content for a platform, and use tags correctly, your posts will be automatically shown to a large audience. You can indeed acquire a big and active following rather quickly. If you’re lucky enough, you can even pull it off for free.
However, navigating social media requires a good instinct and the knowledge of hidden rules — every platform has those. Some social media are more strict with sensitive topics than others, meaning you often need to be very careful with your wording.
The terms of service always change. What was allowed one day might be banned the next. Your account, no matter how big it is, will not be immune to a sudden deactivation. Not every account can be restored, even if it was banned mistakenly.
Not much customization is allowed on social media. It would be difficult to implement a store or forms if you need those. You can create custom themes on some platforms (like, for example, Tumblr), but you’ll need to code it yourself with HTML.
| Pros | Cons |
| Free to join | Little to no customization |
| Social media’s algorithm can be used to your advantage | Your page is not actually yours — you need to follow the terms of service of your platform |
| Opportunity to go viral | You’ll need to adapt your content for the platform |
| Bad SEO (your blog won’t rank high on Google) |
Starting a blog on a social media website is a potential way to get viral quickly, but you need to keep in mind that it is often a question of pure luck and money, too. You should never expect to blow up the moment you start your blog.
CMS
CMS stands for a ‘Content Management System’. CMS and website builders both achieve the goal of creating a blogging website from scratch, but their means and advantages are different. Popular examples of CMS are WordPress and Joomla.
CMS gives you full control over website creation. It is open-source technology, so you can customize every aspect of it and implement your own code. To some extent, CMS provides pre-made assets, such as design templates. But overall, CMS provides you with the instruments; everything else you have to do yourself. You’ll need to find hosting servers, buy a domain, and manage the maintenance of your website. Moreover, the open-source nature of CMS can be an upside and a downside at the same time — freedom of code customization leads to potential security vulnerability.
CMS might be free at the baseline, but hosting servers, domains, and additional plugins are not.
| Pros | Cons |
| The most customizable option | Requires HTML knowledge |
| Free* | Has a learning curve |
| The website can be transferred between the hosting servers | Security vulnerability |
| You’ll need to pay extra for plugins |
Overall, CMS is a great tool, but it might be a little complicated for beginners.
Website builders
The mission of website builders is so everyone can build a website regardless of their background. Website builders provide an intuitive drag & drop system that allows the creation of websites from pre-made blocks. Every element in a builder can be moved and changed freely. Additionally, website builders’ plans come with ready-to-go templates, hosting services, security, and customer support all at once. They don’t require prior knowledge in coding, yet have a lot of room for customization. Popular website builders for blogs include Site.pro, Wix, and Squarespace.
However, some of them can be expensive, depending on what platform and plan you choose. Before committing to a website builder, compare the pricing of different solutions.
| Pros | Cons |
| Ease of use | The cost differs |
| Customizable in design and functionality | Not every builder lets you implement your own plugins and code |
| All-in-one tool for website creation | |
| Optimized for SEO |
But not all website builders are restrictive or expensive. Site.pro offers all the necessary features for starting a blog for free, including a wide range of templates, a custom domain, SEO optimization features, and more. Its paid plans are also very cheap, starting at only $1.20/month.
Website builders are the most balanced solution when it comes to starting a blog. You can easily build a website that will show up high on Google and promote it on your social media accounts.
Step 3 — Set Up Your Website
Whether you choose a social media platform, a CMS, or a website builder, you need to set up your blog. With social media, you don’t have much room for making it look unique, but with builders and CMS — it’s a whole other story.
Building a website for your blog is not as difficult as it looks. After all, you can use premade templates, arrange blocks as you like, and add images, videos, and links.
If you struggle with the starting point — look at what other blogs look like. You can gather inspiration and copy some assets, like layouts and menus, and tweak them later to make them truly yours.
You can also use AI to generate a website for you. More and more website builders are starting to implement the AI feature to facilitate website creation even further. With Site.pro, you can write a prompt in the text field, and AI will generate a website in seconds. Try typing in something like ‘Create a website for my blog’. When writing a prompt, it’s better to be specific: include your theme, your desired color palette — everything that comes to your mind. AI-generated websites will have some AI-generated content like pictures, videos, and text, which you can either use or change later.
What sections your blog can include:
- Homepage: Introduce yourself and your blog; here you can place previews of your latest posts.
- Menu: Don’t flood it with too many links. The main purpose of a menu is to make your website easy to navigate.
- Blog page: The timeline of your posts.
- Archive: It may include images, useful links, etc.
- Contacts: Leave your e-mail and links to where else people can find you.
The last, but not the least important part of setting up your blog is to choose a domain. A domain for your blog represents your personality, and it will become your brand, too. It must be instantly recognizable and preferably short. You can include your name to strengthen the personal connection and add a domain zone ‘.blog’ to indicate that your website is your blog. For example, ‘janedoingstuff.blog’.
If possible, the domain should also have keywords in it that relate to the theme of your blog, be it your business or hobby. You can buy a domain directly through the website builder on Site.pro by clicking on ‘Domains’ in the top menu. The system will show you available domain zones and how much each of them costs.
Of course, you can get away with a free custom domain, but removing your provider’s subdomain will enhance your brand and make your blog more credible.
Step 4 — Run a UX Test
Most people skip this part, especially when they don’t build a website for commerce. But usability is important for every website, and UX testing can really enhance the experience of your readers. Just ask your friends to find something on your website, click on the buttons, and let them share their opinions with you. After all, you want your blog to be read and engaged with, so user experience matters.
A UX test can reveal what
your website lacks and point out obvious bugs you didn’t notice yourself. Don’t neglect it!
Step 5 — Optimize SEO
Optimizing SEO is important for search engines like Google and Yahoo. If you want people to be able to find your blog organically, you have to do it.
How to optimize SEO:
- Make user-friendly links. An example of a good link is janedoingstuff.blog/blog/how-to-make-good-urls/. A bad one, on the other hand, would be just a bunch of letters and numbers.
- Add alternative text. It helps SEO while also making your website accessible to people with limited vision capabilities. To add alternative text to your images in Site.pro’s builder, click on an image and write down the text in the text field in the right menu.
- Add keywords, meta titles, and descriptions. They can also be generated with AI directly through a builder.
Step 6 — Plan Your Posts
The main secret of a successful blog is consistency and planning. Make a spreadsheet, organize your ideas for posts, and come up with a content plan. For a start, a month would be enough; you can always expand your plan.
Pro-tip: write down ideas the moment they pop up in your head. Never trust your memory!
Step 7 — Start Writing
Of course, you can write your first post even before you create a blog, but when you already have an organized space, it’s much easier to actually start writing.
Don’t rely on inspiration too much. Writing for a blog should be a habit if you want to achieve success. You can also invite other authors to write for your blog.
Experiment with format: make interviews, Q&A sessions, write about your experience of starting a blog, interact with your readers — don’t let yourself get stuck in made-up conventions.
The content of your blog should be future-proof to stay relevant, so don’t chase the clout aimlessly.
Step 8 — Post & Promote
Sharing your writing is always a bit scary, but don’t be shy. Share your work proudly on social media, recommend it to your friends and colleagues. Of course, first, you need to have at least some content so people can decide whether they are interested in following your blog.
Step 9 — Monetize Your Blog
There are many ways to monetize your blog. You can place ads or other authors’ posts, share your platform with brands when you’re big enough.
You can also consider joining an affiliate program of a website builder. An affiliate program is a partner program for creatives and businesses. As an affiliate, you receive a link, and every time a user clicks on this link and buys a paid plan from a website builder, you get paid a commission rate. It could become your passive source of stable income.
Website builders usually pay from 20% to 50% of the price of a plan bought with affiliate links. Joining an affiliate program is free, but usually requires you to fill out an application and wait for approval on a website builder’s part. Some website builders are more strict than others, but joining Site.pro’s affiliate program is easy and accessible to anyone who completed the registration. You can access your affiliate link through the ‘My Websites’ page.
Conclusion
Managing a blog is a lot of work, but if you break down this process into simple parts, it isn’t very difficult from a technical standpoint. The hardest part is to start. We hope that this article will give you confidence and inspire you to launch your blog!
