What I Wish I Knew Before Starting A Blog in 2021

Believe it or not, this is my 2^nd blog. I love blogging, but there are so many things what I wish I knew before starting a blog.

Blogging has been one of my hobbies since I was a teenager. I started out on Wattpad with writing novels. Then for a while, Pinterest had a blogging aesthetic. Finally, in 2020, I started my first real blog. But this blog isn’t even my first real blog that I tried to earn money from. I started my first blog in 2017 and quit after a month or so. I gave up so again in 2018 after getting frustrated with the coding in my website and messing it up.

In my previous blog that I sold, I usually wrote blog posts that showed a realistic viewpoint of blogging instead of these huge results and payment reports. I recently sold my blog, which averaged about 5k monthly views after a year and a half.

I love writing blog posts and creating content online. But blogging (just like any other platform) takes a lot of work. Many bloggers downplay how time-consuming and difficult it is to maintain a blog. But let me give you everything I wish I knew a year and a half ago, so you can succeed as a new blogger.

 

What I Wish I Knew Before Starting a Blog

 

1. You will not get rich overnight.

One of the biggest misconceptions about blogging is that it can make you rich overnight. Sorry to burst that bubble early on, but blogging is like any other business. It takes time. Most bloggers that say they made $10k in one month of blogging is most likely a blogger with years of experience and a huge audience OR if they are new, they are most likely selling you a course on how to start a blog without any substance which is most people. If you are lucky enough for Pinterest to boost your pins and account, then sure it’s possible to make some money early on. But the expectation of making tons of money with little effort in blogging is not accurate.

It took me about a year and a half of blogging, an actual 6-8 months of consistent work, and tweaking my SEO strategy to make enough money to fill up my gas tank. Learning affiliate marketing and SEO will probably give the quickest results.

2. It takes A LOT of content to get A LOT OF views.

When I first started my first blog I expected to get tons of views for a few pieces of content. I didn’t get virality from Pinterest, so that meant I had to go back to the drawing board. I was comparing myself to huge bloggers with tons of content and hundreds of thousands of monthly views. One thing that bloggers don’t mention is that you will need tons of content to get tons of views. I even read in one Facebook blogging group that a few of your blog posts will give the majority of your pageviews, which was true for my previous blog.

These two blog posts were the reason I got more views, and they both lead to more views on my other posts. Basically, more content = more chances for you to get more views. Ten blog posts will not do it UNLESS you know how to work Google SEO or go viral on social media.

3. Think of your blog as a business.

One thing I wish I knew before starting a blog is to think of it as a business. I didn’t realize that until I took By Sophia Lee’s Perfecting Blogging Course, where she explains the concept more in-depth. Prior to the course, I spent tons of money on hosting and other pointless things. Even when launching this blog, I quickly bought a theme that did not fit this blog’s niche. It’s important for you to also do tons of research and find helpful guides about web hosting and other blogging-related topics and blogger’s reviews before spending tons of money.

Think like a business from the beginning. You should do tasks like:

• Setting a budget.
• Keep tracking of finances.
• Learning what are your returns on investments.
• Hiring for what you can’t do or learn.

4. Reserve around $500 to start your blog.

I go against every popular blogger who recommends BlueHost or Siteground as your first host. I did it with my very first blog a few years ago after graduating high school…but my jaw dropped when I saw the renewal costs. I recommend LyricalHost due to their monthly subscription that will be the same price no matter what and they also have phenomenal customer service.

But by saying that, you need to have money to start a blog, especially if you want to make money. You’ll need the initial price of hosting and web domain. Then, you’ll need to buy a theme and subscriptions to design graphics.

Simply, invest in your blogging business.

Related: Lyrical Host Review (with a Promo Code Inside) | As Told By Ariel Blogging

5. Spend money wisely on courses.

What I wish I knew before starting a blog was actually taking courses before starting a blog and thinking about my spending decisions on blogging courses. Most blogging courses out there contain information that can be easily found online. Google is free. Just spend a few hours just reading and searching. Hundreds of bloggers give free blogging tips all the time. Simply, going through Pinterest and YouTube will get you pretty far.

However, it’s important to see learn from a seasoned blogger what to do to succeed.  

I was a broke college student so I couldn’t drop $1k on a course (and still won’t). I never spent more than $200 on a course, and each season I saved up to buy another course or waited until the blogger had a sale on the course. I also did tons of research on each course and look at several unbiased reviews on each one.

The main blogging course I recommend people start out with is By Sophia Lee’s Perfecting Blogging Course. I got it when it first came out and it is honestly why I’m still blogging. I followed Sophia for years and read and watched all her blogging content. So she was a trusted source. Sophia’s course stands out compared to other blogging courses because she showed and explains in detail her strategy while also being honest about the blogging world.

6. Learn SEO ASAP.

SEO is my main source of traffic and the most consistent. Most bloggers will stay away from Google SEO because it’s a little tricker and seems harder. But it’s not. It’s way more consistent than social media (which I’ll get into later in the post). The reason my previous blog’s traffic increased 857% after 6 months was because of Google SEO. Pinterest gave me only 10% of my traffic while 85% was all because of Google.

I learned more about Google SEO in Sarah Chetrit’s Not Your Average SEO Course. Particularly, I learned how to correctly optimize my old blog posts, boost my ranking and how to use SEO to my advantage. I’m still using the information from her course and my job to launch this blog.

I can’t recommend learning Google SEO enough. I truly believe every new blogger should learn how to navigate it before social media.

Related: The Best SEO Course for Bloggers That’s Under $200

7. Put social media marketing on the back burner.

As someone who studied and works in digital marketing, you can’t put all your eggs into social media. You can follow all the tips and algorithms for months and nothing can still happen. This happened with my last blog’s Pinterest (and several blogger’s accounts in the Facebook groups I’m in) where my account was placed on a spam block.

Don’t get me wrong, social media is amazing for advertising your blog and growing a platform. But you are at the mercy of the algorithms and hoping that it places your content in front of the correct audience. Also, apps like Instagram are changing their algorithm, and it’s way harder to grow on there than ever. Don’t let me get started on how your account can be taken down for no reason other than it just does.

I saw this with tons of bloggers in my Pinterest courses’ Facebook groups. Many of them were not well versed in social media and failed to realize they needed to have more than one stream of traffic (similar to income). After a Pinterest update, they lost their traffic, and some even lost clients and brand deals. This is also because so many bloggers wanted quick results and relied on random spikes of traffic—outside of seasonal content which is a whole different topic.

Bloggers should aim to have consistent traffic, and SEO will give you more consistency compared to social media’s random spikes. It’s nice to have spikes in traffic once you have an established number of viewers.

Basically, have multiple streams of traffic and do not rely on social media so much that the algorithm changes can ruin your stream of traffic entirely.

8. Plan all you want, but it takes action.

I’ve planned my blog posts and content for Pinterest for the longest and on time (2-3 months ahead of time), but never wrote the ideas out or made the content. Action is the keyword here. You can plan all you want, but the later you wait, the more difficult it can be. Honestly, I wish I would have started my old college blog before last year in 2020. I took enough action to complete some of my blogging goals. I also did not like the content I was writing anymore, so I took the action of selling my blog to start this one.

Within one month, I launched this one and wrote 4-5 blog posts. Action is what is needed. Trust me, no one cares about you flopping. I also rather take action and make tons of mistakes at 50 page views per day, than 5,000 views a day. Just do it, as Nike says.

Related: 10 Productivity Tips For Bloggers That’ll Make Blogging Easier

9. Join Facebook groups.

Facebook is not the most popular social media for people my age. I purposely try to avoid it at all costs (especially around election time, lol). BUT Facebook Groups are probably the thing that really changed my knowledge on blogging for sure. It is one of the top things I wish I knew before starting a blog.

I know that I mentioned Facebook groups a lot throughout this post but it’s true. Join them. Find active blogging groups on Facebook because there will be tons of people who have failed and made mistakes that you can learn from. There will be tons of people asking questions that you probably had as well. It’s also cool to network with bloggers, too.

10. Monetize with ads first, then worry about affiliate marketing.

Next, what I wish I knew before starting a blog is to find an ad program that will accept you as a young blog and monetize early on. I did not start displaying ads on my old blog until about 9 months in. I know it may sound pointless to have ads if you don’t have that much traffic, but it’s better to do it early before a wave of traffic happens and you have to wait to be approved and wait some more for verification and to see if the ads are on correctly. Just start out with ads and then worry about affiliate marketing.

Affiliate marketing took me 8 months to make enough money to get paid. Also, get with a high-paying affiliate marketing program. Learn about conversion rates and how much the company takes out because some affiliate programs will leave you with crumbs.

11. Write seasonal content early.

Finally, I did not know what seasonal content was until I took By Sophia Lee’s Perfecting Blogging Course. I wasn’t a décor blogger or a food blogger, so seasonal content seemed silly for me as a then-college blogger. But before I sold my blog, I wrote about a fall bucket list and it ranked on the first page of Google and was going to make up for the dip in traffic from my dorm and college move-in content. This is one important thing to know before starting a blog no matter what your niche is.

Seasonal content is content related to holidays and seasons. Like businesses, your blog will have an influx of traffic during a certain period. For example, my college blog peaked during the summer which is when college freshmen look up stuff for dorms. You should write seasonal content to make up for the loss that will happen.

At first, it felt so inauthentic and difficult for me to write seasonal content, but seasonal content is what people will click on more, which will bring attention to other blog posts. You also need to write seasonal content 2-3 months before the season peaks, which I learned the hard way. No one is going to read your Thanksgiving content on Thanksgiving day or your move-in content on the first day of school.

Overall, blogging takes a lot of patience and trial and error.

This blog was all about what I wish I knew before starting a blog. Hopefully, this help you learn more about blogging.

Other Post Blogs To Read Before You Go:

• How To Start a Blog in 2022
• My Blogging Journey: 6 Month Update
• 11 Common Beginner Blogging Mistakes You Should Avoid To Become a Successful Blogger