Learning how to start a blog in Nigeria can be overwhelming for beginners because of the consistency, skills and discipline that are involved. Starting and growing a blog is not a walk in the park; it involves a lot of commitment.
However, just relax, because this ultimate guide for Nigerian beginners will hold you by the hands to show you how to build your blog from the ground up.
The post will begin by guiding you on how you can pick a domain name so your blog will have an identity online before it shows you where you can buy hosting for your blog.
Next, it will explain to you how you can use WordPress to design your blog and also how you can publish your first blog post. Another important point this post will elaborate on is the ways you can make money with your blog.
Finally, it will explain to you how you can promote your blog because creating a blog without promoting it will lead to frustration. Let’s start by defining what a blog is
What is a blog?
A blog is a platform where people can create and publish content on a website. The posts published on a blog appear in reverse chronological order, i.e the new posts replace the old posts.
The homepage of a functional blog changes every week. This means that you will always find new and fresh blog posts at least every week on a blog, the front page is not supposed to be constant.
Why should you start a blog on Nigeria?
When you start a blog in Nigeria, your voice heard; you will be able to express yourself in a way that you would never have. Another important reason why you need a blog is that it is a way to make money online in different ways which will be explained later in this post.
1. Pick your name and niche
The name you choose for your blog has a way of affecting your blog in more ways than you can imagine. It is advisable that you choose a blog name that’s related to your blog niche, easy to understand and catchy.
Your blog should not give people a hard time pronouncing or writing.
What is a blog niche?
A blog niche is an area you decide to focus your blog writing on. It can also be defined as an area of your interest, passion or specialization that you can write about to make an impact and money.
For you to build a brand online, it’s important that you choose a blog niche to give you focus and direction.
Your attention won’t be divided and you will be able to focus on a particular market audience. For you to pick a blog niche, there are questions you can ask yourself to help you in that regard. Let’s look at some of them.
What is Web hosting?
Web hosting is the space provided for you to host your website files on the internet. By doing so, you will be able to access your files at any time. The files will be available to them around the clock.
There are web hosting companies in Nigeria and abroad that you can use to host your blog in Nigeria. These companies have different web hosting packages categorised based on the different needs of websites.
Your selection of website hosting should be based on your blog needs. You can upgrade as your blog grows. Later in this post, we are going to talk about some website hosting plans you can use to design your blog.
What is a domain name?
A domain name is a name used to identify your website or blog. It is also called a website link or URL ( Universal Resource Locator ). When people input the domain name on their website search bar, it will lead them to your website.
Some examples of website URLs are www.facebook.com, www.google.com, and www.amazon.com.
It is common knowledge that many people find it difficult to choose a domain name when they want to start a blog, therefore, we will attempt to show you to do so.
How to choose a domain name to start a blog in Nigeria
One of the important things you must do while starting a blog in Nigeria is to choose a domain name because that is what your blog will recognise. A bad or difficult name will make it difficult for people to remember your blog name. Read further to learn about some tips that can help you to choose your blog name.
1. Coin your blog name from the purpose of your blog
What is the niche you are writing about? Which area are you focusing on? What do you want your blog to be known for?
When you answer the above questions effectively, you will be able to determine the name of your blog.
For example, a news blog like legit.ng is trying to tell you that the website will provide you with legit news. That means that people should expect authentic information from them.
In the same vein, your blog name can tell visitors what to expect from your website.
2. Make your blog name easy and simple to understand
Many people think that having a big and ambiguous name will add credibility to the blog, not knowing that, that is far from the truth.
The easier the name the better, the simpler the name the better.
It is so because people may be impressed with a big name but that won’t make them remember your blog name. But they will remember it if it is simple and catchy or memorable.
Think of names like Facebook, 2go, WhatsApp, Uber, bolt and flutter wave. They all have one thing I’m common; they are short and memorable. You can pluck a leaf from them.
3. Use your name
Sometimes, using your name makes everything simple. When you use your name, you are building a personal brand.
That means you will need to put in a lot of work to make the website content unique to you.
Examples of top bloggers using their names are Neil Patel and Ryan Rob
4. Check for its availability
Even when you have decided on a blog that you feel is perfect for your blog, you will have to check for its availability on a domain Checker.
If it’s available, congratulations, but if it is not available, you will have to change the domain name or check for other domain extensions you can use.
Difference between a website and a blog
As you already noticed, we use the words blog and website interchangeably in this post because they mean almost the same thing with a slight difference. A blog can be called a website but a website cannot be called a blog.
This is because a blog is a type of website and not the other way.
The major difference between a website and a blog is that a blog is dynamic while a website is static. Take, for example, a typical school website, it has information about the school displayed on the website. If you should go back to the website after some months, you will discover that the website will still be the same.
But a typical blog, on the other hand, gets updated at least once a week. This means that the homepage of the blog changes periodically.
Choose a web hosting to start a blog in Nigeria
The web hosting you choose affects the speed of your website, the support you get whenever you get stuck, the money you will spend and a lot of other factors. That’s why it is important that you choose your website hosting provider with care. Some factors to consider while choosing a website hosting are explained below
1. Speed
Just imagine, having a website that is slow, do you know what will cost you?
Traffic, yes, traffic.
A lot of potential visitors will remain as potential visitors without becoming active because the attention span of becoming is very small at this age. Since they can easily visit another blog with just one click, why do you think they have the luxury of time to wait for your blog to load?
Amongst other factors, the hosting provider you choose is a major contributor to the speed of your website. Therefore, you will need to choose a website hosting that has a good reputation.
2. Pricing
Another important factor to consider is the pricing of your website hosting. Some website hosting is very expensive for the features they are offering, therefore, after considering the speed of a website hosting company, you still need to consider the pricing.
Why spend more on a service if you can get it elsewhere at a lower price without compromising quality?
3. Customer Support
The support you get from your hosting providers ought to be fast and accurate. If you are having a challenge and your hosting provider’s customer care team is not there to answer you promptly, it could lead to frustration.
There’s a peace you get when you are sure that your queries and difficulties will be attended to on time. So you need to look for a website hosting that will be readily available.
Truehost Nigeria Website Hosting
We have mentioned previously how to pick a website hosting, we are now going to discuss how you can buy hosting. We are going to use a website hosting in Nigeria that meets the above requirements and more.
The hosting company is called Truehost cloud, its Nigeria office is located in Ibadan, Oyo State. They offer very affordable hosting services without compromising quality.
Before you buy a hosting plan, you need to know that there are different types of hosting, each offering hosting services in different capacities.
Types of website hosting
The hosting you choose to start a blog in Nigeria should be based on your website needs, if you are just starting and are on a budget, you can start with shared hosting. However, if you have capital and want to give it all, you can go for a dedicated server or Virtual Private Server (VPS).
1. Shared Hosting
As the name sounds, that’s what it means. It is a website hosting that is being shared by other websites. That’s to say that a hosting server is used to host many websites, and the resources of that server are being used by all the websites collectively.
The activities of one website on a server can affect other websites on the same server. This hosting is suitable for bloggers who are just starting out, and whose blogs won’t be requiring many resources.
2.WordPress Hosting
This hosting is customised solely for WordPress, it has WordPress features that you can use to start your blog in Nigeria if you want to use WordPress.
Some hosting providers install essential WordPress themes and plugins under this hosting plan.
3. Virtual Private Servers ( VPS )
VPS hosting is a special kind of hosting that has the virtual of a dedicated server and shared hosting. The hosting will give you access to a dedicated section of a server.
It gives you more control than shared hosting.
4. Dedicated hosting
A Dedicated server hosting gives you total control of a server. You have full control of the website and can do quite a lot on the hosting.
5. Reseller hosting
The reseller hosting is for individuals that want to resell the hosting to other people. If you want to start a small web hosting company or maybe you have lots of clients, you can sell the hosting to your clients and gain profit from it.
You have read about the hosting types, you are to choose according to your website needs. Note also that web hosting companies have divided these web hosting types into different packages so you can choose the most suitable one based on your website needs and your financial capacity.
Let’s see how to buy hosting from Truehost cloud. We will use the Truehost silver package under shared hosting as our case study.
1. Choose your plan
The above are some of the hosting packages under this hosting plan, the recommended one being the Silver package which costs ₦7,500 per year and ₦750 per month. Remember, we have 12 months in a year, which means you are given a 20% discount for buying a 1-year plan.
When you select the hosting plan you want, you will be required to choose a domain name to link to the hosting. However, if you have bought a domain before, you don’t have to buy another one, you can transfer the domain from your previous hosting company to Truehost.
2. Select your blog’s domain name
This step requires you to check for the availability of the hosting domain you have decided to use. When you input the domain name, it will tell you if it’s available or not. If it’s available then hurray, you can go ahead to buy it, if it’s not available, you will have to try with another name.
Every domain has an extension, the popular one being .com, but there are a lot of other domain extensions you can use for yours. Some of them are .com.ng, .Ng, .net, .org, .edu and .edu.ng.
A domain name may be taken already with a .com extension and still be available for the.Ng extension. So, if you are insistent on using .com you can choose from the other available extensions.
3. Check the availability of your blog’s domain name
If it’s available, you can just click on the extension you want to use. Before you will be directed to create an account with Truehost if you don’t have one already.
4 Create a Truehost account
This stage requires you to fill in some basic information as shown in the image above.
5. Enter your billing
Finally, you will preview your purchases before you make payments. From the above, you can see that the .com domain was bought at N8,000 and a silver hosting of N7,500 for a year, which sums up to N15,500 only. If you are satisfied with everything, you will now make payment through your debit card or transfer.
The best Truehost web hosting plan for you to start a blog in Nigeria
If you want to start a blog in Nigeria as an amateur, we advise that you use the Truehost Silver plan to get started, and if your blog traffic grows beyond the Silver plan, you can upgrade to a higher plan.
2. Design your blog in Nigeria with WordPress
What is a CMS (Content Management System)?
Optimizely defines CMS as an application that is used to manage content, allowing multiple contributors to create, edit and publish. Content in a CMS is typically stored in a database and displayed in a presentation layer based on a set of templates like a website.
The following are common features of a CMS:
- Content creation, which allows users to easily create and format content
- Content storage, which stores content in one place, in a consistent fashion
- Workflows, assign permissions for managing content based on roles such as authors, editors and admins
- Publishes, organizes and pushes content live
What is WordPress?
WordPress is a content management system with templates and add-ons that makes website design seamless and easy for both beginners and experts. No wonder it is the most used CMS of all CMS in the world.
The WordPress platform hosts about one-third of the websites on the internet because of its simplicity and versatility. It has an inbuilt blog you can use without hitches.
It has two major components; themes and plugins. The theme is the software that determines the aesthetics of your website, if you choose a poor-quality theme, your website will look awful.
You now need to look for a theme with good features and customization to design your blog in Nigeria. There are thousands of free and premium themes available for you to choose from on WordPress. You just need to know which one will suit your blog needs more.
Generally, a premium theme has more customization than a free theme, therefore, you may have to opt for a premium theme if that is what you need for your blog. However, you can start with a free blog and then upgrade as time goes on.
WordPress.com Vs WordPress.org
You may be confused now, wondering if there’s a difference between the two. To answer your dilemma, yes there is a difference between the two.
WordPress.org is also known as the real WordPress or Self-hosted WordPress because it allows you to host your website on any hosting company you desire while WordPress.com is hosted on WordPress with a lot of limitations.
With WordPress.com you will be able to design your blog for free on their platform with a subdomain not .wordpress.com. That’s to say that your domain will be something like www.myblog.wordpress.com.
And again, you won’t be able to place ads on your website or install plugins and themes the way you want until you upgrade to the premium plan.
WordPress.org on the other hand allows you to download and install WordPress for free on your hosting. You are free to use any website hosting you want, to design your website. Plus, you can use any domain name you desire, as long as it is available.
We recommend that you use WordPress to design your website, so you will have complete control of your website without restrictions.
Hope you now see the differences.
Terminologies in WordPress
1. Category
It is the classification of a website’s content.
2. Dashboard
The control panel of a WordPress website
3. Drop-down menu
This is a type of blog menu that has a lot of pages and sub-pages.
4. Domain name
The name used to identify your blog online.
5. Footer
It’s the lower part of a website or blog that is being used to display important pages of the blog.
6. Header
The upper part of a blog that contains the menu
7. Landing Page
The page of a website is targeted at achieving a particular goal.
8. Metadata
The information that appears below a title tag
9. Navigation Menu
This is the menu that guides visitors on a blog by having important pages included in it.
10. Page
This is a type of content on WordPress that has distinct characteristics from posts.
11. Permalinks
It is the permalinks of your blog posts that people can use to access your blog.
12. Plugin
It is software that adds functionality to your website.
13. Post
This is a type of written content you publish on your website that appears under your blog pages.
14. SEO
The meaning of SEO is Search engine optimisation which means everything you do online to make your blog or website rank on the first page of SERPs.
15. Theme
The software gives a WordPress website shape and meaning.
How to install WordPress and configure your blog settings
When you buy hosting from Trueshost, they will send your Cpanel credentials to your Gmail for you to use to configure your website.
You can log in to your Cpanel account by inputting the username and password created by Truehost for you. When you log in, your Cpanel dashboard will be displayed for you. It serves as the admin of your website, where you can install WordPress, access your website files, back up your website and do a lot of other things
Scroll down the dashboard to the software and then click on Softaculous App Installer to install WordPress. You can use it not only to install WordPress but other CMS too.
Next, you will click on the install button to install WordPress on your site, this process takes less than 1 minute.
Before you install, you will be required to fill in the information displayed in the image below.
After successfully installing WordPress on your website, you can log in to your WordPress website admin by adding /wp-admin to your website domain. For example, assuming Google uses WordPress for its website design, then the link to access their WordPress dashboard will be www.google.com/wp-admin.
Input the login details you used while installing WordPress on your Cpanel dashboard.
Install your WordPress blog theme
The dashboard of your website is the first page you will see when you log in to your WordPress admin.
The theme is what gives your website shape and meaning. It contains customizable templates for posts and pages, which means the beauty and appearance of your website are dependent on the theme you choose.
For you to install a theme on your website, go to the appearance button and you will find the theme icon, after which you will be directed to WordPress directories where there are thousands of free themes for you to use. You can choose any theme of your choice.
There are free and premium themes on WordPress, if you desire a lot of customization, then you will need to go for the premium theme. But if you are on a budget, you can stick to the free theme, until you have the money to buy the premium theme.
Install your WordPress blog plugin
Another important software you will need to install on your website is the plugin. Plugins add functionalities to your website. If you see any function or feature on a website and you want to duplicate it on your website, you just need to find the right plugin and you are good to go.
There are plugin form functions like e-commerce, table of content, forms, e-learning, page building and a lot more. WordPress also has a directory for plugins where you will find thousands of free plugins.
Click on the plugin button to have access to the directory where you can search for the plugin you want to install. There are both simple free and premium themes, just like themes.
Customize your blog display
You can customize your website header, body blog post, font size and colour and a lot of other features through the customizer.
Click on it to make the changes that meet your need. Note that the level of customization depends on the theme you install on your website.
NOTE- After installing a theme and or a plugin, you will need to activate it before it starts working on your blog.
The best free WordPress themes you can use to design your blog in Nigeria
There are free themes in the market but the following are some of the best you can find out there.
- Astra
- 2.OceanWP
- Neve
- Hemmingway
- Cenote
- Lovecraft
- Olsen light
- Writee
- Tracks
- Hueman
Essential plugins you need to install on your blog in Nigeria
Knowing the basic plugins for your blog is very important because plugins make your website make sense.
1. Yoast SEO
Your website needs its SEO to be in check and that is what this plugin is purposed for. It will give you suggestions that will make your website perform better online
2. WP-Cache
This plugin helps to make your website fast.
3. Smush
It reduces the size of your website images so as to improve its speed.
4. Jetpack
It helps to monitor your website and also improves its speed.
5. WP Form
If you want to add a form on your blog for users to reach you or for a survey, you can use this plugin to perform that function.
6. Optinmonster
You can use this plugin to get emails from your blog visitors.
7. Google Analytics
The plugin will help you get data from your website that you can use to make pre-informed decisions that will improve your website.
WordPress blogging settings you need to know
There are little tweaks you can make on your blog that will go a long way in making a big difference. Some of these settings are what we will discuss in this section.
1. Set your permalinks
The permalink is the link to your blog posts and blog pages. The structure of your permalinks matters, because that is what users and potential visitors will use to access your website,
It is advisable that you use the post name structure because it will display the title of the blog post through the link. This will make people understand the purpose of your blog post, which has the potential of attracting them to your blog.
But when you use the numeric for instance, people will just see your website domain name without knowing its purpose.
2. www or no www
The settings for how your website appears should be consistent, don’t use www and non-www on the same site. It should be consistent all throughout your website. Note that non is better than the other, but for orderliness’ sake, you need to decide on the one to use.
3. Set up your blog menu
Before you create your menu, you must have created pages that you want to use on the menu. The common pages bloggers use on their websites are the home page, About us, contact us and Terms of service or privacy policy.
After creating the pages you can then add them to your menu in the order you desire.
4. Create your blog’s main pages
We will discuss the four main pages of your blog
1. Home page
The home page is the first page people see when they visit your website through your domain link. Since you are using WordPress to start your blog, you will need to set your blog post page to be your home page from the settings as shown in the image below
2. About US page
The About page should contain details about what your blog is all about and what you stand for. Some people go further to explain their missions, vision and how they started.
3. Contact Us page
This page should contain how you want visitors to contact you, you can decide to use a form or display your address and contact details.
4. Terms of service page
You are to use this page to tell people how you operate and how their data is safe with them.
Manage your blog comments
Many times, spammers will come to you to write meaningless comments, to cut this menace you will need to install plugins to help you manage it.
However, if you are just starting you can manage the comments manually since you have to approve the comments before they appear on your blog.
3. Write your first blog post
1. Discover your blog niche
How to choose a blog niche
Some of the questions you should ask yourself are
- What are you passionate about?
- What can you do?
- What problems do you see around you that you can solve?
- What experiences do you have?
- What do you want to be known for?
What are you passionate about?
Passion is defined as any great, strong, powerful emotion, especially romantic love or extreme hate by Wiktionary.org
Forget about the strong romantic love part, bring your mind home- that’s not what we are talking about now
You are passionate about something when you have strong emotions that are always making you want that thing
Most men I know in Nigeria are passionate about football ( with a few exceptions though ). Even when their team is not performing well they still support them, hoping that someday soon they will do better
Just go to a football viewing centre and see how they will be making analysis and sometimes intelligent arguments just to prove a point.
That’s a great niche right there! Create a blog that brings the latest football news to Nigerians, and write it in a style that will resonate with them.
On the other hand, create a forum that allows fans to discuss football topics on your website
Do you now see how passion can be converted to a blog niche?
Whatever your passion is, writing, eating, teaching, baking, make-up, fashion, agriculture, art, music, cooking etc.
You can start your blog in Nigeria in that niche.
What can you do?
Many motivational speakers, clergymen and philosophers have been hammering on the fact that every man has something to offer to the world for years now
What can you offer? Think deep
- What do you do easily?
- What can you do for long hours even if you are not paid?
- What do people compliment you about?
Just think about it
It could be music, playing football, talking to people, listening to people, love for children, travelling, name it. You can find a niche out of it
What problems around you can you solve?
Pastor Sunday Adelaja wrote a book titled “where there is a problem there is money”. He emphasized the need to look intently at problems to be able to find solutions that will generate money
Look around you, what problems can you profer solutions to?
For instance, if you see that couples are finding it difficult to stay in the marriage and you have what it takes to counsel them
What’s next? Create a relationship blog with your own uniqueness
In every problem lies a potentially profitable blog niche
What experiences do you have?
Adam Enfroy who’s known for building a profitable blog within a short period of time, advises people to leverage their skills while starting a blog
The skills and experiences you have acquired over time could be used to start a blog
Medical workers can start a blog talking about health-related matters. Engineers, agriculturists, teachers, clergymen and women, cooks etc can all start a blog related to their skills and profession
What do you want to be known for?
Have you ever envisioned yourself doing something? Will the niche you have in mind be what you will be proud of in years to come?
100 niche ideas to start a blog in Nigeria
Before we list the blog niche ideas, it’s important to say this to you
There is an important aspect of choosing a blog niche we haven’t mentioned, if you miss that aspect you may not go far with your blog because there won’t be motivation to keep you going
I guess you know what we are talking about already, you still don’t know?
We are talking about money, yes! money.
You need to consider if the niche is profitable before you start a blog. How do you do that?
By considering the following factors
- Are other people making money from the niche you want to cover?
- Does it have an audience?
1. Are others making money from the niche?
If no one is making money out of that niche offline or online that’s a red flag
There ought to be others making money out of that niche or a niche closely related to it; there’s nothing really new under the sun
On the other hand, you can start a niche you’ve conducted research on and found the potential of it yielding income in future, and then stick to it until it pays off
2. Does the niche you want to start a blog have an audience?
People are everything in business; without people who do you sell to? Who do you Impact?
Your niche has to be solving people’s problems and answering their pressing questions
If you discover people are not interested in your kind of knowledge then there’s no point stressing yourself to start a blog in that niche
Even though there are exceptional cases where people don’t know they need something until you make them realize they do
A short story
A story is told of two marketers for two different shoe companies who came to Africa to see if there is a market for their companies
When they arrived (on different occasions I think) they discovered that Africans don’t wear shoes; they walk barefooted
Marketer A reported back to his company that Africans don’t wear shoes; therefore there’s no market for them there to sell their shoes
Marketer B reported back to his company that Africans don’t wear shoes, therefore there’s a huge market for them to sell their shoes
They were all correct but with different mindsets
Marketer B came back to Africa and educated the people on the need to wear shoes and then sold shoes to them
So you can be proactive, creative and innovative in choosing a profitable blog niche
There’s no limit to the niches to select from as long as you have an audience that will be willing to pay for the knowledge, products or services you intend to offer
The 100 niches you can use to start a blog in Nigeria are:
- Parenting
- Dating
- Teenage
- Couples
- General relationship
- Marriage
- Divorce
- Pregnancy
- Hairstyling
- Beauty products
- Makeup
- Clothing
- Fashion
- Food
- Nigeria local foods
- Nigerian culture
- Nigerian natural resources
- Furniture
- Gaming
- Sports
- The lifestyle of Northern Nigeria
- The lifestyle of Southern Nigeria
- The lifestyle of Eastern Nigeria
- The lifestyle of Western Nigeria
- The lifestyle of Middle belt Nigeria
- Entertainment
- Education
- Career
- Tutoring
- Politics
- Religion
- Medicine
- Natural medicine
- Self-development
- Leadership
- Personal Finance
- Economics
- Football
- Public Speaking
- Writing
- Pitching
- Job
- Students
- Lecturers
- Lawyers
- Engineers
- Tailoring
- Catering
- Nigerian mothers
- Nigerian fathers
- Retirement
- Agriculture
- Farming
- Fish Farm
- Poultry Farm
- Animal farm
- Cow farm
- Snail farm
- Goat farm
- Plantation
- Architecture
- Interior decoration
- Pet and animals
- Dog
- Graphic design
- Photography
- Technology
- Phones
- Phone Accessories
- Gadgets
- Laptops
- Music
- Learning instruments
- Driving
- Cars
- Real estate
- Learning Nigerian languages
- University application
- Baking
- Finance
- SEO
- Digital marketing
- Marketing
- Motorcycle
- Movies
- Bicycle
- Car spare parts
- Local dishes within an ethnic group
- History
- Nigerian raw food materials
- Nigerian market
- Pregnant mothers
- Single mothers
- Youth
- Shoes
- Male clothing
- Female clothing
- Secondary schools
- House Decoration
- Health
2. Perform Keyword research
Keyword research is looking for topics your target audience is likely to search for online using tools. There are a lot of keyword research tools that you can use but we are going to talk about just a few of them in this post
1. Ubersuggest
This tool use is very useful in performing competitive analysis to find out what your competitors are writing and how you can create your content.
It will also suggest topics you can write on based on the seed keyword you use. The tool is a powerful SEO tool owned by Neil Patel
2. Google Search Console
It is a tool from Google that can help anyone with a website to understand how they are performing on Google Search, and what they can do to improve their appearance on a search to bring more relevant traffic to their websites
It has a feature that shows searches that your blog appears for on SERPs and It also shows impressions (an impression is the number of times your blog appears on search engine result pages even if the user doesn’t click on it )
When you check your site impressions you will be able to know contents you can optimise to rank at the top on SERPS
3. Answer the public
It is a keyword tool that visualizes search questions and suggested autocomplete searches in an image called a search cloud
4. Google auto-suggest
When you type into the Google search bar, there are ways to get suggestions on topics related to your search.
Before you complete your query you will see suggestions popping up automatically, this is a powerful tool because the suggestions are based on people’s queries online.
You can use this method to get a lot of topics to write on your blog.
5. Google related pages and people also ask
When you scroll down Google SERPS you will see Related pages and People also ask boxes. You can get blog topics from them also.
3. Hook your audience with an interesting title tag
The title tag of your blog post is the blue link that appears on Search engine result pages. It is the way people see the link to your blog post.
If you don’t make it attractive, you may end up not getting traffic on your blog, therefore, you will need to learn how to write attractive blog titles. There are books and materials that go into details to explain how to go about these.
5. Write a good introduction
The introduction of your blog post should capture what your content is all about, failure to capture them at this level will mean low dwelling time and low dwelling is a minus to your blog.
You need to clear all doubts from your reader’s minds by confirming that they are reading the right content. Tell them what to expect from the post and how it will benefit them.
6. Structure your blog layout
1. Make it readable
You need to make your blog post layout readable by making the font legible and simple. Just try to keep things simple.
2. Use relevant featured images
The featured images you decide to use should relate to the purpose of your blog post. Don’t get carried away by the euphoria of writing a blog post and making it beautiful without it being meaningful.
You can get free stock images from websites like Unsplash and Google photos
3. Outline your blog posts with subheadings
Your blog post should have subheadings so that it will aid the assimilation of the readers. Because reading a lengthy material without subheadings makes reading tiring and uninteresting.
4. Create a blog content strategy
Having a strategy makes blogging easier and better. As the popular saying goes “Failing to plan is planning to fail”, so you need to plan your blog but crafting a strategy on how you want your blog to look, the type of visitors you want and the number of visitors you want.
When you put these things in place, blogging becomes easy and strategic.
1. Define the blog goals
You need to ask yourself certain questions that have to do with your blog. Ask yourself “where do I see my blog in the next 10 years?”
What are the things I need to put in place to reach my goals?
How do I go about them?
Setting goals and working towards the goals will make your blog stand out amidst all the blogs I’m in Nigeria today.
2. Locate your audience
Where can you find your audience? And how can you give me them?
The first thing to do is to know your target audience. Do you want to write to old people or teenagers?
3. List your blog Content immediately after you start a blog
You don’t have to wait until you start your blog before looking for blog topics, it is advisable that you perform keyword research and look for a reasonable number of blog topics before starting your blog.
As time passes you will learn more about your audience, which will make you write better and also get better topics for your blog.
5. Promote your blog posts
Newbie bloggers think that by writing and clicking the publish button their blog will grow automatically; which is far from reality. It takes conscious effort to grow a blog.
You will have to strategize and restrategize as much as possible to grow your blog over time. The caveat is that it takes time. You will need to be consistent until you make your mark as a blogger. We are going to discuss some ways you can promote your blog in Nigeria.
1. Social media
One location where you may simply attract customers is social media. Consistent social media content creation can help you develop a strong following that will be a major source of revenue for your blog.
Millions of Nigerians are on social media, if you want to engage them then that’s where you should be. You can engage with them in the following ways:
1. Use visuals
2. Show them you care
3. Create relatable content
4. Reply to your customers’ chats and comments
2. Guest blog
Guest blogging has been in existence for a long time, bloggers meet other bloggers to write as guests on their blogs.
Doing so will expose the guest blogger to a new audience and he or she can also get backlinks to their blog.
Backlinks are links to a website from another website, that’s to say if you decide to write a guest blog on another website and then you input a link to your website from that website you have gotten a backlink.
Backlinks serve as recommendations and votes of confidence from another blog. Google see blogs with more backlinks as valuable. Therefore, guest blog as much as you can.
3. FB groups
There are Facebook groups for every niche, you can join one and then write valuable content and comments that will make people inquisitive about you.
You can share your blog posts as well.
4. FB Page
You can create a Facebook page for your blog so as to attract the right audience with unique content.
5. Email marketing
This type of marketing has proven to be one of the most effective ways to market online. Many experts have testified that sending emails to your blog visitors can bring them back to your blog and make them your blog fans.
How to make money on your blog in Nigeria
The ways to make money with your blog in Nigeria are numerous, we will discuss some of them in this post, but note that there are still many other ways you can make money which you will discover as you keep writing and planning your blog.
1. Freelancing
Performing work for many clients online in exchange for cash is known as freelancing. Similar to how a tailor can see multiple clients in the real world without being limited to just one, it is the same way freelance online writers, bloggers, copywriters, web designers, etc. can market their services to a variety of customers online.
The majority of bloggers use their blogs as a portfolio to attract customers who pay them for services like writing, website design, or SEO.
2. Affiliate Marketing
This is the act of marketing another person’s blog for a commission. There are businesses that have products that bloggers can display and sell on their blogs for a commission.
The person or company with the product is called the merchant, while the person selling the product for a commission is called an affiliate marketer.
Many bloggers have made lots of money online through affiliate marketing.
3. Sponsored Posts
Businesses frequently ask popular bloggers to advertise their goods and services. You will also receive the same deals if your blog has expanded to thousands of monthly visitors.
You can also approach companies in your niche and let them know about your audience and the advantages of advertising on your platform.
4. Online courses
Once you have established yourself as a subject-matter authority, you may rake in cash by developing an online course that instructs students in your area of specialization.
For instance, let’s say your blog teaches readers “how to prepare Nigerian food.” You can develop a course or webinar that teaches individuals specific knowledge after a number of years or months of constant blogging and traffic creation.
Numerous Nigerians teach online students and earn money every day. By selling a copywriting course for N5,000 to thousands of people over WhatsApp, Emmanuel Akpe has made over 50 million nairas.
5. Ad networks
One of the well-liked ways for bloggers and other content producers to earn money online is through Google AdSense. Although there are numerous ad networks you may utilize to monetize your site, Google AdSense is by far the most well-known.
Google inserts advertisements on your website for goods and services that could be of interest to blog readers so that you can get compensated when visitors view and click on the ads.
6. Coaching/ Consulting
Because so many other people will require your services, the experience and expertise you have amassed over time can be used as a tool for financial success.
According to Neil Patel, blogging is the simplest way to approach large corporations for consulting without pitching. One of the attractive ways to get money blogging in Nigeria is through consulting.
7. Physical Products
You can sell physical Products on your blog when you have built a good following on your blog. Since these people now trust you, you can sell trustworthy products to them.
But you need to be careful not to sell products that you have not verified or fake products because it will spoil your reputation and that of your blog.
Conclusion
If you follow this blog post from the introduction to this stage you should have garnered ample knowledge to start your blog in Nigeria that will make money for you because it covers all the basic information every beginner needs to get started.
To get started buy your hosting and domain from Truehost using the guide explained previously in this post.
