HOW TO start A travel blog

Last Updated: 10/13/21 | October 13th, 2021

Disclosure: Please note that some of the links below are affiliate links, including the links for HostGator and Bluehost. At no additional cost to you, I earn a commission if you make a purchase using these links. If you have any questions about the companies or my status as an affiliate, please don’t hesitate to email me.

Whether as a hobby or profession, starting a travel blog is pretty easy. You can set it up in under 30 minutes. It’s a lot much easier than when I started my blog in 2008. Back then, I didn’t know the first thing about making a website. Luckily, on my adventures around the world, I met Matt and Kat, a British couple who also happened to be web designers.

When I came home and made a decision I wanted to start this travel blog, they agreed to help me set it up and show me HTML. I hand-coded the web site and used a funky tool called Dreamweaver to build it. It was painfully slow and I wasn’t very good at it. (And my original web site was really ugly!)

Luckily, you no longer have to build web sites that way!

Creating a web site has gotten a lot much easier and simpler thanks to WordPress, an out-of-the-box platform created to make sites much easier for those not technically savvy (like myself). It powers over 25% of the Internet and is the best platform to start a blog on. It’s incredibly flexible and can do whatever you want it to do — from a basic journal to complex blogs and e-commerce websites.

In our blogging masterclass, we’ve had thousands of students start a web site on WordPress without any technical skills. They got them up and running — and you can too!

While I’ve talked about how to prosper as a travel blog in the past, today, I want to give a quick tutorial on how to create a travel blog from scratch in seven easy steps.

Innholdsfortegnelse

Step 1: picking a Name
Step 2: Signing Up for a Host
Step 3: Installing WordPress
Step 4: setting Up Your Website
Step 5: Installing Your Theme
Step 6: creating Your main Pages
Step 7: joining Our blogging Masterclass
ofte stilte spørsmål

Step 1: pick your domain name

The first thing you need to do is pick a domain name (i.e., your web site name). When doing so, there are no hard and fast rules. There’s no such thing as a “wrong domain name,” but there are a couple of policies I like to live by:

Make a name that can last – If you pick “JohnsAsiaAdeventure.com” and then you leave Asia, the domain name won’t make sense anymore. Make sure you pick a name that isn’t so focused that if you decide to shift gears, you can keep the same domain name.

Don’t date your blog – Don’t pick something related to your age either. “Twenty-Something Travel” becomes really irrelevant when you get older, which actually happened to a blogger I know. pick a name that can be used no matter your age!

Avoid certain words – avoid words like “nomad,” “vagabond,” “wanderlust,” and “adventure.” They have been done to death, and they will make you seem like you’re copying people, not being original.

Pick a name that describes what you do as much as possible – I was a nomad, so “Nomadic Matt” was the best pick for me. If you’re into luxury, put words in your domain name that convey that. You want people to see the name and go, “I get what that web site is about.”

Keep it short – use 3-4 words maximum. You want the name that rolls off the tongue. even Ramit Sethi from “I will show You to Be Rich” abbreviates his site to “I will Teach” or “IWT.” The shorter, the better.

Keep it basic – I’m not a fan of using jargon or slang in your domain name, as I think that makes things confusing for people who don’t know it. The last thing you want is someone saying, “What does that mean?” or being confused. If someone has to think hard about the meaning, then you’ve already lost them. So don’t try to be clever!

Step 2: sign up for a host

After you’ve picked out your domain name, you’ll need to register it online and get hosting (the little computer in the sky that’s going to power your website). There are a lot of basic hosting companies out there — and a lot of of them are pretty terrible.

However, the two greatest and best are HostGator and Bluehost. I would opt for one of those two.

While they are owned by the same parent company, I lean toward HostGator, as I find its call center customer service quicker and friendlier, and HostGator is prone to fewer outages (no one wants their web site to go down!). It’s also really improved its service and now uses complimentary SSL certificates (that’s the thing that tells users your web site is secure).

Here’s a walk-through of how to set up your host with HostGator (it won’t take long):

First, head over to the website’s sign-up page and get hosting for only $2.78 per month. That’s over 60% off the normal price!

Next, choose your plan (I suggest the hatchling plan):

Enter your desired domain name at the top of the page. Make sure before you sign up that the domain you want is available, so as to avoid issues with your signup process.

The system will then prompt you to take out “domain privacy protection,” which we recommend you do. (Why? This will hide your address and contact details from appearing online when someone queries your domain name, and it will keep spammers from calling you to sell their sketchy web services. It’s really bothersome — and once your name and phone number are out there, they’re out there forever. Nip it in the bud by hiding them from the beginning.)

If you already have a domain name but need hosting, simply select the “I already own this domain” from the tab at the top. Then, enter your domain name and continue to the next step.

Make sure you have selected the ideal hosting plan from the drop-down list and then select the billing cycle you are prepared to pay. The longer you lock in for, the more affordable initial pricing will be.

We suggest starting with the “Hatchling Plan” (which gives you hosting for one single domain), but if you have plans for a lot more than one website, then select the “Baby Plan” instead, to give you room to grow (since you can host unrestricted domains with it).

Next, you will then select the username for your account and a safety PIN. fill out your billing information and preferred payment type (credit card or PayPal.)

You can opt-out of all of the additional services on offer by unchecking them.

Review your buy details and make sure everything is correct. then click “Checkout Now!” at the bottom of the page.

Once your buy has been received, you’ll be redirected to the HostGator billing portal. You will also be sent two separate emails with the login credentials to your hosting control panel and the billing portal for your HostGator account. Be sure to save the information. save them on your computer and/or print the emails for safekeeping.

They will look similar to the example below:

For those of you with an existing domain or a domain purchased from a third-party site like GoDaddy, take note of the nameservers provided on your hosting account email. You will need to add those to your domain where you purchased it, to link your domain and hosting together. Please refer to the support papers from where you gotten your domain for exact instructions on how to update your nameservers.

Det er det! All that takes about five minutes from start to finish!

Again, you can click here to go to HostGator to set it up.

Step 3: how to install WordPress

After you’ve registered your domain name and chosen your hosting package, the next thing you’ll want to do is install WordPress. (WordPress is what will actually run the website. The host is simply the computer your site sits on.)

WordPress is an open-source, complimentary web publishing application, content management system (CMS), and blogging tool built by a community of developers and contributors to make it easy for people to blog!

After you’ve paid for your domain, you’ll get an email telling you your login details. Log in to your hosting control panel using the link supplied to you by email when you purchased your hosting from Hostgator. The link would look similar to this:

https://gatorXXXX.hostgator.com:2083

The email will be titled “Your Account Info” if you have trouble locating it in your inbox.

Once logged into your control panel, you need to scroll down the settings page to locate the “Software” section. then click on the “QuickInstall” link. The software section will be located toward the bottom of the page.

On the page that loads, select WordPress from the top menu or the WordPress tile on the page..

Select your domain name from the drop-down. Leave the “install/path/here” field blank.

Enter the name of your blog, an admin username (make sure the admin username is hard to guess), your name, and your email address, and then agree to the terms and conditions below. then click the “Install” button.

Once the install process has finished, you will be given the password you need to log in to your WordPress site in the notification bar at the top (dismiss the popup that appears). Take note of the password, as we will show you how to change that later on. You will also be emailed the details if you miss or forget to save the info.

Step 4: setting up your website

After you’ve installed WordPress, go to domainname.com/wp-admin and use the username and password you created to log in. You’ll see a screen like this after you log in:

Here’s a little introduction of the menu on the left side of the screen:

Dashboard – The dashboard is the first thing you see when you log in to WordPress, and it’s the main administrative area for your blog.

Home – This will take you back to the main dashboard view.

Updates – This area will tell you if WordPress, your plugins, or your theme need to be updated.

Jetpack – Jetpack is a plugin that allows you to add a spell-checker, contact forms, extra widgets, etc.

Posts – You can vIew alle bloggartiklene dine her, i tillegg til å sette opp nye og legge til kategorier og tagger.

Media – Her kan du se mediebiblioteket ditt og legge til nytt medieinnhold, som bilder og videoer.

Sider – Sider er de individuelle destinasjonssidene på nettstedet ditt (som om siden din, kontaktsiden, ressurssiden osv.). Du kan legge til nye sider her i tillegg til å gjennomgå og redigere eksisterende.

Kommentarer – Kommentarer til bloggartiklene dine går hit. Det kan være lurt å sjekke spam -mappen med jevne mellomrom for å forsikre deg om at du ikke savner ekte kommentarer.

WPForms-WordPress’s Contact-Form Plugin.

Marketplace – Her kan du opprette en online markedsplass.

Utseende – Denne delen lar deg tilpasse nettstedets utseende.

Plugins – Gjennomgå, installer og oppdater pluginsene dine her.

Brukere – hvis det er mye mer enn én person som får tilgang til bloggen din, kan du opprette kontoer og gi dem visse privilegier her.

Verktøy – Denne delen har visse verktøy for å hjelpe deg med administrasjonsoppgaver.

Innstillinger – Du kan justere alle nettstedets innstillinger her, inkludert ting som bloggtittelen og størrelsen på miniatyrbilder som brukes.

Innsikt – Insights leverer trafikk og brukerstatistikk om de som sjekker ut nettstedet ditt. (Google Analytics er imidlertid et bedre valg.)

Plugins er en fantastisk måte å legge til ytterligere funksjonalitet til et WordPress-drevet nettsted. Og med over 50 000 levert i WordPress Repository og mange mange flere premiumalternativer som er tilgjengelige fra utviklere, er det ubegrensede muligheter for hva du kan lage med nettstedet ditt. (Jeg viser noen eksempler nedenfor.)

For å komme i gang, klikk på “Plugins” og deretter “Legg til nytt” når du er logget inn på WordPress -dashbordet ditt. Her kan du søke etter plugins som du vil og installere dem ved hjelp av en enklikkinstallasjon som automatisk installerer dem til WordPress-plattformen din.

Alternativt har du muligheten til å publisere en plugin du har kjøpt eller lastet ned fra et tredjeparts nettsted. For å gjøre dette, se “trinn 3” -pilen på bildet over. Alt du trenger å gjøre er å klikke på “Last opp plugin”, så blir du bedt om å publisere zip-filen til pluginen du lastet ned fra tredjeparts nettsted.

Når du har lastet opp en plugin (eller søkt etter en, som jeg har vist på bildet nedenfor), kan du installere den.

Etter å ha klikket på alternativet “Installer nå”, vil knappen endre seg for å si “Aktiver.” Dette lar deg aktivere plugin på nettstedet ditt og gjør den klar til å konfigureres og brukes.

Hvis du kan tenke på en funksjon du vil ha på nettstedet ditt, kan jeg nesten garantere at det er en plugin for det, men her er de viktige for reisebloggen din:

Akismet – Akkurat som å få søppelpost i postkassen din, vil nettstedet ditt få spammere som søker å legge igjen søppelkommentarer på nettstedet ditt. Akismet søker å minimere mengden av dette ved automatisk å filtrere det for deg.

Yoast Seo – den beste SEO -pluginen der ute. Dette kombinerer muligheten til å lage meta -identifiserer og beskrivelser for innleggene dine, optimalisere titlene dine, lage et nettstedskart for søkemotorer å lese, tilpasse hvordan artiklene dine vises på sosiale medier og gjøre mye mer.

Relevanssi – While WordPress does a lot of things well, what it fails at is adding search functionality to your site. Relevanssi søker å fikse dette og gi leserne de mest nøyaktige resultatene når de søker på nettstedet ditt.

UpdraftPlus – You can never back up your site too much. The WordPress database holds every word you’ve ever written, and if your blog has started to make you a few dollars, you would be nuts not to keep regular backups. UpdraftPlus does it perfectly.

Grow by Mediavine – A terrific social sharing plugin for your site. It comes with terrific a basic set of icons that work well on both desktop and mobile.

Cache Enabler – This plugin creates saved copies of your site, making loading your web pages much faster.

Jetpack �