Things you should consider before starting a blog

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It’s been a year, I am writing blog posts. I thought it is an easy task. However believe me it requires lots of efforts and dedication. Over the journey of one year I have made some mistakes and I want to share my thoughts on this. I am the only one maintaining my blog and I am a working professional.

Post per week goal
When I started writing I had a goal of writing post per week. However this requires strong dedication. As days passed by, I found it difficult to achieve this goal and almost failed.
Another dimension is, you can’t just sit, start writing and publish. You should create quality and original content and creating quality content takes time.

Hosting choice
If you are thinking of starting a blog and thinking of hosting on your own then I would strongly recommend considering other options like free blog hosting on wordpress.com or google’s blogspot/blogger for at least initial period. Over this period you will gain some experiences about blogging and will get an idea of how much time you can dedicate for blogging. Also hosting your own blog has certain overhead of managing security and other stuff.
However one disadvantage of using above mentioned service is, your content is in their hands and can be taken down even without noticing you, unless strong reason.
Following article will give you information about top free online blogging tools
http://sixrevisions.com/tools/top-free-online-blogging/

Migration of blog
You have blog on free hosting as mentioned above i.e. wordpress.com or google’s blogspot/blogger. It is getting good traffic and visitors. Now you want to move your blog from these services to your own blog. Before doing that on your own, give some time googling how to migrate from these services to your own hosted blog. This is because I made this mistake and probably the biggest and stupid mistake.
What I did? I downloaded my posts from blogspot and imported into my own hosted version and simply deleted blogspot blog. The moment I did it, I lost my old traffic and now I am on ground zero.
Some useful articles if you are migrating from wordpress.com to self-hosted wordpress site.
http://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/how-to-properly-move-your-blog-from-wordpress-com-to-wordpress-org/
http://mashable.com/2011/02/09/move-blog-wordpress-com-org/
Also if you are moving from blogger to self-hosted wordpress
http://www.labnol.org/internet/switch-from-blogger-to-wordpress/9707/
https://rtcamp.com/blogger-to-wordpress/tutorials/permalink-seo-migration/
Note: I reverted back to blogger.

Choosing right theme
You should choose right theme for your blog because there is a great potential of engaging user if your theme is good. In this era internet is not limited to only desktop. It is ubiquitous. It is available on phones, tablets etc. Your theme should be capable of providing good user experience to your users, no matter on what devices they are reading. Also theme should be SEO friendly which will increase your visibility in search engine. I would not hesitate advising you to go for premium theme from trusted providers.
Some more articles for this
http://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-themes/selecting-the-perfect-theme-for-wordpress/
http://sixrevisions.com/wordpress/make-sure-not-shady-wordpress-theme/

Right domain name for your blog
Name is important thing. It is nothing but brand of your blog. I would encourage you to choose correct name for your blog. Search for the term ego surfing. The name should be unique, easy to remember, short and probably shouldn’t exist in any dictionary. You should take sufficient time to decide name of your blog.
Some helpful tools to choose your domain name and see if it is already used or not:
Domai.nr, dyyo.com, nameboy
http://www.wpbeginner.com/beginners-guide/tips-and-tools-to-pick-the-best-domain-for-your-blog/
http://sixrevisions.com/resources/12-excellent-tools-for-picking-a-domain-name/

Follow professional bloggers
You should follow professional bloggers and some useful blogs. This will surely help you keep updated and also you will save lots of time by reading their blog posts like how to migrate your blog, how to improve security of your blog etc. Also you will get an idea of how this blogs are written and probably your next blog topic.
I follow these blogs
labnol.org
sixrevisions.com
9lessons.info
wpbeginner.com

I hope this article was helpful to you.

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