How to Start a Blog

I feel like it's silly of me to be making this post since I've only been blogging for a few months, but I've been asked this question by a few people: How do you start a blog?
Well, I could respond to this question in a sassy manner and say "Find a blogging website, set up an account, and start blogging," but it does feel like it's a bit more than that when you get there.

First, obviously, you're going to need to get set up with Blogger, Wordpress, or another blogging site that you know of. Those are just the two I'm familiar with. Blogger is linked to your Google account and Gmail, and that's what this blog is hosted on. Wordpress, I believe, is a software that you download from their website or onto your Apple devices as an app. Blogger also has an app in iTunes (which is what I use to write 99% of my posts).
*TUMBLR IS NOT A BLOGGING SITE* It's more of a REblogging site. If you want to make an actual, legitimate blog, use Blogger or Wordpress, not Tumblr.

Second,  make your blog visually appealing. Make sure the design of your blog reflects your personal style and fits with your theme. Also, make sure it's easy to navigate and read. That's what people are going to be doing on your blog; READING. So don't go crazy and choose a fancy cursive font (yes, they do offer those). It's always nice to have a picture of yourself on the sidebar so people can put a face to the words. I always like to see the blogger's face. This goes along the lines of "easy to navigate," but your sidebar should give your readers options to subscribe to your blog.
*Sidenote: I've had that "Subscribe by email" option on my sidebar the whole time I've been using this blog, and just today I figured out that I needed to turn it on to make it work. Hopefully this post will show up in some inboxes! I also made comments open to everyone, so even if you don't have a Google account, you should be able to comment now! Yay!

Finally, you can start blogging! This is really the hardest part. A lot of people will want to find a specific theme to stick to. Obviously, my blog doesn't have a theme. I kind of jump all over the place. So it's perfectly fine if you don't have a theme in mind, but I have read that themed blogs get more traffic. If you follow me on Pinterest, my "Blogging" board has lots of tips, more than I can give you in this one little post. A couple specific tips from me:

• Blog as frequently as you can. I started writing a blog post every day, but now I do it every other day or so because of school.
• Try to come up with a theme day. You can have "Food Friday" or "Throwback Thursday," whatever you want. And it doesn't have to be an alliteration, I just really like alliteration. Theme days give you at least a little bit of a prompt on weeks when you might have writers block or a bunch of other work on your plate. If you get nothing else from me during the week, you will always get a Wordy Wednesday post!
• Share your posts to as many social media sites as possible. Facebook is especially great for getting lots of views on your posts. People on Facebook are really nosey. Not to mention a lot of your Facebook friends are probably relatives who love to know what you're up to.
• Don't be scared! Be confident in your writing and don't worry about whether people will like it or not. Blogging is a form of self-expression. Yes, it does get seen by the entire internet, but so do your tweets and Facebook statuses and YouTube videos and Instagram posts. The difference with a blog is that it's a lot more words and a lot less pictures and/or videos. 

Most importantly, have fun! For those of you who have been thinking about writing a blog, I hope this inspired you even more to get started and gave you some helpful tips. Happy blogging!

EDIT: My mom and I were messing with the comment options and we found out that to comment without signing in with an account, you can click the "Comment as:" box and choose "Name/URL," then type in your name and click "continue." Then the comment will post with your name without needing an account of any type.