Awesome! You’re ready to begin and create your own blog. That’s super exciting!
Why Choose Start Blogging Today
Start Blogging Today is a course designed to walk you through setting up and configuring a WordPress blog. There’s a couple of really important topics to know before you begin.
Mai Solution is for those of you who want to start a blog and don’t want to have to worry about hosting, don’t want to have to worry about themes, don’t want to have to worry about plugins. So we put together this course as a way for you to start creating some content [and] follow some design guidelines. We walk you through everything you need to do, and before you know it your website will be up and running.
Read the Transcript
So why choose Mai Solution and why start blogging today? Blogging is a great way to share your thoughts, your expertise, build a business and grow it into something that you can share with others, and/or monetize and make some money doing. And why choose Mai Solution? Well, Mai Solution is built on the same platform that all the pros use who we work with and creating custom websites for them.
And we believe that there [are] a couple different types of people who want to launch a website. There [are] people who like owning a home and really like to buy all the tools, really like to fit the kitchen cabinets into the walls, and those do-it-yourselfers love to buy Mai Hosting and Mai Theme and create and craft their own website.
There’s another group of people who already have a website similar to those who have a home, and they’re outgrowing it and/or they want to have a jacuzzi next to an inground pool with a sliding board on it, right? So that’s custom work. And we do a lot of that custom design for very well-known blogs, and by doing that work, we’ve come to realize that not everybody is either a do-it-yourselfer or in a position to really do a lot of custom work.
And that’s where Mai Solution comes in. Mai Solution is for those of you who want to start a blog and don’t want to have to worry about hosting, don’t want to have to worry about themes, don’t want to have to worry about plugins. All that is set up, all that is configured, and it’s all on the same system that our pros use so you can rest assured that your website is going to be fast, that it’s not going to break, and you can start building your blog and your brand. So we put together this course as a way for you to start creating some content, follow some design guidelines. We walk you through everything you need to do, and before you know it your website will be up and running. And then you can take your domain name that you registered, apply it to Mai Solution, and your website will be live.
We’re super excited that you’re here. Check out this free lesson and let us know if you have any questions. Cheers.
Everything you need. Just start creating.
Start Blogging Today is based upon the Mai Solution Platform and provides you the following benefits:
WordPress is already set up.
Yup, you’re all set. No need to download WP and configure it.
Mai Theme for Aspiring Bloggers is set up.
WordPress works best with themes, and we’ve loaded the Mai Theme Aspiring Blogger theme for you.
No domain name required (until you’re ready).
Mai Solution uses unique domain names for development sites. You can start blogging today and when ready, import your domain name and take your Mai Solution site live using your domain name.
Important Blog Design Considerations
There are several considerations to keep in mind when building your blog. Some, like graphic design choices, are more obvious, but can actually become more difficult to figure out if you do not have any content, have not thought about what your core pages on your menu will be, and have not thought about lead generation or where you’ll put your CTAs. This free lesson goes beyond the obvious—what you’re blog will look like—and will help get you thinking about the other parts of your blog that you need to have in place to be truly successful.
Content Considerations
All of your blog content is an opportunity to communicate your message and engage with your audience. Most typically, you’ll write about a topic that explores some tiny piece of your brand’s overall message and which shares valuable information, your opinion, or another type of resource (e.g., a recipe).
Your blog posts can build on each other (like writing a book and sharing one chapter at a time); each blog post can be standalone content (like how all of the articles in a magazine issue have a common theme but don’t actually relate to each other); or you can have many topic threads on the go at one time where blog posts relate to each other but don’t necessarily need to be read in order (like writing several books at a time and sharing the chapters out of order). Which strategy you prefer depends on how you like to write (sequentially and methodically versus multitasking and mixing it up) and how you think you can best communicate your message.
Other types of content are also really important to your site beyond the standard blog posts. These include your core pages (About, Contact, Start Here, etc.), product pages, favorites, and testimonials.
Design and Layout Considerations
Deciding on your website layout and design elements is an essential task you’ll want to dedicate a serious chunk of time and effort to in order to have a remarkable website.
In this topic, we look at specifics like the importance of navigation and menus, how to best utilize sidebars (or if you should use them at all), why we and most bloggers love the medium width content layout, accessible web design, and what core pages you’ll want to be sure to set up.
Graphic Design Considerations
You’re now ready to take the next step and make some fun choices! What will you call your brand? What will your logo be? What color palette will you use? Will you use photographs or illustrations? How will you format your content? What associations to your brand do you want to reinforce? In this topic, we discuss the big decisions you need to make and some creative and organizational processes that can help you make those decisions.
This is where you start thinking of logos, taglines, and the overall look and feel of your blog and associated social media. These choices establish some visual associations along with a brief description of your brand so that you can start connecting with people and building your audience.