You’ve been thinking of starting a blog, but you’re on an extremely tight budget.
You don’t want to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars to get it all set up. You’re happy with a simple (but professional-looking) setup for now.
There are too many articles online that don’t reveal how much it costs to start blogging. The posts out there skirt the question and say things like “it depends.” It can be annoying and a bit aggravating. You’re just trying to get an answer to the question!
With this post, I’m going to show you EXACTLY how much it costs to start blogging. You can then make a more informed choice going forward.
As you progress as a blogger, I recommend setting aside a small budget that will be used for expenses related to your blog. This will help keep a mental separation between your business and your personal expenses. It’s also good for accounting and tax purposes.
Key Blogging Requirements
- A WordPress website: Free
- WordPress hosting: $2.95 per month or $59 per year
- Professional theme: Free
- Yoast SEO Plugin: Free
- WordPress Editorial Calendar: Free
- Social Sharing Icons: Free
- Twitter and Facebook: Free
This is all that you need in order to start blogging. You just need a WordPress website, hosting, and boom! You’re ready to roll.
As you go, you can pick up a free theme to make your site look sexy and some powerful plugins to expand the functionality of your website. They’re super easy to install.
Typically, I see three things holding my students back from pulling the trigger:
- You’re not willing to invest that initial $59 per year
- You can’t decide what to write about
- You haven’t settled on a domain name for the blog.
If you don’t have that initial sum to invest into your blog, then I can’t help you. I’d spend a day doing some freelance writing and make that initial sum. Then, don’t spend it, but invest it in your blog.
When you follow the steps I’ve outlined in my formula for blogging profits, you’ll quickly make that initial sum back. After that, any income that you generate won’t come with any financial expenses.
Thankfully, you don’t have to decide on your domain name right now to get started. You can do that later. You are entitled to one free domain when you sign up with Bluehost. Don’t be rushed to pick it out right away.
Lastly, there’s that lingering question – what the heck should you write about? It’s easier to decide than you might think. Maybe you’ve been looking at it the wrong way. When you have the right approach, everything will click into place.
Enhanced Blogging Requirements
- Premium WordPress Theme: $50 – $100
- Popup Email Subscriber Capture: $9 per month
- Email List Software: $19 per month
- Google Analytics: Free
- Branded In-post Images: Free
- Royalty Free Images: Free
- Education and books: Free – $10.
I gotta stress that you don’t necessarily need the items above to get started, but they will certainly enhance your blog. They will help you get traffic, subscribers, and build revenue streams FASTER.
My students will usually start to invest more in their blog once they’ve gotten some traction. It’s a motivator! When you have hundreds or thousands of people checking out your site, you’re more likely to invest into their experience. It’s directly tied to your income.
If you did nothing else, you gotta:
- Build an email list
- Read as much as you can get your hands on
- Educate yourself with YouTube videos like these.
Since you’re still new to blogging, you have to be continually learning. In a weird way, I guess you could call this investing in yourself, your knowledge, and your skills. Over time, this will have the greatest return on investment.
Your Time, Energy, and Effort
- Checking email: .5 hour per week
- Writing articles: 6 hours per week
- Website improvement: .5 hour per week
- Promoting articles and content: .5 hour per week
- Continuing education: 2 hours per week
- Total: 9.5 – 12 hours per week
We can’t forget the time that you spend writing, growing, and working on your blog. Your time is valuable. You could be doing something else, like freelancing, or working at your 9-5 job.
The easiest way to estimate the “opportunity cost” of your time is to take your hourly rate and multiply it by number of hours you’re spending on the blog. For example, if you make $20 per hour and spend 10 hours per week on the blog that’s about $200 per week worth of time.
Sooo many bloggers will waste time doing things like always looking at their statistics, constantly check their emails, or getting obsessed about how much you can make from the craft.
Don’t get me wrong – yes, blogging can be extremely lucrative and profitable.However, you only get there my writing blog posts, not reading about other people’s results.
Let’s Total Up the Costs…
In total, this runs up a bill of an initial $59 hosting fee and 5 – 10 hours per week worth of work.
Is that MORE or LESS than you thought?
Most people are surprised at how inexpensive it is… but there is one hard part. Holding yourself accountable to your goals.
Yep – that’s the killer. It’s what causes so many blogs to fizzle out. The bloggers don’t have any kind of accountability system.
Today, I want to offer you a way to help keep you accountable. It’s a step-by-step course that will walk you through setting up the blog. You’ll get personal direction and homework assignments.
Sound good? Sweet!
Just sign up and enroll in the blogging course. It is a “blogging accelerator.”
By the way – I’m not one of those faceless people online. I like to put myself out there through this blog and my YouTube channel. At any point in time throughout the course, you can reply and I’ll personally read it.
My Blogging Fees Snapshot
Below, I’ve included some of my yearly expenses related to my blogging work. These are not all of my business expenses, but I hope it gives you an idea of what seasoned bloggers might invest into their blog.
Keep in mind that your income will grow alongside your expenses. One of the reasons that blogging is so profitable is because it doesn’t cost a lot to run one (compared with the income you generate).
Naturally, as your email list grows, your email bill will also increase. The same goes for other items, like when you increase content production and hire more writers to help you out.
| Writers |
-$5,516.72
|
| Assistant |
-$753.28
|
| Buffer |
-$100.00
|
| Email list software |
-$1,800.00
|
| DropBox |
-$83.88
|
| LeadPages |
-$296.00
|
| Bluehost |
-$435.22
|
| Domain Names |
-$177.50
|
| OptinMonster |
-$108.00
|
| Course Hosting |
-$312.00
|
| Premium Theme |
-$118.65
|
| Books and Education |
-$600.72
|
| Total Expenses |
-$10,301.97
|
I hope you’ve enjoyed this article and my no-nonsense breakdown. If you wanna get in touch, hit me up! Would love to hear from ya and learn more about your plans for your blog.
This article contains affiliate links.
Or you can start a blog for free through Blogspot like I did. He...7x
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