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You have just started your blog, and you might be wondering what is left for you to do. I’m going to provide you with a Pre-Launch Blog Checklist.
So many bloggers find themselves in this place after getting hosting and setting up WordPress.
I want to make things simple for you in this post. I’m going to provide you with a pre-launch checklist of all the things you need to do before launching your blog.
The printable PDF pre-launch blog checklist is available. All you have to do is sign up for the free resources below. Plus get much more freebies you need to run a successful blog.
Table of Contents
Let’s Begin the Pre-Launch Blog Checklist
After setting up WordPress, it is essential to do these steps.
For you to understand more easily, I’ve added some screenshots so you can visualize the steps as I go through them.
You can even do them as I explain each pointer.
#1 Change The Admin Display Name
Type the name you want to be displayed on your blog posts in the Nickname field.
Beside display name, select the drop-down and choose the name that you’ve just typed.
Scroll down and “Update Profile.”
Type the name you want to be displayed on your blog posts in the Nickname field.
Beside display name, select the drop-down and select the name that you’ve just typed.
Scroll down and “Update Profile.”
#2 Update Your Profile Picture
On that same profile page, you can also update the profile picture.
You can find this option a little above the Update Profile button at the bottom of the page.
Click on the “You can change your profile picture on Gravatar” link. This will take to Gravatar to update your photo.
#3 Activate SSL
SSL is merely ensuring that sensitive information such as email addresses, credit card info e.t.c, sent over the internet is transmitted safely and protected.
You can know if a website has an SSL certificate installed, looking at the top left hand in the URL by the little padlock. Sites without an SSL certificate will be marked as “Not Secure.”
If your website doesn’t have SSL, if you have an eCommerce website, Google will warn users that your site isn’t safe.
Having an SSL certificate installed on your site is not compulsory. Your blog can perform functionally well.
However, if you want users to trust your blog and return, an SSL certificate would be recommended.
To make things even easier, you get a free SSL when you sign up for Bluehost. They are the most customer service-oriented hosting provider. I’m not kidding, they are.
So guess what, you have no excuse why you shouldn’t have an SSL certificate installed on your site.
#4 Figure out your branding
Let me say that your content strategy is more essential, more content drives more traffic, yes.
You may even change your brand in the future.
However, you still need to have a look that sets you apart.
- Use a set of fonts for your headings, paragraphs, and sub-headings so your blog can have a consistent look and not all over the place. For the fonts I use, Montsteratt, Playfair Display and Raleway.
- Decide on the colors you want to use on your blog. Don’t dwell on this too much; choose 2-3 colors to work. For example, I use Blue, red, and yellow.
- Create a logo; you can create a free logo with Canva. Go to templates, select a logo, choose something simple. You can use your blog name and add a tagline, that’s what most blogs use.
Create a Canva account, you sign up with gmail account. And then select the templates and design away.
- Once you log in, select the logo option, and you’ll be redirected to hundreds of logo templates you can choose from. Choose your brand fonts, colors.
Be careful. This stage has a way of taking a lot of your time. Don’t overthink this stage.
Canva is a great tool I use to create graphics for my blog, and the best part is it’s free.
Blog Prelaunch Checklist
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#5 Change Permalink Settings to Have Post Names
The next thing you want to do is to ensure that the links on your blog rare set to the post name.
Correctly setting your permalink settings is crucial as it helps with the SEO for your blog posts. When you set it in a way that your title is in the URL, that’s a significant checkpoint is in optimizing posts for SEO.
In order to do this, go to settings on the left-hand side menu, then click on Permalinks .
Set the radio button to Post Name and then press the Save Changes button at the bottom of the screen.
#6 Set Your Discussion Settings
We are in the settings option so go further done to the discussion settings.
You don’t want to have to worry about checking comments and checking for spam.
Go to settings in the left hand and click on Discussion.
You can turn off comments if you want to, disable pingbacks, or even set attempts to give notification to other blogs that you have linked to them.
#7 Set Your Site Title and Tagline
Your site title will simply be the name of your blog.
Your tagline can basically tells what your blog is about.
These two things will help communicate what your website is about to first time visitors.
Under settings click on General.
#8 Change The Favicon Of Your Blog
Favicon is the icon that appears in the tab of a browser window when your site opens.
To get some free favicons, you can go to Icons8.com, go through and select the one you like and download it.
Once you have downloaded it, go back to the WordPress admin area.
On the left hand side, go to Appearance then click on Customize.
On the Customize page click on Site Identity
Then click the Select site icon.
The option to upload files will show up. Select the favicon you downloaded and upload it to your blog. You will go back to the customize screen just hit the Publish button.
#9 Get legal pages
This is very important!
If you blog without legal pages, you are putting yourself at risk.
The risks include not protecting your content or perhaps facing lawsuits because collecting sensitive information such as email addresses without providing a disclaimer is breaking FTC law. You must state how you plan to safeguard their information.
If you make money through affiliate marketing, you need to disclose it.
The three most legal pages you need are:
- A privacy policy lets users know the type of information you collect about them and how you intend to keep it safe.
- Disclaimer protects yourself in terms of the advice and services you offer.
- The Terms & Condition ensures that visitors to your site don’t abuse, misuse, or steal your content.
I’m not in any way a lawyer, and I’m not able to give legal advice. However, there are loads of legal templates online you can check out.
# 10 Write 5-10 articles.
This doesn’t have to be exact. You can start with 5, but 10 would be a good number of posts to begin with.
That would be enough content to keep visitors to your blog busy reading while you work on creating leads to grow your email list.
Be consistent in publishing blog posts, and keep your presence on your blog active. It doesn’t make sense you’re on this month, off next month, and so on.
Be consistent.
You can schedule posts as well which will make it less pressuring for you to remain consistent. You will be more inclined to spend time creating quality content rather than rushing to add daily blog posts.
#11 Set Up Your Google Analytics
The idea of having a blog is to have visitors. To keep track of users who visit your website is to use Google Analytics.
Don’t have a google account yet? No problem head on over to Google and sign up.
Then head over to Analytics.Google.com and select the Sign Up button and follow the steps, you will add information about your website throughout the process.
If you have a Google Analytics account already, all you have to do is add your new website to your account.
Click on the Admin on the left-hand side menu of Google Analytics, choose the middle column labeled Property, then click on Create Property and follow the steps to add the information about your new website.
With the MonsterInsights plugin, you can easily integrate your new blog with Google Analytics.
2 BONUS TIPS
#12 Set up your social media accounts
Choose which social media platforms you want to promote your blog and get traffic. I recommend that you choose 1 or 2 as build up your audience and then go into more platforms later on.
Create accounts on your chosen platforms and set up the accounts.
Remember to link your social media accounts to your blog so that your readers and visitors to your blog can follow you and interact with your content.
Post new content regularly on your social media to get new followers to get new visitors to your blog.
#13 Get an Email Service
If you want to get started on this journey to making money online, email marketing is the number one way to make money blogging.
You want to start building your email list right from the start. So you need to get an email service right away.
Mailerlite is free for up to 1000 subscribers, and it allows you to send 12000 emails campaigns free for the month. It gives you all the features the premium plan offers you.
Isn’t that great?
It’s userfriendly for new bloggers. They also have an excellent user interface that makes setting up your email campaigns so easy.
And finally, download your free blog pre-launch checklist! It’s totally free and it’s printable.
If you haven’t started your blog yet…
Make sure you go check out this free step-by-step guide and get your very own blog in less than 15 minutes.
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