Blogging is a fantastic hobby and a great way to make money on the side, but growing your blog takes a lot of time and energy.
You also need help, but the online world delivers with fantastic blogging resources to start and grow a successful website.
What Are Blogging Resources?
Blogging resources are the tools and materials you need to start and grow your blog. They include things you need, like hosting, and things that aren’t mandatory but will help you become successful as a blogger, like training courses.
We will cover the basic resources you need to start a blog and the professional blogging tools that will help you grow.
What Materials Do You Need to Blog?
If you want to blog, you need a computer and an internet connection. Next, you need a domain name, hosting, and a WordPress installation.
Although you can host a personal blog on blogging platforms like Blogger, if you want to be taken seriously as a blogger and monetize your blog, you need your own domain.
Domain Name
You can find a great domain name using GoDaddy’s domain name finder.
When exploring potential names, it’s essential to consider your niche and potential story ideas. You shouldn’t get so specific that you can’t expand, like “huskyharnesses” but it should also relate to your niche or personality. The best name showcases what you’re offering while giving you room to write about anything you want.
Before settling upon a name, check all the big social media sites to make sure it’s available.
Hosting
Bluehost is one of the best hosts for beginners, due to the low cost. If you’re just starting and don’t want to spend a lot, you can host with Bluehost for less than $5 a month.
Though I started with Bluehost, I’m now with InMotion, a middle-of-the-line host that offers excellent customer service and little downtime.
Before the Google slaughter of 2023, I was with Big Scoots. They are far more expensive than the other two options, and I can no longer afford it, but they offer the best customer service and will help you solve any technical problem with your site.
WordPress
Finally, you need to install WordPress. Although there are other platforms available for blogging, WordPress is the best and most well-known. In addition, because so many bloggers use it, there are far more customizable plugins available, giving you greater control over your site (we’ll talk about some of them below).
These are the primary resources anyone needs to blog, and you can find more information on how these work in our epic post on how to start a blog.
What is the Best Tool for Blogging?
There are so many great blogging tools available that it’s hard to pick one that is “the best.” Therefore, I’ll pick the one that offers the most value.
If you are serious about growing a successful blog, you need to join the Money Mix Insiders. It’s a blogging mastermind group and toolkit all rolled into one. They offer SEO tools, plugins, themes, coaching, marketing opportunities, and so much more.
Your subscription to the Money Mix Insiders program provides you with many of the tools discussed on this list as part of your membership.
Blogging Resources for Beginners
I understand that if you are just starting, you may not see the benefit of paying $95 a month for a mastermind group (though they offer a three-month trial for just $1 – if you want to check it out!). If you are new and don’t want to spend much money, consider these free and cheap resources.
Niche Facebook Groups
Facebook may be a cesspool, but it’s still a great way to meet other bloggers.
Many Facebook groups are dedicated to blogging that can help you grow your social media accounts or get expert advice on your pressing blog questions.
One thing to remember, though, is that not everyone is an expert. People do their best to answer questions, but they may be biased against a particular idea or may not have considered other, better ways of accomplishing a task. Take the advice from these groups with a grain of salt and test ideas on your own.
Google Search Console And Google Analytics
Every blogger needs to set up Google Search Console and Google Analytics, two tools that help you understand your website traffic.
Google Analytics tells you information about who is visiting your site. You will see your page views, which page people are on, where they are coming from, and when they left. This valuable data helps you understand your website’s visitors and how they find you.
Google Search Console offers a wide range of information on how your website is performing in Google’s search engine. You can see your average position, click-through rates, and the number of impressions you get, and can drill that down to the page level. Search Console also provides valuable information about your core web vitals, which is essential for ranking.
Grammarly
Grammarly is a software system that enhances your writing. It spots grammatical and spelling errors in your posts and helps you correct them. The professional version also checks your tone, style, and voice. You’d be surprised by how often you write in the passive voice rather than active!
If you want to be taken seriously as a blogger, your writing must be grammatically correct and easy for readers to understand.
Grammarly has limitations. Sometimes, it doesn’t see mistakes. I’ve published articles with terrible typos, expecting Grammarly to catch them, and it didn’t.
The other massive limitation is that it’s too robotic. The pro version will ask you to delete all the flavor from your writing, opting instead for simpler prose without any voice or edge. Although that’s not necessarily bad, I don’t like it, and I stopped using Grammarly Pro after accidentally replacing my fun, punchy sentences with dull, straightforward prose one too many times.
As a blogger, you must balance your love of prose with ensuring that readers know what you are saying. Grammarly will help you do that and will help ensure your writing is tight.
Canva
Although blogging is about writing, if you want to be successful, you need graphics. Every blog post should have a featured image, and visual blog posts like recipes and travels could use extra photos in the body.
Canva is a fantastic resource for making graphics. You can make Pinterest pins, Instagram posts, short videos, and more with the fantastic design tool. To be a successful blogger, you need to market yourself on these platforms, and Canva can help you create the perfect posts quickly and easily.
Canva also features stock photos, but read the fine print before using them as featured images. Most images aren’t available for standalone use, and the ones that are come with a size limit.
Although items are available for free, most bloggers will be better off with a Canva Pro subscription.
Stock Photos
Although Canva is an excellent resource for creating posts and images, it doesn’t have a lot of options for free photos. Unsplash offers a giant reservoir of stock photos. Most photos on the platform are free to use, though the artists do appreciate credit.
As you grow, you’ll want to use paid photos. Shutterstock is the best in the business, and they now offer an unlimited package so bloggers on a budget can access quality images for a low cost.
Be sure to check the license before using any photo – some allow editorial use, others have strict limits. With paid subscriptions like Shutterstock, you won’t have to worry as much.
Kit
Most new bloggers don’t consider their email list, but the sooner you start, the better. You should be building your list from day one, and Kit is one of the best platforms for it.
With Kit, you can create opt-in forms, funnels, and automatic sequences. You can send your RSS feed to your list so that they get notified every time you post, or a weekly digest if you post a lot.
Although there are tons of email providers, I prefer Kit because they typically have strong deliverability. They are a little more expensive than some other providers, but if you don’t want to start with the fancy add-ons, you can start for free with under 1000 subscribers.
Social Media
If you want to be successful, you must promote your blog. Social Media is one of the best marketing tools available. If you don’t have a Twitter handle, Facebook Page, Instagram, TikTok, Pinterest, etc., you need to get them now.
I understand that time is a limitation, and it’s impossible for one person trying to grow a blog to focus on all these platforms. Instead, grab the handles and focus on building one. When you are comfortable with the first platform and have a lot of engagement, you might want to branch out and focus on the next.
However, you don’t want to get huge on Twitter only to find that someone else grabbed your desired Instagram handle before you did.
The Best Plugins and Add-ons for your Blog
The above resources are all off-page tools to help you grow and develop your blog. Next, we’ll talk about on-page tools and plugins you need to succeed.
There are thousands of plugins available, but you don’t want too many because you don’t want to bog down your site with fancy extras. Instead, limit yourself to a few plugins that enhance your blog’s functionality.
Many of the plugins I mention are premium, but they are worth the cost. However, if you want them for free, you can join the Insiders SEO Hustle, which gives its members free access to many plugins they need to be successful bloggers.
SEO Plugin
There are two main SEO plugins on the market: Rankmath, and Yoast SEO. I started with Yoast and switched to Rankmath after indexing issues caused by a disconnect between Yoast and another plugin I use.
Every blogger needs an SEO plugin. It will help you focus on your keyword and give tips for the best on-page SEO to help you rank for that specific keyword.
The pro versions of some SEO plugins even offer suggestions of related words and more tools to help you rank, but if money is a consideration, the free versions work fine.
Link Whisper
Internal linking is integral to your SEO strategy. But after years of blogging, it’s easy to forget about related posts.
Link Whisper is the ideal solution. It showcases your internal linking opportunities, conducts link audits, and helps you keep track of your external linking.
*Offered for free to members of the Blogging Insiders SEO Hustle!
Revive Old Posts
It’s important to continue sharing your older posts on social media, but who has the time for that? Revive Old Posts does.
The free version allows you to share on Twitter and Facebook, while the pro version allows you to share on virtually any social media platform that enables link sharing. It’s a great way to continuously get your content in front of your audience without much effort.
*Offered for free to members of the Blogging Insiders SEO Hustle!
WP Rocket (Site Speed Plugin)
Many of Google’s core updates have addressed core web vitals and site speed. If you want to rank on Google, you must have a fast site with a great user experience.
Numerous site speed plugins help accomplish this task. WP Rocket works with Big Scoot’s Cloudflare and offers all the caching options I need in a straightforward plugin.
The only downside to WP Rocket is that it’s a premium plugin. You can find free caching plugins like W3 Total Cache, but they don’t offer the full range of functionality that WP Rocket offers.
*Offered for free to members of the Blogging Insiders SEO Hustle!
Imagify
Blog images are giant resource hogs. If site speed is essential to you, it’s vital to reduce the size of your images. Imagify is a premium plugin that compresses your photos the second you load them.
The reduced photo size keeps your database lightweight and ensures a faster loading speed of all the images on your site.
Professional Theme
Another consideration of a fast website is a lightweight blog theme. A theme creates the general look and feel of your blog.
I previously used Astra Pro because it’s offered as part of the SEO Hustle Blogging Insiders group. It’s a simple, lightweight theme that doesn’t bog down my site and helps it load properly.
The downside to a simple theme is that you lose some of the “prettiness.” I switched to Generate Press recently because it’s also lightweight but adds a little magazine-like flair to the homepage. Some themes sacrifice speed for design, and if you’re a designer or photographer, you may need to make that decision.
Information blogs that are more about the content than the design don’t need all the fancy add-ons. All they do is slow the site down, which hurts it in Google’s eyes.
Opt for a lightweight theme like Astra Pro or Generate Press to make your site as fast as possible.
Blogging Courses
Blogging courses are a dime a dozen, so be careful before signing up for one. Many creators realized they could make more money telling you how to do something than they can actually doing the thing. Other courses are giant ads for blogger affiliates that bring them even more money or funnel users into paid Facebook groups that don’t offer much value.
However, there are some great courses available. They may not be specific to blogging overall, but they have a lot of great content for particular parts of blogging and can help you grow your business.
Below are courses that I’ve actually taken that helped me grow my blog. I’ve taken other courses that have been less than helpful, and there are thousands of classes I haven’t taken.
Pinterest Ninja
If you plan to use Pinterest for blog traffic, you must learn how to use the platform. I’ve taken a few Pinterest courses in my day to try to master this constantly evolving social media network, and Pinterest Ninja is the only one that has any value.
While the other courses stressed “make pretty pins” without telling you how, Pinterest Ninja showcases the search engine aspect of Pinterest and shows you how to optimize your profile, pins, and boards for Pinterest’s search algorithm.
Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing
Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing will teach you the basics of affiliate marketing. It will help you understand how to find affiliates and add them to your website. If you are a brand-new blogger unsure of how to get started with affiliates, this course will help you.
However, if you have some experience with affiliate marketing and are looking for an advanced course on how to make sales, write copy, and drive traffic to your affiliate posts, this is not the course for you. I haven’t found a course that teaches all those things yet, but I can tell you that the more traffic you get, the more affiliate sales you will make.
Money Mix Insiders
Okay, this isn’t a blogging course. It’s an immersive blogging program and mastermind group with far more value than any course I’ve taken. Instead of spending $100 on a course, spend $3 on a three-month trial of the group and see the value it brings. I promise you won’t be disappointed.
Blogging Tools to Grow Your Blog
These last few tools are extras you need to use to grow your blog and rank on Google. These resources are generally off-page tools that help you find and write great content for your blog.
Keyword Research Tool
To rank on Google, you need to do keyword research. I get it; you want to write what you want to write, right? I was like that too. But then I learned that I could achieve that goal while still considering what people were searching for with the help of a keyword research tool.
Although free options are available, the two best keyword research tools are Moz and Ahrefs. Moz is easier to use and has the metric many people ask about (Domain Authority, DA), while Ahrefs offers more data. I use Moz because I want a simple, easy-to-understand keyword research tool.
If you become a paying member of the Blogging Insiders group, you can choose between a Moz and an Ahrefs subscription within the group. This alone almost covers the full cost of membership!
TF-IDF
TF-IDF is a service that helps you write for SEO. Although it helps your on-page SEO, it’s not a plugin you can add to your WordPress interface. You need to visit a different website to use it.
TF-IDF compares your text to the top 20 sites already ranking in Google for your given keyword. It then gives you a list of related keywords that other sites are using that you are not. The goal is to help you rank higher by using more words and phrases related to your chosen keyword.
TF-IDF is a paid tool, but you can get it free as a Blogging Insiders member. Even trial members get to check it out for free!
Text Optimizer
Text Optimizer is very similar to TF-IDF. However, rather than comparing your words to the top 20 ranking websites, it tries to compare your text to what it thinks Google considers related keywords.
Text optimizer will give you an optimization score of 0-100, showing how well you optimized your content with related keywords. It will tell you if you have too much content about an unrelated keyword and will spit out a massive list of words you can add to your text to help optimize it better for Google.
Text Optimizer is also a paid tool, but you can get it free as a Blogging Insiders member. Even trial members get to check it out for free!
Page Speed Insights
We’ve mentioned site speed numerous times in this post, and that’s because it’s essential! Google created a website that will tell you how you are doing with site speed and core web vitals.
It’s free and easy to use; all you have to do is plug your URL into the box, and Google will tell you where you stand. Finding fixes for any issues is a lot harder, but if you use some of the plugins we mentioned, you should be able to get your site speed up.
Blogging Resources Make Blogging Easier
The blogging resources mentioned in this list will help you become a professional blogger. Of course, it’s not a matter of plugging the tools in, sitting back, and watching the money flow in. Running a blog is a lot of work; far more goes into it than the tools you use.
If you are serious about blogging, you need the right tools and need to put in the work. These are the right tools. Doing the work is up to you.