Google Blogger Guide

With the help of blogging you can express your thoughts and share anything with the world. Also If you are wise in this field, then you can earn a decent income from it.

Each day, millions of articles/posts/stories get published in the web, and more than 200 thousand new blogs created. It means more than two new blogs published every second. Isn’t Amazing? So many blogs are springing up daily with their various topics, and many of them became famous in the world. So, now It’s your turn!

So If you’re new to blogging and planning to start a blog for free, then you’re in the right place. In this article, I’ll show you how to create a blog on blogger.com (Google’s own free blogging platform).

Before we start let me tell you some interesting fact about Google Blogger/Blogspot.

What is Google Blogger?

Blogger.com is Google’s own free blogging platform where you can create a free blog with the .blogspot.com subdomain (for example, yourblogname.blogspot.com) or you can buy a domain (always recommended) to have your perfect website (for example, www.yourdomain.com).

Advantages Of Starting A Blog On Google Blogger

Starting a blog with Google Blogspot is very easy, and you don’t need any professional skill to operate your blog.
Google owns the platform, so you have that trust and credibility.
Blogger is free for all, and they never ask for a penny.
Though there are many of free blogging platforms available on the web (like WordPress, Weebly, Wix, Tumblr, and others), Blogger.com is the winner of all of them when it comes to giving you freedom and the features offered.
You can set up your custom domain there instated of free .blogspot.com subdomain.
You can Configure a free SSL Certificate for your blog (by simply turning on HTTPS). Now blogger offers HTTPS version of both type of sites, so no matter if you’re using their .blogspot sub-domain or your custom domain.
They provide free simple and responsive templates and also allow you to upload your own theme. In the web lots of free and premium blogger template available, so you can install them and customize as you want.
Some cool features like template editor, template designer, and layout editor, are very advantageous. With the help of the template editor, you edit the code of your theme and can customize it as you like. Template Designer used to design the essential elements of your blog and to add custom CSS to your blog. Layout editor helps to place various widgets at different locations on your blog by just dragging and dropping.
Blog post publishing and management system are very easy to use.
The communication system is good also. You can use its default comment system or can set up Facebook, Disqus, Google Plus Comments easily.
Blogger post editor provides all essential tools to write an excellent blog post. It allows you to edit or modify your article, search description, labels, location, custom permalink, custom robots tags, image alt tag, blog post scheduling, errors, and redirections, etc.
You can monetize your site with Google AdSense and other programs like affiliate marketing easily unlike other platforms.
Like other CMS (Content management system), Google blogger also lets you take backup your data. So, if something wrong happens with your site, then you can restore it with your backup.
Also later, if you wish to move on other platforms (like WordPress, Wix, Weebly) then by using their plugins, you can easily switch to them without losing anything.

How to Create A Free Blog with Blogger.com

Create a blog

Sign in to Blogger.
On the left, click the Down arrow .
Click New blog.
Enter a name for your blog.
Click Next.
Choose a blog address or URL.
Click Save.

Choose your blog title, address and theme

After clicking ‘new blog’ or ‘create new blog’ option, a new window will be open like the following screenshot below and there you need to fill details. Now enter your blog name, address, and then pick a theme. After that, you need to click ” Create blog” button to finish your initial blog setup. Don’t worry about your selection; you can change/modify them later also.

Add pages to your blog

Important: You can’t use specific posts as pages.

You can create pages for consistent content like “About” or “Contact.” Pages can show up as tabs at the top of your blog or as links on the side.

Step 1: Show your pages

Sign in to Blogger.
In the top left, select a blog.
From the menu on the left, click Layout.
In the section you want your pages to show, click Add a Gadget.
In the window, next to “Pages”, click Add .
Set your settings and click Save.
To save the arrangement, in the bottom right, click Save .

Tip: To change where your page shows up, drag the gadget to a new location.

Step 2: Create, edit, or delete pages

Important: There’s no limit to the number of pages you can have in one blog.

Create a New Page

Sign in to Blogger.
In the top left, select a blog.
From the menu on the left, click Pages.
In the top left, click New Page.
Enter a page title and other information.
In the top right, click Save, Preview page, or Publish.

Create a Page with a Link to Another Website

Sign in to Blogger.
In the top left, select a blog.
From the menu on the left, click Layout.
In the “Page List (Top)” section next to “Pages,” click Edit .
Under “Pages to show,” click + Add external link.
Enter the page title and URL and click Save Link Save.

Edit a Page

Sign in to Blogger.
In the top left, select a blog.
From the menu on the left, click Pages.
Click on the title of the page you want to edit.
Edit your page.
In the top right, click Save, Preview page, or Publish.

Delete a Page

Sign in to Blogger.
In the top left, select a blog.
From the menu on the left, click Pages.
Point to the page you want to remove.
Click Delete this page Delete page.

Step 3: Select the pages to show

From the menu on the left, click Layout.
In the “Pages” section, click Edit .
Select the pages you want to show and click Save.
To save the arrangement, in the bottom right, click Save.

Create, edit, manage, or delete a post

You can write, edit, or delete posts and drafts any time.

Write a new post

Sign in to Blogger.
Click New Post .
Create the post.
- To check how your post will look when it’s published, click Preview.
Save or publish your post:
- To save and not publish: Click Save.
- To publish: Click Publish.

Add labels to your post

You can use labels to organize your posts. Your readers can use your labels to filter the content they get.

Sign in to Blogger.
To open the editor view, click an existing post or click New post .
On the right, click Labels .
Enter a label or click an existing label.
- To add more than one label to a post, separate labels with commas.

Tip: In your dashboard, next to the title, you can find your labels.

Filter your posts with labels

Sign in to Blogger.
In the upper right, click Labels .
Select any number of labels.
Click Apply.

Publish a post

Schedule a Post

Sign in to Blogger.
Under the name of a blog, click Posts the title of the post you want to publish.
On the right sidebar, next to Published on , click the drop-down arrow .
Select Set date and time.
On the calendar, choose a date and time, then click Publish.
- If you want to reschedule a published post, click Revert to draft.

Edit a post

Sign in to Blogger.
Under the name of a blog, click Posts.
Click the title of the post.
Make your changes.
- To check how your post will look when it’s published, click Preview.
For posts that:
- Have been published: Click Update or Revert to draft.
- Haven’t been published: Click Publish or Save.

Delete a post

Sign in to Blogger.
In the top left, click the Down arrow .
Click the name of a blog.
Point to the post you want to delete. When it appears, click Delete .

Content to avoid

Do not use:

Material hosted by someone else without their consent.
Copyrighted materials.
Content that violates our content policy. This includes, but is not limited to, explicit imagery posted without the subject’s consent and hateful, violent, or crude content.

Add images & videos to your blog

You can add photos, videos, and other images to your blog posts. When you add images to your blog, they’re stored in a Google Album Archive.

According to Blogger’s copyright policy, you’re not allowed to add:

Content that’s hosted by someone else without their consent.
Copyrighted material without authorization.
Any content that violates the Blogger content policy.

Add an image to a blog post

Important: If the height or width of a photo exceeds 2,048 pixels or if a video is longer than 15 minutes, it’ll count toward your storage limit.

To add an image to your blog post:

Sign in to Blogger.
In the top left, select a blog.
Click the post you want to edit or create a new post.
At the top, click Insert image .
Choose from where you want to upload the image.
Select one or more images and click Insert.
- To change the size, caption, or alignment of the image after you add it, click the image.

Add a video to your blog post

Sign in to Blogger.
In the top left, select a blog.
Click the post where you want to add a video.
At the top, click Insert video .
- You can upload a video from your computer or choose a video from YouTube.
Select a video and click Insert.

Fix issues with images and videos

If you have problems when you try to upload images or videos to your blog, try these steps:

Clear your cache and cookies.
Turn your pop-up blocker off or, in your browser settings, allow pop-ups from Blogger.com.
Turn off any plugins you’ve installed on your browser.
Make sure you’ve installed the latest version of your browser.

Manage your comments

You can manage who comments on your posts and the type of comments they can leave. You can also comment on other people’s blogs. There’s no limit to how many comments can be left on a post.

Manage your blog’s comments

Set your Blogger Comment Settings

Sign in to Blogger.
In the top left, select a blog.
From the menu on the left, click Settings.
Under “Comments,” adjust your comment settings:
- Comment location: To allow responses to your post’s comments, select Embedded.
- Who can comment: To restrict anonymous comments, select Users with Google Accounts or Only members of this blog.
- Comment moderation: If you want to approve comments, select Always or Sometimes. If you don’t want to approve comments, select Never.
Click Save.

Tip: To turn on comment settings in the Post Editor, click Options .

Moderate comments

Important: Only admins can moderate comments.

To review comments before they publish, turn on Comment moderation:

Sign in to Blogger.
In the top left, select a blog.
From the menu on the left, click Settings.
Under “Comments,” click Comment moderation.
Choose how often you want to review comments and click Save.

Approve or delete a comment

Sign in to Blogger.
In the top left, select a blog.
From the menu on the left, click Comments.
From the drop-down menu at the top, select Awaiting moderation.
Read the comment and click Publish, Delete, or Spam.

Publish or reject comments from your email

If you enter an email address to manage comments, when someone leaves a new comment, you’ll get an email. In the email, click Publish, Delete, or Mark as spam.

If you select Mark as spam, the comment is deleted.

Edit and Modify Blogger Search Preference Settings to Optimize Your Blog SEO

In this section, you can optimize your blog for search engines. With the help of these setups, you can able to get better ranking in search engine.

Edit meta tags: A meta tag is a brief and concise summary of your blog or website. It supposes to install after the title of the page. The user of a search engine focuses on the description of the post after reading the title of the post. So, Keep in mind that it is very much necessary that your meta description must be related to what you have written in your blog. Your meta tag description must be written within 150 characters.

Custom page not found: When someone lands on your site through a URL that no longer exists, you can set a message to them that the page doesn’t exist. You can set any custom text or HTML message instructing them what to do next.

Custom redirects: Using this feature you can redirect your full-length permalinks to a shorter one and also you can redirect your broken links to your site. Bloggers custom redirects only support redirection within the same blog URL, so this isn’t suitable if you’ve changed your blog domain name.

Crawlers and indexing: These features are imperative because doing proper setup there, a chance to get better ranking in search engine and incorrect configuration can harm your SERP(Search engine ranking position) or you may lose your search engine visibility. So stay away from this part, if you are not expert.

Customize Your Blogger Blog

In your blog dashboard left panel section, you can see “Theme” and “Layout” option. There you can do your all customization stuff like new template installation or modification, edit or remove blogger widgets, logo setup, text color, and style edit and many more.

Customization Allowed In Blogger Theme And Layout Section

You can Choose a Template from its available templates collection, or you can upload your own theme.
Also, you can take backup or restore your blog template anytime by clicking on the Backup/Restore button on the top right side of the Theme dashboard.
By clicking on Customize button, a new template editor will open where you can able to make some changes such as changing the background, changing font design and colors, adding Custom CSS, selecting the layout, etc.
You can Edit HTML of the template.
You can choose a Mobile Template for your site.
In the Layout section, you can manage your blog layout by simple drag and drop process.
You can see the multiple locations in the Layout Editor where you can add various widgets also.
In the layout section, you can edit Favicon, blog header, footer, sidebar, etc.
You can use the Blogger Teme Designer to change the layout widths and other settings.

Conclusion

I started my blogging journey with BlogSpot, and I later advanced to WordPress. If you want to be a passionate blogger then start your journey with Google Blogger. Google Blogger is also offer money making opportunity with Google Adsense. You can also make money through affiliate marketing.