Passive Income Unlocked - Ground Zero: Where to Start

There are a ton of factors that set a good site apart from a not-so-good site, so it can seem overwhelming when you first get started.

Even in my case, I have a background in IT, but knew nothing about building content sites when I started a few years ago. Looking back, I made a ton of boneheaded mistakes that seem so obvious to me now.

Thankfully, building a site doesn’t have to be complicated, and even if you make a few mistakes, most of them can be corrected along the way.

If you’re ready to launch your first site, you really only need a few things to get started: a domain name, hosting, and a content management system (CMS). Everything else comes after and won’t cost you a dime.

Domain Name

You can think of a domain name as the web address that people use to reach your site. If you name your site Joe’s Fishing Adventure, the domain name would be joesfishingadventure.com.

For tips on selecting a domain name, check out this guide.

While you’re at it, check out my post about selecting a niche, as that’s important to consider before selecting your domain name:

Hosting

You can think of hosting as where your site’s posts, pages, images, etc. live. They have to be stored on a server somewhere so people can access them when they type in your domain name or click on an article in a Google Search result.

Content Management System

A CMS is a platform for managing the content on your site. There are plenty of them out there, but to keep it simple, you’ll want to use WordPress.

WordPress is by far and large the most heavily used CMS out there. This is where you’ll add posts, images, etc. to your site.

Back when I started my first site, I tried to figure these three things out separately. Luckily for you, you don’t have to.

These days, you can purchase your domain and hosting as a single package that comes integrated with WordPress as well. This is called managed WordPress hosting.

This basically means that you can buy your domain and hosting from the same place, and the host will handle configuring WordPress for you. You can even access your WordPress site from within your host’s dashboard, if you wish to.

There are tons of managed WordPress hosts out there, so I recommend doing some research to go with something you’re comfortable with.

For the easy button, Bluehost is a solid option. That’s what we’ve always done in the past, as their pricing is reasonable, and the interface is super easy to use.

​Here’s a step-by-step guide to getting up and running with Bluehost, if that’s who you decide to go with. Again, spend a few minutes to look at your options. There's a lot of good ones out there.

Bluehost isn’t going to give you the fastest website by any means (no entry-level host will), but that’s not something you really need to worry about with a brand new site. Whoever you decide to go with, go with the 1-year option, then reevaluate at that point in time.

Ideally, by the 1-year mark, you’ll have enough traffic to justify moving to a faster hosting company. We’re currently using Rocket for all of our sites, but again, I wouldn’t spend money on something like this until you’re getting a considerable amount of traffic to your site.

Once you get your site fired up with a domain, hosting, and WordPress, your next step, and the most important one, is to get content on your site.

Use the guides below to find keywords, then pull out your digital pencil and get to work.

• ​Finding Topics Within a Niche​
• ​Finding Keywords Within a Topic​

If future emails, I'll dive more into strategy and techniques to get your content to start ranking. Until then, roll up your sleeves and start writing (or typing, preferably).

Jeff

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Next Steps

Check out more content at the Passive Income Unlocked website​

Watch videos on our YouTube Channel​

See our Go-To Tools and Resources​

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