5 Easy Steps To Becoming A Successful Blogger

Sharing your opinion on the Interwebs has never been easier, what with Twitter, Facebook, and every other social media platform out there. But if you want to establish yourself as a brand, or an expert, you need some long-form to complement your 140 character gems. And for that, you need some kind of website or blog.

With an estimated 152 million blogs on the internet — and top bloggers reporting millions in earnings, the business of blogging is moving at the speed of — well, Like.

I was reasonably early to the party, starting my first site in 2009 following a layoff from Rolling Stone. Post-employment, I knew I wanted to continue writing, but the entrepreneur in me also wanted to build something (and the Jewish mother in me wanted to be part of an industry that was growing).

So I pivoted from print to digital, chronicling high-profile events and interviews (Prince, Bono) via my own Blogger site and social media channels — Twitter and Facebook, mostly. Seven years later, with a following north of 300,000 and a team of five, I blog about blogging (meta, I know), and count partnerships with Dell, American Express, and Ted Baker.

The industry has changed a lot in these seven years, but I've also observed patterns across the most successful of these websites.

So, here's my step-by-step guide to starting your own from scratch — and making sure it stands out.