How To Start a Food Blog in 8 Easy Steps

Who doesn’t love food? Food is one of the most popular topics online, whether it’s Instagram photos of your latest meals, food hashtags, Facebook food videos, or food blogs. Food blogs come in many forms, from recipe blogs, to food and restaurant reviews, to extremely niche blogs focused on one type of food exclusively. 

Whatever type of food blog interests you most, creating and maintaining a food blog can be a fun and lucrative project! All you need is some basic web knowledge and great content. We’re here to help with the technical aspects of your blog so that you can start sharing the food you love! Just follow these steps to create your own food blog. 

Steps to Start Your Own Food Blog

1. 1. 1. Pick a Niche and Brand Name
      2. Lock in Your Domain Name and Hosting
      3. Install WordPress 
      4. Pick a WordPress Theme
      5. Install WordPress Plugins 
      6. Set Up Analytics
      7. Start Creating Content 

Pick Your Niche and Brand Name

The first thing you’ll need to do is decide what your food blog is going to be about. Are you sharing recipes, food that you find at restaurants, or both? Whether you’re making the food or someone else is, there are plenty of directions you can go from there. A recipe blog could focus solely on baked goods, dinners, healthy meals, diet-specific recipes like vegan or gluten-free, easy to make recipes, meals for kids – the list of food blog ideas goes on and on.

On the flip side, even a food blogger sharing what they eat out can be laser focused. You may choose to share only one type of food – all cheddar cheese, only desserts, pizza – again, there’s endless opportunity. Many food bloggers are also travel bloggers, sharing their favorite food from around the world. 

Whatever food niche you land on, the first step to creating your own website for a blog is picking a domain name! Brainstorm a name that matches the theme or topic of your blog. Many bloggers incorporate their name somehow or a punny food saying of some sort. Figure out what fits your theme and style best. Make sure it is short, memorable, and easy to spell.

My method to picking a domain or brand name is trying to combine words that relate to the niche or location I want to blog about, sometime even incorporating my name into the blog.

My name being Erin plus and food/niche terms plus maybe a location.  For example erin+eats+philly if I wanted to be a Philadelphia food blogger, then register erineatsphilly.com.  Or niche+name+food term, vegan+erin+eats.  Then search for your domain availability below and register it if you find a good one before it s taken.  I suggest creating a spreadsheet to try different combinations.

Lock in Your Domain Name and Hosting

Once you’ve figured out a domain name you like, check that someone else hasn’t used it! You can check for domain names for free on BlueHost with this tool: 

If your domain name of choice is available, you can purchase it or get it for free with a BlueHost hosting plan.

All websites need a hosting site to publish their pages on the internet. There are plenty of different hosting sites, but we recommend BlueHost for beginners. BlueHost is the most affordable option, and is also very reliable and easy to use. Through BlueHost, you can also buy your domain for free if you sign up for a year. There are many reasons why bloggers choose BlueHost:

• Free Domain and Site Builder
• 1-Click WordPress Installs
• 24/7 Support
• 30-Day Money Back Guarantee
• #1 Recommended by WordPress
• Easy to use – no need for a website designer!
• Have your website up and running in minutes

Setting Up BlueHost

There are different plans with BlueHost, and for most bloggers the basic plan will do just fine. 

Fill out your account information, and select the 36-month plan. This plan offers the cheapest rate and also allows you to get your domain for free.

A BlueHost plan also comes with add-ons, most of which you have to pay for. You should definitely invest in Domain Privacy Protection for only about $10 a year. This keeps your personal information like your address and phone number from being visible to the public, so for your privacy you should spend the ten dollars. The other add-ons are unnecessary – don’t waste your money, uncheck them. 

Once you confirm your purchase, you’re ready to start building your website!

Install WordPress

A large number of websites use WordPress, especially for blogging. It’s very easy to use, and can be installed for free through BlueHost. To install WordPress, follow these simple steps:

1. 1. 1. Log into BlueHost.
      2. Under the Web Builders section, click WordPress.
      3. Click “Install”.
      4. Enter your domain name and click “Check Domain”.
      5. Agree to the Terms and Conditions and click “Install Now”. 
      6. After the installation is complete, click “View Credentials” to receive login information.

Now that you have WordPress installed on your website, you can start designing what you want the site to look like.

Pick a WordPress Theme

WordPress themes determine what your specific site will actually look like. There are abundant themes to choose from, some free and some premium themes that you’ll need to pay for. 

You want to find a very well-designed theme for a couple of reasons. First, you want your site to look good, and a nice theme will make that happen. Second, your theme needs to be functional and responsive. That means that it has features and buttons that work as they’re supposed to, and that the theme will fit any screen. A responsive theme makes it easy to read on any device. A well-designed theme is also vital for SEO purposes; if there are coding issues or errors, Google is less likely to show your website in search results. 

Since the theme can make or break your site in terms of quality, we recommend buying a premium theme. The cost is well worth what you get, as a poorly designed theme will make blogging and gaining an audience and traffic much more difficult. From our own experience blogging, we can recommend a few great, user-friendly themes.

The Best WordPress Themes:

• • • Elegant Themes
    • Foodie Pro Theme from Studio Press 
    • Brunch Pro Theme

Once you find a theme that you like, you can purchase it and install it! Follow these instructions to add your theme to your website: 

1. 1. 1. On your WordPress dashboard, click “Appearance” on the left side menu.
      2. Click “Add New”.
      3. Here, you can search for your theme or upload the theme you already purchased by clicking “Upload Theme”.
      4. Click “Install”.
      5. Once the theme is installed, click “Activate” to make it live on your site. 

With your theme installed, you can begin creating a home page and adding content! Tweak your blog to make it look great and so that it is easy for visitors to navigate. 

Install WordPress Plugins

While your WordPress Theme will work well on its own, there are plenty of plugins you can add for extra features. Plugins can do a variety of things, from adding forms and tables to spam filtering and social media add-ons. There are abundant plugins you can try, some better than others. To begin, we recommend these plugins:

• Tasty Recipes: This plugin makes it easy to format and share recipes on your website! Any recipe-based food blog will need a recipe plugin, and this one is our favorite. It’s also SEO friendly and has great features.
• Tasty Pins: Pinterest is a popular site for recipes; this plugin makes it easy to share your images to Pinterest and link back to your site! This will make it easy to set Pinterest descriptions and adds a “Pin It” button to your images for visitors to save to their boards for later.
• Social Sharing Plugin: There are a few different social sharing plugins offered by WordPress. These make it easy for visitors to share your blog post on social channels.
• Yoast SEO: SEO can be complicated, but this plugin will help ensure your content is optimized for search engine results.

Set Up Analytics

To track how your website performs, set up analytics tools to monitor things like traffic, click through rate, Google rankings, and much more.

Google Analytics is a free tool that every website should use. Simply set up a Google Analytics account and add a tracking code to your website so that you can monitor its performance! Another helpful and free tool from Google is Google Search Console, which helps ensure your website is running correctly and that pages are recognized by Google.

If you’re serious about your blog, you should track its performance and make improvements based on what you learn. 

Start Creating Content!

Once your website is up and running with all the proper tools, you can start posting content! If you know how to write for SEO, you can optimize your posts so that they rank well on Google and bring visitors to your site. There are also plenty of other ways to promote your blog, including social media, ads, and more. Check out some of our resources to make the most of your blog!

Blogger Resources:

• How to Write for SEO
• The Best Social Media Management Tools
• How Do Search Engines Work?
• Best Food Hashtags
• How to Get Your First 1000 Followers on Instagram
• Food Blog Ideas: Names, Topics, and More

Starting a Food Blog

Food blogs can be a fun way to earn some extra income, and with hard work it can even become a primary source of income. Before you can really make money food blogging, however, you’ll need to build a great blog with interesting content. Focus on quality first and profits will come in time.