The Business of Blogging Part 3: Obtain Proper Licenses and a Tax ID Number - Vyde (2024)

FAQs

Do you need a license to start a blog? ›

Most bloggers do not need to obtain a federal license to do business, but most states do require bloggers to have a general business license.

As a blogger or influencer, you should be treating your blog and Instagram handle as a business. Even if you aren't generating income just yet, we still recommend filing for an LLC.

What kind of business is a blog? A blog is classified as a digital publishing business . That's because a blog operates mainly by publishing content on the internet, including articles, photos, and videos. Most blogs start off as a sole-proprietorship business at first.

Yes. Here are some of the things you'll need to think about: You will need a separate business bank account for your LLC where you will take in money from your blog and pay expenses. You should track all of your blog business income and expenses separately through a bookkeeping or accounting system.

You are legally required to post a privacy policy on your blog (even if you are not blogging for business). There are all kinds of personal information and user data your blog is collecting (some from Google Analytics) such as someone's: name. email address for your email list or sale of products.

Yes! Starting a blog is one of the easiest, most accessible ways to launch your own business and earn an income online (from anywhere in the world).

Can the taxpayer expect to make a profit in the future from the appreciation of assets used in the activity? If you've made a profit during at least 3 of the last 5 years, including the current year, the IRS assumes your blog is a business.

If you run a small personal blog or business website and do not have plans to grow it further, then your creative works are already protected by copyright. On the other hand, if you are doing business across states and plan to grow further, then it becomes essential to register your trademark and copyright.

If you want to become a successful blogger, you're going to need a smart blog business plan that can guide your decision-making, tell you what to invest your time in and keep pointing you toward the next stage in the growth of your blog business.

NAICS Code: 519130 Internet Publishing and Broadcasting and Web Search Portals | NAICS Association.

Are bloggers self-employed? ›

If you are a blogger you are most likely are a self employed business. If you accept payment for your blogging activities and don't work for someone else, you are self-employed. This doesn't need to be full time either, part-time activities count too.

The idea is to group your posts systematically so your readers can easily find the content that interests them. Between 4-6 categories feels about right. Too many will make your content harder to find. If you have too many categories then consider reducing them and supplementing with tags.

If the only place you're using the domain name is as your website address/ URL, then you don't need to do anything else. If you're using the new domain name to market your business or provide products and services, then you will need to file a DBA.

Blogs are a robust and dynamic platform that can become successful and profitable. A personal blog must be transformed into a business blog to be capable enough to generate revenue. To do that, you require strategic planning and the right monetizing methodologies.

Yes, bloggers do need copyright. Copyright protects their work from being used without permission and provides them with legal recourse if someone does use it without authorization. It also gives the blogger exclusive rights to reproduce, distribute or display their work as they see fit.

WordPress.org is open-source software, meaning you can use it to build your blog for free. Its abundant features offered via plugins and themes make building your blog relatively easy compared to some other open-source options.