I mostly blog because I like writing, I like owning my own identity on my own site, and because other people have written about the benefits it's brought them.

I haven't blogged a ton (I plan to more) but I wouldn't say it's brought a ton of benefits so far.

The blog posts that have done well have had people email me nice things, produced some mean and uncharitable comment sections, some offers for low-paying freelance writing opportunities, and some signups for some projects I'm working on.

The number one piece of advice I'd give is to have some sort of goal in mind. If you're writing for fun, then make sure you have fun. If you're writing to build an audience, publish consistently and have a clear audience you're targeting in mind, and stick to writing stuff relevant to that audience. If you build an audience around a specific niche, you can convert that to something like signups for a product for people in that niche (e.g. a paid course on whatever programming topic you write about). However, you probably need to be somewhat intentional about that. And you'll probably get "stuck" in your niche to some extent, so pick one you care about. I think blogging increases your "luck surface area", but it's better to have a specific goal than hope for serendipity.