Blogging is no longer limited to niche hobbies. Almost everyone and businesses have a blog in some form or another. Blogging has its many attractions and in my first blog for Eeko Media let’s have a look at how to start a blog.
There are a lot of benefits to blogging, and for some it is a good way to earn extra income online. Before you start to write a blog make sure you know and understand who you are writing for.
So, what is a blog? A blog is an online diary or journal typically located on a website or as an entire site, this is for sharing information with an exclusive group or to engage with the public. More and more businesses are starting to blog, not just to drive website traffic but also to promote their products or services. Reasons for this, that it helps to build confidence with existing and potential customers.
How do you start blogging:
- Decide what you want to blog about
- Choose your platform – (Will this be on your website or as an entire site?)
- Grab a custom domain and choose web hosting- if you are new to online
- Start writing– Promote what you write
Blogging isn’t necessarily difficult to start but consistency with posting will see results. What I mean by that, it’s not enough to occasionally write a blog every once in a while and expect results, remind yourself of why and what you want to achieve from blogging and plan ahead. For example, if you plan to write two blog posts a week, use your content or marketing calendar, and schedule your posting days. Then, once you have posted follow up and engage in comments and discussions.
One of the reasons why I blog is to inspire and build an audience. Being able to inspire an audience through writing is a satisfying feeling and when people respond to you in a positive way it makes me want to do it more.
As a blogger, imagine using your words to inspire people. Ways you can inspire is to,
- Give advice and educate
- Make someone’s day more productive
- Create something beautiful
- Help other people or their business
All this can be achievable through the power of your blog. Don’t wait to jump on the bandwagon to get started, share your blog on social media each time you write a post and use relevant hashtags. This will help widen the audience of your posts, and your blog will benefit.
Over time you should notice that, by blogging it will have a huge impact on your ability to write. Starting out might feel awkward and slow, but once you get into the swing of writing it should become a lot easier. Words will flow with ease and you’ll develop a style that’s uniquely you. You will get a good idea of what people respond to that will push your creativity, find topics that you engage more with and what your audience enjoy reading.
Lastly let’s look at how starting a blog has its pros and cons and there’s no right or wrong way to make it work. The points I mentioned above aren’t necessarily difficult to get going, it’s quick and easy to set up. Luckily you don’t need much technical knowledge to get started. With that in mind, blogs can be time consuming so finding time to write regular updates can become a chore. Also, you can’t control how people will respond and they may leave rude or inappropriate comments- be prepared for spam too! And remember whatever you publish is available for everyone to see. So, if you write a post in anger or with very little thought, you might regret it later.
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