Blogging is not new. Blogging is so old that part of its original term – ‘weblog’ – isn’t really used anymore to describe cyberspace (that would be ‘web’). And since in the early days photos and videos could not easily be shared because of file sizes and slow download speeds, it was mostly words upon words when you checked out the internet in the nineties. It wasn’t even done for money then, so keep in mind that if your goal is financial success in blogging today, you should definitely read on.
Enjoy It
As Netflix is finding out, ‘content is king”. When it comes to the typically small operation that is an independent blogger, that means you need to add posts consistently, especially in the early days. Even if you have a flair for writing, if there’s only a handful of short posts, people won’t spend a long time on your site, and will quickly move on.
If you are going to write a lot, it certainly helps to focus on content that you enjoy. Ideally, it would be topics that many other people enjoy too, since obscure historical facts about daily life in the medieval period might have a very niche audience.
Maybe it will be about popular movies where you share a well thought out contrary opinion. Maybe you will write bizarre and humourous takes on current events. Maybe your own life is a wild roller coaster and you share (almost completely true) stories about that time in London when you saw a police escort take a member of the royal family to a cafe that got rave reviews.
Whatever it is, make sure you like doing it, otherwise it will be hard to publish things on a constant basis. Make sure the title of your blog allows you to branch out. Calling it something like ‘Music Thoughts For Your Earhole’ (you can take that one for free), you are suddenly limiting yourself to talking only about that.
While blogging about your life can be easy since it’s just about spilling out your day onto a computer screen for all the world to see, keep in mind that you should be careful about mentioning other people (especially friends and family) who might not want a walk-on role in this literary adventure.
Share It
You’ve just written a modern masterpiece for your blog, a well-written observational piece of modern culture that is just the perfect length. Unfortunately you don’t have time to sit back, rest on your laurels and wait for the views and sponsorships to roll in. We don’t mean you have to get right back into writing the next article. No, right now, it is time to roll up your sleeves and get other people to notice it.
Having someone stumble across your personal blog (even if you are on a hosting site like WordPress) is a ‘needle in a haystack’ sort of situation. You have to go out and bring attention to your writing, and that means engaging in social media, even if you’ve written a couple of rants about the problems of social media. That means you definitely need a Twitter page and Twitter handle, and you have to start making regular posts there. You should also begin following other people who tweet regularly and make positive comments on their posts.
While Twitter is best known for written quips, you should also be looking into both Facebook and Instagram, and post there as well (typically you will be making a similar post for all three when you have a new blog article you are promoting). These sites might be more photo-friendly, though.
This level of social media interaction is essential for building awareness and sending traffic towards your blog. In fact, it is likely that you might become known for your social media pages before your blogging ones.
In fact, for some people, becoming a ’Twitter blogger’ is the goal, even though its 280 character limit definitely limits the options of what you can write. Yes, you can make multiple posts in a row that can eventually hold your entire article if you want, but make sure it doesn’t become more cumbersome than it’s worth. If your writing is good enough, people will just click on the link to your blog to get it in one easy package.
Film It
While we don’t want to say that words are going out of style in an article about blogging tips, we definitely have to acknowledge that there is competition with watching people talk. As we mentioned in the introduction, initially the internet couldn’t handle photos and videos very well. That has changed so now people share their opinions by talking into a microphone (podcasts) or talking into a microphone while a camera is filming them (vlogs).
Regardless of whether they are reading something they carefully wrote ahead of time or just riffing it, it has to be acknowledged that this style of presentation is really giving old fashion blogging a run for its money. As mentioned above, the best way to address this challenge to the written word is to engage it carefully.
Creating your own short videos to promote your articles can be done well if you treat it a bit like your Twitter or Facebook posts. Just give viewers a taste so they will be interested enough to go on and read the article. Now that you are also a vlogger in a restrained form, you still have to do it properly and have a professional look to each video. You might not have the charm and energy that your writing has in your first few broadcasts, but getting better at this will definitely help bring more attention to your blogs.
