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Happy Monday all!
So back when I started this column I wanted to make it something that would be useful for people and that you guys could use as a resource. When thinking of today’s topic, I thought “What is the question I get asked the most by people?” and I’d have to say the number one thing is “How do I start a blog?”. While I’m no expert by any means in this category and honestly when people ask technical questions about the back end of the site, I usually don’t even know the answers still but I have learned quite a few things throughout my (almost) two years of blogging that I would love to share.
So whether you’re looking to start a blog, have been pondering the idea or am just curious of where it all begins, here are my top 5 tips to getting a blog started.
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Find Your Focus. First and foremost, pick your focus. Are you going to produce content that is more relevant to lifestyle, maybe you’re a foodie and are looking to start a food blog or a small business owner looking to share her journey. Whatever you are looking to write about find your focus and create your “ideal” audience. This will help you when coming up with content and generating readers who are genuinely interested in your content. Your focus doesn’t have to be something completely out of the box or something nobody else is doing, you’re best bet is do what is most you so you can stay true to your audience.
Pick a Name. Coming up with a name is the fun part! Once you’ve decided on your content/focus create a name that explains what your readers will find in a nutshell. Then say it out loud to someone and see how it sounds. Do you feel confident saying the name? Will people be able to somewhat know what your site is about by the name? These are two things I have learned after years of attending events and being asked “What’s the name of your blog?”.
Do Your Research. There’s no training guide on how to start a blog, even though there are many tips and advice articles out there these days. There’s no right or wrong way to getting started, but there is a few things I recommend you do your homework on. Think of things you like on other blogs, maybe it’s beautiful images or step by step tutorials, maybe it’s the easy print out recipe posts. Whatever it is, spend time researching how to achieve these because most likely if you like it on other sites, people will like it on yours. Spend time learning how to use a DSLR camera or embedding recipe plug-ins. Maybe do some research on ad placements or setting up SEO.
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Make a Plan. I’ve heard many girls say they want to start a blog but haven’t had time to plan 3 months of posts beforehand. I’ll give you a little behind the scenes of my blog, I started my blog with 0 planned posts and still never have time to plan out my posts until the night before. You’re not going to get a week of nothing to do, but blog shoots and post writing once you start so why should you need one before starting? No need to plan out months in advance when starting, just be sure to plan out when you want to post, how often and then a few hours before each post to write and create the post. I wish I could say I do my shoots way in advance, but typically I do the week’s shoots the weekend before…I’ll get ahead one of these days;)
Just Do It. Ok no more thinking about it, it’s time to just do it! You can think on it for months and go back and forth on whether or not to start or how to, but the truth is you’ll learn most of the things you need to know once you start. I started my blog with 0 clue of what I was doing, but have learned quite a bit along the way from researching things I found I needed to know after starting or from other bloggers I’ve met along the way. Like I said before there’s no right or wrong way to do it and there’s no perfect moment to start, so just do it and you’ll figure it out along the way!
Any blogging tips you’ve found helpful? Any questions you’re still pondering before getting started, share below!