Blog Posts How-To And Tips (Sharon Taylor)
Aug 25, 2010
Before getting down to the how and what of blog posts, let's take a quick look at the big picture of blogging. Thing is that blogs are meant to be a personal place, where the author can be informal and connect one-on-one with each reader and as a community. Without this interaction and personality, a blog is just another pile of pages cluttering the internet.
In the case of commercial and professional blogs, the core content and style remains the same, with the same personal tone and a bit of humor. But the look and feel is more polished and the blog reaches a much bigger audience. Here's a brief outline of the important things to keep in mind.
Subject: The concept is that a blog is a place to talk to about things that a person finds interesting. This is why blogs focused on specific topics do well. The author is an expert on said topic, or at least has a keen interest in it. This might be of help to someone who's thinking about starting a blog without a specific topic in mind. For such a person, it's not a good idea to blog about topics like politics, football or gardening without having an interest in these topics.
Back-end: It's also important to decide what kind of technology to use. There are a gazillion companies offering blog platforms, both free and paid. The usual way to start is with a free blog host, which millions of others are using and doing quite well. But individual needs and the purpose of the blog should be taken into consideration.
But if there's a clear plan and willingness to invest time and resources, it might be worthwhile to take a look at how to set up a blog with its own domain on a paid host. This allows for much more flexibility and control over the blog settings, and the look and feel of the blog. It's possible to run scripts and software that can help in making the blog a lot more professional, with more bells and whistles.
Design: On the internet, attention spans are so small that the first impression is the only chance to arouse interest. A clean design with some nice graphics and a professional logo are a big help in this regard. Easy way is to download a free blog template off the internet. For those with budgets and the need for a professional blog might want to hire a designer for these things.
Content: This is the single most important part of running a blog. Unless the author is able to belt out unique, interesting and timely blog posts, the rest of it is all a wasted effort. Each post should be written informally and in the first person, and should not exceed into a long discourse. The post needs to be peppered with humor and spiced up with strong opinions.
Traffic: Another very important part of the job. Thousands of blogs get dumped by their owners every day, because it seems to be a wasted effort sans readers. Building a reader base is part talent and part social skills, as in linking to blog posts written by others and posting comments on other blogs. There's also the optimization part, which is a whole new subject. The summary of it is that traffic acquisition has many components, from adding blogrolls to advertising and SEO.
About the AuthorWant to find out more about Blog Posts, then visit Sharon Taylor's site on how to choose the best Blog Posts for your needs..