Blogging has come a long way since it started back in 1983 as a simple newsgroup function. Once used primarily as an online repository for personal thought (think an electronic diary)
today many blogs are fodder for workplace discussion and personal links in emails and forum posts. In fact there are currently well in excess of 100 million blogs in existence.
If you want to provide longevity and visibility to your blog I’d like to present a few ideas that can help you reach that goal.
10. Understand what you’re getting into. Blogging can be very hard work. It will require you to spend regular time developing content for your blog. If you start your blog half-heartedly it may end before it ever really gets started. You will lose interest fast if you don’t see immediate results. Blogging requires the blogger to agree to delayed gratification.
9. Determine a core concept. If, like Jerry Seinfeld, you want to blog about nothing you had better be extremely good at it otherwise you will need to determine a focus of the material you will present.
8. Don’t write simply to gain comments. The truth is there won’t be a lot of comments for quite a while. It will take time for people to find you and a little bit longer than that to gain a following.
7. Laser focus everything you write. Stay on target. If you’re writing about steam engines of the 19th century don’t take a break to talk about the latest political issues. There are plenty of blogs covering those topics. Make sure you provide only what your niche audience wants.
6. Establish an RSS feed. Make it easy for existing fans to keep up to date with your blog without having to visit your blog site all the time.
5. Provide plenty of links. Search engines will view your blog as more trusted if you supply links. You will also gain status among search engines if others link back to your post so encourage others to do so.
4. Keep it simple. Your blog posts should be around 200 words in length. If you’re writing an article use a free article directory, but don’t put it in your blog. Blogs are intentionally short to keep interest high while conserving space. If you write an article and it’s used elsewhere write a blog brief and link to it, but keep the blog posting itself short.
3. Choose quality over quantity. The sheer number of blog posts may be less important than keying in on the most important topics and covering them well. This gives readers time to mentally digest your material for long-term retention.
2. Invite an occasional guest blogger. If there is someone who can provide significant value to your readers you might ask them to consider drafting a blog for you in exchange for links back to their site. You can become viewed as a facilitator of great expertise by doing so.
1. Always cite sources. This can be in links or text, but give credit where credit is due. Many blogs will allow your links to be sent back to the site of origin so they can know how their information is being used. This allows readers to see the information is more than your personal opinion. They will also come to believe you are serious about your blog and the quality of information you provide.
Blogs are becoming important elements for learning new skills or learning about the latest news not typically covered by regular media sources. It can even be used to simply share a piece of your mind. Blogs allow the common man or woman to provide their own exclamation point on information. They can be as niche oriented as you like or as mainstream as you want to get.
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