Starting a blog is exciting and so rewarding. Bloggers all blog for different reasons but are there for the same reason – to be a part of a unique community that interacts, engages and shares while sharing a specific trait: passion. Before your fingers begin to dance on the keyboard, it is most important to cover the basics to avoid a blog identity crisis, blog burnout and the most dreaded, the death of the blog. Creating and maintaining a blog takes time and we know that time is not free. Every new blogger is eager to get the first post up and then to sit and watch the traffic but overlooking the basics is setting yourself up for failure down the road. The newbie blogger passion diminishes as there is nothing concrete to refer back to, nothing to modify – there is just nothing. Identifying the basics is a chance to dig deeper into what the blog itself means to you and is a stepping stone as to how you will go about each post, the highs and lows of blogging when your blog resembles a weather forecast or you are wanting to build a better blog.
3 Blogging Basics
1. What is the Purpose of the Blog? Is it for business to generate leads? Pleasure to share your thoughts? Business because your boss tells you that you have to? Think why am I blogging? Sure we all want to help and share our knowledge but there is another part to that. Do you have ads on the site that you hope people click on, do yo have your own products to sell, are you a consultant that is looking for new clients and blog to draw attention to your firm?
2. What is Expected Return? What do you want to get out of blogging? Traffic? Links? Some #1 rankings for articles? A community on and around the blog? Once you determine what you want to get out of blogging, think about how will you achieve this? Is it even something that can be achieved?
3. What is the Focus of the Blog? What are you going to be writing about and is there enough to be said about the topic? Are there any sub-parts to the focus? Is the focus too broad or to narrow? Does it need to be broad? For example, this blog is a small business marketing resource for all that is advertising and marketing. Very broad however, the topics are catered to the small business owner with tips, ideas, how to, etc on things that affect their marketing most.
Blogging is more than words on a page each day or when you post. It is giving the readers a chance to learn something, see another point of view and think differently, interact with you by telling you how great and useful the post is and adding a bit more to the post with their comments. The passion that successful bloggers posses is what makes them successful. No-one starts out with 100,00 subscribers. It takes time to build subscribers. Isn’t it only fair to have the blogging basics of purpose, expected return and focus outlined before you go out into the community and ask for their subscription? Is it even about that? Isn’t there an audience for every blog? So why does it matter? Readers read what they find interesting and if they do not like it they will not return. If you told them that they were coming to a blog that is a small business marketing resource and the articles were about ow to clean your laptop keyboard, they are turned off and away. Although if you are only on looking for people to visit the blog 1x then I guess the focus probably does not matter that much. But the purpose and expected return do.
A blog is the author’s own blank canvas to create something pretty spectacular. A place where words become a story and many times the comments rewrite the ending. That in and of itself is powerful. Your blog (even ones that your boss tells you that you have to write) is your space to write your way, to tell your story while avoiding blogging mistakes of others that have come before you. When put this way, it give the 3 questions above more meaning and more depth.
What is purpose, expected return and focus of your blog? Have you ever thought of it this way? I will get you started:
Kherize5 blog: Purpose is to create a place for small business owners to come and be kept up to date on what is new is SM and advertising and, as an agency know that we are here to help them grow Expected Return. Traffic, comments, new connections and lead gen. Focus is on advertising and marketing efforts and how they relate to the small business owner.Your turn!
photo credit: Kristina B