A blog is simply a virtual conversation or written commentary posted on the Internet consisting of concise, informal, often personalized diary-style text posts. Blogs are usually displayed in reverse chronological order, with the latest post appearing at the top of the page, and old posts at the bottom. A blog may also contain an optional database of resources for users to search for particular topics or ideas. There are literally thousands of blog services available online to help individuals, organizations and other businesses manage their blogs.
But how do you get started building a blog? Many people begin with a simple website, such as WordPress or Blogger. These platforms are very user-friendly and allow for a high degree of customization, but they lack the professional capabilities and resources that established blog publishers have. In particular, there are few venues where you can find the right expert content, access to an audience, and tools to maximize your potential to build a following and to engage with and influence your audience.
Successful blogging requires an initial investment of time and effort. You cannot write one blog post and expect it to go viral or make you money overnight. Successful blogging involves a consistent process of writing informative articles, sharing them with others, and then repurposing the articles for re-purpose on your blog, your website or as additional content for your blog posts. The key to successful blogging is to build a strong base of followers or readership, both to engage with your audience and to contribute to your blog posts and content. This process is made easier when you follow certain basic blog posting strategies.
For example, if you want to promote a blog post on fall shoes for instance, you would not want to start your blog by typing “fall shoes” into the search engines. That post will not show up in the search engine results because “fall shoes” is not a keyword or phrase that is relevant to your topic. To get your post to show up in the search engines, you need to write an article that is focused on the subject matter and contains the keyword or phrase that you wish to rank high for. Once you have done that, you can then go about optimizing your article for the search engines.
When blogging, it is important to share information with your audience. However, it is also important that you do not over-share information. Sharing information can attract more readership but this may not lead to conversion or sales unless the readers feel that they have received valuable information from you. Over-sharing can also make a blog appear like spam to users of the search engines and other online community members, who may decide that they do not want to add your blog to their list of online community favorites.
Most blogs are meant to be public and shared with anyone who signs up to receive them by email. For that reason, many blogs are run on a static website, such as a blog host or static website development company. The reason for this is that when you use a static website to create a blog post, you do not have to worry about updating the blog post once it has been published. In addition, a static website makes it easy for a person to set up multiple blogs hosted on multiple domain names, which is also beneficial if you wish to create multiple streams of income. If you are going to blog, you should seriously consider both options.