Blogging is fun. You can be your own author and publisher and create your own platform for a subject you are interested in. Here are some tips to get you started.
Each day hundreds of millions of words are published on millions of blogs on the internet.
There are blogs on every topic imaginable: health, photography, poetry, caring for a family, battling illness, a company’s product, a keepfit business, politics, food, product reviews, books, travel, fashion, pets, self-improvement. Come up with a subject and there’s someone blogging about it.
If you have something to write about, to share, or to promote – then blogging is a good start.
For those who don’t fully know what blogging is about, here’s a quick run down.
What is a blog? A blog is a form of freestyle writing. It can be a journal or list of short articles, a commentary, a deposit of facts (eg recipes), a diary of thoughts on a subject – or no subject. A blog is what you want it to be.
There are no rules when writing a blog (apart from the obvious legal ones – i.e. you do not libel anyone or their business and you respect religion and race and ethnicity).
A blog is your own home for your own words.
Who blogs?
Some people blog as they would keep a pen and paper diary
Others use it as a regular commentary on a project or hobby or interest
Others add graphics or videos
Some blog about their business and products
Companies use blogs to engage their staff (eg developments within their sector, tips on personal development, highlight new appointments, introduce new staff etc). Or a firm might add a blog to its website to update its clients. For example: A finance company might use its blog to inform its clients of the latest financial news and what it could mean to them. A babywear company could blog about new products and maybe add video interviews with parents on what the company’s products mean to them. A restaurant may add a blog to its website to share the chef’s favourite recipes and share new trends in eating. An avid gardener may blog about what is happening in their garden or allotment, and offer tips and advice and put up pictures of prize blooms.
What does ‘blog’ mean?
The word ‘blog’ came from joining the words ‘web’ and ‘log’. A log (book) kept on the web became a blog.
Updating a blog is blogging. The person who keeps a blog is a blogger.
How does a blog work? Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order i.e. what is written last is at the top of the page.
The writer writes (‘posts’) their words into their blog page.
The blogger/writer can add pictures, video or audio to their blog.
The fact that readers can leave comments at the end of a blog entry is an important part of many blogs. Comments help build a community.
Most blogs are mainly text, although some focus on art (artlog), photographs (photoblog), sketches (sketchblog), videos (vlog), music (MP3 blog), and audio (podcasting).
Blog entries can be shared on social media (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, for example) making the blog’s reach wider and drawing in new readers to the blog.
Micro-blogging is another type of blogging. Micro-blogs feature very short posts.
Twitter is a good example of micro-blogging with comments kept to a limited number of characters. Most tweets will now fit 280 characters, up from 140.
Before you start your blog bear in mind that your words will be in a very public space.
So think first about what you do and don’t talk about.
When you’re communicating in a public space your own (and other’s) security and privacy needs to be considered.
Why blog? Blogging is an open door to an audience of millions. It is an opportunity:
to get heardto be publishedto write your own unique perspective on something you choose to comment onto find a global audienceto find people who share the same thoughts or interests in remote corners of the worldto receive and offer comments
While many people are blogging for fun, many use their blogs for business and to bring awareness to their existing brands or websites.
Whether you want to create a blog about your favourite pet, your interest in gardening, your new life in France, a struggle you are going through in life, it’s all possible through the use of a blog.
Getting started Before starting your blog, you need to think about what’s your focus. What are you going to write about? Many bloggers start with something they are passionate about. This way you will be writing about something you are familiar with.
Set up your own blog It’s easy for anyone to get started, design your own site and all for free – with little or no training needed.
WordPress is one of the world’s largest blog sites but Blogger and Tumblr are also big players and free to use.
Follow the instructions on blog sites such as www.blogger.com or www.wordpress.com to set up your own site. Then get writing.
You’ll soon discover you will:
become a more confident writerfind the space to analyse your own thoughts and opinionsdevelop a trust in your own thoughts and reactions be it to a book, a film, a memory, an eventbecome more articulate
Blogging requires some dedication and commitment. If you want to develop an audience for your writing, you will need to publish a fresh entry regularly. Otherwise they will move on elsewhere.
Tips
Read other people’s blogs. Consider what you like about them. Reply to their posts in the comment box on their blog.
Use your blog to mention someone else’s blog and provide a link to their site.
The world of bloggers is particularly friendly. If you mention them, they are likely to mention you…and you are likely to benefit by gaining more readers.
Copyright And one last but hugely important consideration is copyright.
Copyright protects your work. It stops other people from using your work without your permission. Your work receives copyright protection automatically. You do not need to register your work or pay a fee.
Likewise, just as your work is protected by copyright, you cannot use someone else’s words or images, music or graphics without their permission.
You will be in breach of copyright if you choose to add an image you have found on the web or if you have copied words or an article from another site.
It is no good thinking it’s okay if you put a credit on someone’s photograph or mention their name in a passage of work you have copied. It isn’t. It’s their work. Not yours. And their work, like your work, is protected by copyright.
Few people breach on purpose. But be careful you don’t do it at all. The UK government site explains the ins and outs of copyright.
You might like to look at Creative Commons, a platform which provides various levels of free, easy-to-use copyright licences to enable the public to share and use creative work.
Take a look at this list of ‘Top blogs‘ for some ideas. Or search for top food blogs, fashion blogs, travel blogs, cycle blogs, mum blogs, dad blogs, personal development blogs, blogs on humanitarian crisis and conflict – whatever you are interested in – take a look at how others have covered their subject. You don’t need to do the same – but it’s a valuable exercise to see how others have approached blogging.
Finally Remember, unless you set your blog to be private, blogs are there for all to see. So don’t write anything you wouldn’t say in public.