Five Tips for New Bloggers

Looking for tips for new bloggers? Or perhaps you want to start a blog, but don’t know what to do first! Today I’m sharing five tips for new bloggers!

Back in 2008, I decided to start a blog. I quickly learned that blogging isn’t as easy as it seemed. Setting up a blog takes a lot of work and a lot of time and a lot of resources. Sometimes blogging makes my brain hurt. I now know that unless you’re a super awesome website developer, the words platform, page views, SEO, and html coding will be nothing but a frustrating foreign language. I had to reach out to the experts during my start up to learn and even now I don’t have all of the answers. I want to help YOU start a blog though. After almost 10 years of blogging, here are the five most helpful tips I learned for starting a blog.

If you are new to the blog world and would like to sign up for a consultation, I would love to help you out!  

Five Tips for New Bloggers

1. Choose a platform.

Blogger or WordPress? My honest opinion: Blogger is easiest if you don’t care about a dot com. You won’t need to buy web hosting or a domain name. BUT, if you want a www.myblog.com, choose WordPress.  

You will most likely need a web host, check out New Blog Hosting. I truly believe New Blog Hosting has the best customer service around and will actually contact you before you even know if there is a problem on your website. I have been with them for years.

2. Choose a blog theme that makes sense. 

Don’t call your blog “On My Bookshelf,” advertise yourself as a cooking blog, and then post about your favorite fashion trends. Be specific, clear, and never confuse your readers.

3. Blog Design Matters! 

Whether or not you want to pay for a blog designer, your blog layout matters, so you’re going to have to think long and hard about what you want it to look like. Both Blogger and WordPress offer free themes/templates for your blog, and they are easy to navigate on your own. If you can’t figure something out, always ask Google. But, if you are like me and terrible at following tutorials, check out High Note Designs. Lisette is fabulous, my real life friend, and designed Caitlin Houston Blog.

4. Plan Plan Plan. 

Before you hit publish, plan out a series of meaningful posts. You can save them all as rough drafts or even type them up in Word. Readers will return to a blog once they’ve found something worthwhile to read.Invest in a notebook where you can write down all your great ideas or even a planner for scheduling posts. Make sure all your posts are free of typos and contain a few photos. If you don’t have any personal photos, check out a website with free stock images.

5. Visit other blogs! 

The best way to get readers to visit your blog is to let them know you exist. Not only can you mention yourself on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc., but you can also be seen by commenting on blogs. Additionally, many blogs offer link-ups where you can share your posts or social networking information.

When I started blogging, I didn’t have any blog buddies to ask for help. If you are new to the blog world and would like to sign up for a consultation, I would love to help you out!