I saw someone posted this question in a forum.It get lots of replies from other forum members,most of them saying blogging is easy,the hard part is getting traffic to your blog.I'm not an expert about blogging,nor have I been blogging long enough to know everything there is to know about blogging,but I would like to share some of my opinion and experience regarding this.
- Why do you want to have a blog?This is an important question I ask myself before I started my blog.Is it going to be a personal blog,doing it for fun,as a hobby or I want to be a serious blogger,maybe in some way monetizing it or maybe I should start a business blog.Most personal blogs is done for fun an as a hobby,but somehow because of ways to monetize it,some of it has become blogs for the reason of monetizing it,either by using ads or doing paid posting.You will earn some money from it,but most probably your credibility and popularity will also suffer.Ask yourself this question,do you want to blog for short term or long term?
- Topics.Personal blogs doesn't concentrate on certain topics,it can cover a lot of different topics depending on the blog owner.More targeted blogs or niche blogs normally are done for long term benefits,of gaining popularity and monetizing it and business blogging are blogs supplementing the blog owner business and it is done to help promote and creating awareness.
- Content.A major factor of a blog development and progress.You can write your own articles or maybe get it free from article directory sites.The best is to write your own article,and a well written article can help bring quality traffic to you site and help with your SEO.
- Design.There are lots of templates to choose from,or you can create your own.A blog design will have some effect on how well your blog is received by others.
- Traffic.Everybody wants it and want lots if it.You have to learn how to bring traffic to your site,and this can be time consuming and sometimes will get you frustrated.Keep on learning,do all the possible things to help bring traffic and have a lot of patience.SEO,link exchange,tagging,Entrecard are all things that you can learn and do to help increase your traffic.
- Updating.It is not always about your content.You have to update your blog regularly with new articles,but you have to keep on tweaking your blog,changing the layout to make it as nice as possible,add a few important things and getting rid of unnecessary ones.
- Motivation.There are times when you will find that you have no idea to update your blog,you find it is taking a lot of your time,your effort without getting the desired results.That is why it is important to really know why you want to start a blog,do you have what it takes to keep on going,what will keep you motivated to carry on.If you have a certain goal,a certain target,no matter how hard it is,it won't stop you or hold you back.When The Going Gets Tough,The Tough Gets Going.
- Monetizing your blog.It is completely different from a business blog.A business blog is about using a blog to promote,market and popularized your business,but monetizing your blog is getting income directly from your blog,through ads mostly.To really have a good income,you have to have a certain amount of loyal readers,and this won't and can't be achieved in 3 month.If you really want to monetize your blog,set it for long term,build your blog,build your credibility and popularity and you will get a chance at it.If you think it can be achieve in short terms,than you will be frustrated.
- Subscribers.Allow people to subscribe to your blog by adding RSS button or email subscription.Write good and valuable content,and you will get people subscribing to your blog,and by providing good,fresh,quality and valuable content,you will see your subscribers increase with time.
- Blogging platform.There is Bloggers,Wordpress,TypePad and others that you can choose from,you can have your own domain,your own hosting for it too.It is all up to you which one to choose.
I never consider blogging to be easy,even if I have a personal blog.Starting one is certainly easy,but to maintain it,updating it regularly with good content,exposing it are not,but even though it is not easy,I feel it is fun to do,because you always learn new things,blogging to me is an on going learning process,you will make mistake along the way,but it is for your benefit if you learn from your mistakes.You get to know other bloggers,build your own bogging network with fellow bloggers,learn from them,they will learn something from you,sharing new things.The most satisfying results after the effort,the time you spend on your blog is the readers you have,how your blog have developed over the years.You will get the satisfaction if you have set a target,and you finally achieve it.Blogging is not easy,you need to work hard,have lots of patience,but if you really love doing it,it will be fun and rewarding.
Once again - good and sincere advices