10 Things Every New Blogger Should Know

I started blogging about a year ago and the following suggestions are things I’ve learned along the way. Of course I’ve only recently learned all of this, and am doing my best to put it in to practice. Unfortunately, the bulk of my blogging has been at www.myspace.com and I’ve only been doing it for fun. Regardless, it’s good advice, and what I’m trying myself to increase traffic to my site. If you have more suggestions, please feel free to share!

1. “Pinging your blog” is not something you will be sent to hell, grounded, or arrested for doing. In fact, you want to make very sure that you do ping your blog-by going to websites such as www.PingMyBlog.com. There you can enter two or three pieces of information about your blog and they will get it out to a large number of blog directories as soon as you agree to their terms of service (which I love!) and click the big red Ping My Blog button. Oh, you also have to click the directories you want to be notified. I just click, “Check All.”

What information do they want? Well, first they want the title of your blog. Second they want the URL for it. How do you find that? Well, I just right click the title of my blogs, scroll to ‘Copy Shortcut,’ and paste it into the appropriate space at PingMyBlog.

That’s all there is to it.

2. Be patient. Unless you have a huge and supportive family, you’re not going to get hundreds of hits-or comments-in your first week. Probably not even in your first month or four. You’re going to have to spend some time doing your ‘due diligence.”

In simple terms that just means learning all you can about writing and promoting your blog. Ideally you will have done this prior to creating your blog website, if you’re hoping to make money from your efforts. Not that it can’t be done afterwards, but it’s just good information to know ahead of time. And it might save you some grief if you decide it’s just not your thing after all.

3. Don’t try to save every bit of information you dig up to one folder on your desktop. Trust me, you’ll have such a mess it’ll take forever to find anything. Instead, create several folders, which you can then drag into one primary folder. You might label them: “Links and Back Links,” “Tags,” “Blog Promotion,” “Blogging Videos” (youtube.com has a lot of great blogging videos!), “RSS Feeds,” etc...

Whatever you discover you need to learn about. Just make sure that you don’t locate a treasure trove of wonderful information and not bother studying it.

4. Blogger help groups are a wonderful thing. Most are set up as message boards and, while there may be blogger chat rooms, I’ve yet to find one. Still, the message board format works. You can read questions that other newbies have asked, along with responses to that person. You can ask your own questions-just be sure to keep checking back for answers! It’s a great way to learn, often in easier, less technical ways than you might find elsewhere.

5. Blogger help groups are a wonderful thing II. These groups give you an opportunity to visit blogs by other people, where you are encouraged to leave comments. Well, I only comment on blogs if I can honestly say something nice. I’m sorry, but if it’s about sports I can’t, in good conscience, post a message. Because all I would be doing it for is a return post and not as part of a networking campaign. If all you want to do is get one post from one blogger, so be it. But by continuing to visit other blogs that interest you, you build relationships with people who can be a big help in your quest for successful blogging.

6. Blog consistently. If not every day, then every other day. And it’s not as easy to do as it sounds. Especially if you chose to write about one subject. Regardless, you need to have a folder of ideas so when writer’s block strikes, you’ve got a place to run for help. Producing a blog every day is hard work-if quality is important to you. And it should be. If you just want to write a bunch of garbage, buy a little diary from the dollar store and jot it down in there. Of course you could be the William Hung of blogging, I suppose.

7. Write when the ideas strike. Don’t try to limit yourself to one blog a day. Because some days you might have three great blogs just begging to be written! If you hold off on the other two, they may never be written. Plus it’s also a great way to build up a surplus for those days when you’re stuck in bed with the flu, have out of town company drop in. Or just feel like playing hooky for a day. Just open your rainy day blog folder, see what’s there that suits your mood and post it. Five minutes and you’re done. Including pinging it.

8. Carry a notebook with you wherever you go! You never know what you might see or hear that could inspire award winning blogs. A pet contest that included a snake was the catalyst behind (what I feel) was a cute blog I did about the fear of snakes my father passed down to me. A conversation about an infomercial brought about another one. And someday I’m sure I’ll blog about the guy whose pants hit the floor in the middle of a crowded restaurant. If you don’t take note of such things, you run the risk of forgetting about them.

9. Make ‘em laugh. Unless you’re blogging about something like 9/11, it’s always a good idea to add as much humor to a blog as possible. I’m not saying you should insert a joke at the end of every second paragraph. In fact, unless your blog is about jokes, don’t tell one at all. Just try to see the comical side of everything you write about. It’s all in the way you phrase it. “Johnny tripped on the step and was embarrassed,” can tell you exactly how Johnny felt about the situation. Instead, what if you tried something like:

“When Johnny tripped on the step, the expression on his face was nothing compared to the spectacle he made of himself . Arms waving all over the place in an effort to stay on his feet, made him look like psycho version of a ballerina. In the end, his efforts were futile as he spun in two amazingly graceful circles, on his toes, before landing on his fanny with a flourish.“

Granted that’s not the funniest example I’ve ever come up with but hey, it’s one-thirty in the morning, I’ve already written three blogs today and I’m tired (at least it was the night I wrote this!). One other point before I move on to the last tip. Expanding on a thought also increases your word count. Don’t just add extra words to make it longer, explain it in more detail!

10. Proof read!!! Before you post your blog, read it through two or three times. Look for typos, poorly constructed sentences and punctuation that should, or shouldn’t, be there. This is also a fantastic opportunity to expand on your theme, if needed. Could you be a little more descriptive here? A bit more humorous there? Is this sentence really necessary? Does the story flow well? Does it make sense (as in, did I jump from point A to point C and skip B altogether?)? Did I remember to spell check it? You want your blog to make an impression. The amount of effort you put in to it will determine whether that impression is good or bad.

I hope these suggestions have been of some help to you. Happy blogging!