This article tries to drive away a few misconceptions about blogging and to look at it from a rational yet stirring, unswerving yet inspiring perspective.
1-Blogging is effortless: who can’t type a few lines now and then?
Serious blogs which are created with the reader as their central focus should not take their content frivolously. They should be planned and thought of carefully. In fact, we need to ask ourselves a few questions upfront: Which subject matter will I be writing about in my blog? What niche should I choose? Who my readers will be? How can I keep them interested and make sure they will come back to my blog? How can my blog’s theme/layout add to a pleasing and effective experience for my blog’s visitors? Is my writing style remarkable and resourceful enough to catch my readers’ interest? If not, how can I improve it?
So, blogging has to be prepared and thought of carefully. This does take time and effort. Yet, the time and effort we will invest in preparing for our blogging experience will pay off in the long run.
2-I don’t have to be a web-savvy to manage and make a blog stand out:
Some may argue that there are many ready-to-use themes online and that most blogging platforms make it a piece of cake to create a blog. This is true. However, the keyword here is “stand out”. If you want to make sure that you will get both a functional and eye-catching design for your blog, you have to go beyond the standardized themes available online for two reasons:
a-They are available to anybody else and this only makes your blog look ‘run of the mill’ and unprofessional.
b-The themes available online will not necessarily accommodate the content you want to offer for your readers.
This is why some fair knowledge of HTML, CSS and PHP is a bonus in order to create your own theme or to customize existing ones to match your needs.
3-Writing for the web is easier than other types of writing:
Writing for the internet is governed by its own rules and peculiarities. Because the content for the online reader is mediated differently, and that there is a lot of content online that is competing to be noticed, writing for your blog has to follow some defined, practical guidelines. Check my article Writing for the Online Reader for more details.
4-I shouldn’t care about driving traffic to my blog: it will come
Although you will come across the expression “content is king” repeatedly, which is true, you need to have an associated strategy to go with it. Relying on word-of-mouth is not enough, and if you don’t call attention to your refined content via social networks, advertising, writing for other renowned blogs, you will definitely miss a huge opportunity to be noticed and cherished.
5-Any topic can make the subject matter of a weblog:
Yes and NO! Yes, because you can talk about anything on your blog from shoelaces to space tourism as long as you deal with it from a fresh perspective. Yet, if you opt for a topic that has been discussed over and over and without bringing in a fresh idea, chances are that nobody will care. So, boring topics -unless you are going to see and discuss them from a totally new angle – are highly unadvisable.
6-Why should I care about having my own website and domain name? Free web hosting is enough
If you are serious about drawing attention to your blog, consider buying a domain name and better still think about hosting your website for a fee. Why? Free hosting is free of charge but it is not free of other commitments: you still have to make room for ads that you haven’t chosen to include in your page. You also have no control over the size of the files you need to upload to your website and the bandwidth. Having your own domain name is more professional. Some blogging services even offer to register your blog with your own domain name if you choose to. What is more, buying a domain or hosting for your website is more and more affordable.
7- I can make money with my blog easily:
Making money with a blog takes a lot of patience and hard work. It is about building trust: building trust needs perseverance and a lot of patience. You need to drive visitors to your blog in the first place, then you need to keep them long enough to know you have something really genuine and unique to offer to them and that they can trust you. Only then will they buy your advertised products. Competing blogs make this task clearly harder as they always look for novel ways to attract and keep visitors hooked. So, if you need to make money out of blogging, work hard, and watch out for your competitors!
8- I can add anything to my blog as long as it is online:
This might seem obvious but you have to be really careful of content that is not yours. Only add content that you are the sole owner of or that you have the required licensing to use it on your blog. Plagiarism is not only a serious offense but it only harms your reputation and hence any potential for success that you might have.
9-Short posts are better:
Too short is as detrimental as too long. If you write a few ideas without any supporting details and very little elaboration, this will only encourage your visitors to leave as soon as they read your content. Do not give the impression that you are too lazy to help your visitors know more or that you are more concerned about driving traffic than offering the required information. Likewise, write too long articles and a few will stay to read them: so make sure you organize your content in easy-to-read sections and subsections. Alternatively, you may think about writing separate articles and link to them from other related articles. This will even encourage your visitors to spend more time exploring your website and if it is interesting enough they may come more often to see what you have to offer.
10-Blogging is not for everyone: only geniuses can make their blog work
Success is more about perseverance than about genius. You may have a brilliant idea but if you are not patient enough to make it happen and materialize, it is as futile as a bad idea. The opposite holds true, if one has just an average idea and that they work hard and patiently enough to make it happen, they will be successful. So, the point is whether you have an exceptional idea for a blog or an ordinary one, just hold to it and work hard enough to make it work for you because it will.
To sum up, excelling at the art of blogging isn’t trouble-free but it is possible. It takes a lot of trial-and-error, perseverance, patience and passion to have a successful blog.
Tarak Brahmi is a freelancer and weblog
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