I’m sure you don’t need me to point out that there are blogs everywhere these days. You probably already know that a lot of these blogs aren’t very well thought-out before launch.
If you’re interested in starting a blog, don’t make that mistake. Think about these things before you start.
What are your goals?
What are you hoping to achieve in this endeavour? This, of course, is going to determine exactly how you should do things, to an extent. If your goal is simply to have a place to document your thoughts as a means of catharsis? Then you’re a lot more free to go about this as you please.
If you’ve got more specific goals, you may need to be a bit more careful. Are you looking to start blogging in order to earn money on the side? Perhaps, one day, to see it replace your full-time job? Then you need to do research into money-making blog techniques. If you simply want your work to be seen by as many people as possible, then you’ll need to put a focus on the quality of your writing.
Hosting
There are so many options when it comes to hosting a blog. There are, of course, the free platforms that are incredibly easy to set up. The most famous of the lot seems to be Tumblr, which also works incredibly well with social media. Blogger is also up there.
Many people might recommend WordPress to you – and it is, indeed, an amazing platform – but it’s not a hosting service. WordPress is something you install to a domain that you already own from another hosting service. You might want to look into a service like PAC Web Hosting which will let you host websites for a variety of purposes. With your own hosting space, you’ll find yourself freer in terms of website functionality and what you can post.
The content you’ll include
Blogs have always been about the written word, right? The origins of blogging certainly shows that it’s, primarily, a new form of literature. But is the written word what gets everyone’s attention these days? Is that what people are sharing so fervently over social media? If you look at your Facebook or Twitter, you’ll probably see that people are mostly sharing more passive content. Videos and images seem to be the hottest commodities online these days.
But does that mean you should be including such content, at the cost of losing focus on writing? You need to find a good balance between the words you’re writing and the other forms of content you’ll feature on your blog. Just remember that a blog requires writing to be at the forefront. Don’t go advertising your website as a blog if you’re simply uploading meme-oriented videos and images.
Longevity
Last but not least: Can you see yourself writing about this same topic in a year or two? If you want your blog to gain attention, be your aspirations scholarly or financial, then you need to be in this for the long haul. If you’re going to lose interest after a few months, then you need to rethink your chosen topic – or your entire strategy.