10 Tips for Starting a Blog.

Hello everyone new to the ways of blogging, like myself currently. I thought that while I am going through a clean up and redesign of my blog I would note the things that I noticed are really important to put your efforts towards when making your blog into a special place to call home. So here are ten blogging tips for beginners.

1. MAKE FRIENDS
This is what I have recently discovered to be the most important part of blogging. The internet is a world where I don't have to feel judged for being materialistic. Where I get to be completely myself and people who aren't interested are not likely to look at my blog at all. That means it is the best people, and the people who have similar interests and hobbies are right here on Blogger St.
Blogging is almost like a cheat for having pen-pals because you don't have to wait for your letter to reach them and then for a reply. Get out there and look for other bloggers to make friends with, read and leave comments for, because it makes it so much more enjoyable when you can share it with others. By the way, I am one of those people! I would love to be your friend and share this experience, journey, hobby, job, non-stop party...whatever you want to call it, with you.

2. EVERY POST MUST HAVE A PHOTO

This is especially important if your blog has 'featured' posts on your home page or 'related' posts after each post. If there is no associated image your website will show nothing, or a placeholder image, see displayed here.
This is not good, you need an attractive image that will suggest to your readers what the post is about.
I have a folder of generic and styled photographs of flowers, buildings and interestingly textured surfaces that I have taken over time, stored on my computer. Have a look through your own Photo Library and see if you have anything like that and clean up any old posts that have been left without a picture.
There are also many websites with great stock photographs, which very helpful if you are not confident taking your own.

Here is my free photo pack perfect for your lifestyle posts.

3. FIX YOUR SPELLING
It is simply nice to be able to read through a post without poor grammar being a distraction or preventing you from understanding the text. Do not leave grammar errors in your beautiful and thought out blog posts. I promise to you; people notice and typos will be called out. Double check your spelling and the flow of your writing. I know people don't like being told they are wrong and I too can be tempted to hit publish early but you'll kick yourself, especially if the title that has an error.
A suggestion for checking grammar - and this applies to any document you write - Utilise the speech function on your computer. On a mac this is Edit> Speach> Start Speaking. It will read your post for you, allowing you to really hear how your writing voice flows and how others will read it.

4. BIRD'S EYE VIEW
For some reason photos that are taken from birds eye view are immediately more interesting to look at than perspective view, in which you don't know what the focus point of the image is. This is true for blog photos as well as for Instagram. Try it and see that it does make a huge difference. I know it's hard to sometimes find the right angle, especially for showing cosmetics in their best light, and this one is always a safe option. Plus you don't have to put the rest of your house in the picture when it's messy.
Laying everything out with purpose is where the work is, and actually taking the shot is much easier. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with other angles, they can all have a place in the blogging world, but if you haven't tried bird's eye view before then I encourage you to should give it a go.

5. SCHEDUALING
I live in New Zealand. This is a problem if I want a new post to be seen by the world's more enthusiastic blog readers,who I assume are in the UK. There happens to be a particular time of day, when more people are online. This peak social network time is at mid-day, so you want to pick this time to post. However you may need to consider if you have a different midday to most of your audience. This also applies to Twitter, Facebook and other social networking sites you might use, aside from new posts on your blog. Have a look at the statistics, because there are better times for different responses, such as comments or shares or likes. People will be in a different social media mood depending on the time of day.

6. BLOGLOVIN'

It is nice to know that people want to come back and read your future posts and articles but the way people read your content can differ depending on how often they remember to go to your website, if at all. One way to make it easy for them is to sign up your blog to share an RSS feed on bloglovin' where readers can read new posts from all the bloggers they follow in one place. 
You can display a follow button on your website so that when people log into their blog feed your posts will be there for them, and the app will send notifications when you have published something new.

7. TWITTER RETWEET ACCOUNTS
When you upload a new post you want people to come read it, and a great way to get more people to see it is through twitter. What some wonderful people are out there doing is retweeting all of your new posts and blogging news. Here is my list of twitter accounts designed for helping you get your blog to other creative and fabulous blog lovers. Simply mention or use their hashtag and they will send it around to their own tens of thousands of followers.

8. QUALITY OVER QUANTITY
As someone who wants their blog to do well, I know there are a lot of expectations you can have of yourself. It doesn't make it fun if you worry about your work effort and try to be perfect. Just do what you can and you don't have to post every day, that might just that lead to undeveloped ideas being published which you will want to delete later. Make your blog something you are proud of, and give your articles some care. Start by including a good mixture of research and personal opinion.

9. THE BLOGGER PROGRAM
When you want to start reaching out to PR companies for sponsored content and other partnerships, those connections will be easier than ever with forums such as The Blogger Program. All you have to do is sign up and the available deals are right there for you to look through and apply for. Your chances of getting a deal often depend on how many readers you have, but often your exsiting influence doesn't have to be very high. If you are just starting out and you want to get a better feel for writing regularly, or to have more followers, you can very well wait until you think you and your blog are ready for sponsored content.

10. WRITE ABOUT WHAT YOU CARE ABOUT

Your blog is your own corner of the internet. So why would you make it about fashion and makeup if you don't care about fashion or makeup? Yes, many bloggers have done well with those topics but it isn't the only thing in the world worth focusing you attention on. You don't have to do something just because everybody else is doing it. You should blog about what makes you excited and what you would want to learn more about. Your readers will see that passion and that is why they will want more. Make sure that what you post about for is for YOU.


For more advice and hacks for blogging well check out the full convenient list of posts on this website here.

xxoBeka