what is blogging & how to start?(2019)
Blogging is the activity of writing about your opinions with the intention of helping, sharing, and networking.
Getting started is very easy. You buy a domain name, website space and install a software called Wordpress on the website space.
Wordpress is open-source free software that is written and shared by a community of people who have a similar problem and solved it by coming together.
Blogging is a medium where a person can publish his information and knowledge to other people all around the world through online.
What is a Blog? – Blog is an abbreviation that is widely used, but the original term is weblog. A blog is actually not much more than a place on the internet where articles are regularly posted. Such a place can be a special blog platform like WordPress.com, but often a blog is a regular website where news is regularly posted. Blogging one of the most popular hobbies.
A blog can contain images and video as well as text. A reader can leave a comment under a blog post. The lyrics are personal and every blogger has his or her own personal style. The order of the blog articles is usually reversed chronologically. The last piece written is at the top. The articles in the blog are called blog post or short post. But how does a blog or blog work exactly and what is its use for your company or private life?
Who is a Blogger?
You call the writer of a blog a blogger. Every blogger gives the weblog it’s own character and that makes the blogs interesting. A blog often has a regular audience after a while, ranging from a few dozen to a few thousand visitors a day.
Blog vs Website
A blog is expected to be regularly updated with a new blog post. Each blog post will then receive an appearance date. As a reader, you can then see when the last update has been.
In principle, a website does not have to be changed. Unless the information on it is outdated or incorrect. A website is therefore called a static site. A website is often more difficult to maintain, maintenance is therefore usually outsourced
Why would you blog?
The list of reasons is endless. You can blog if you like writing and you want to collect information in an organized way or you want customers for your company. There are so many good reasons to blog that I wrote a separate article about it.
What is a Blog Post?
A blog post is a message on a blog. A blog post can be written for both personal and business purposes. A blog article aims to inform, convince or amuse the reader. The length of a post varies from a few words to about 5,000+ words. Often the text in a blog article is supported by photos, infographics or videos.
What is blog writing?
1. Make it engaging
To borrow some terms from Jasmine Henry’s article published on Social Media Today, a good title should be actionable, intriguing or emphatic. Here are some real-life examples from inbound.org of each to show you what I mean:
How to Speak in Public… Even If You Hate Public Speaking
This is an actionable title as it tells you that the article is going to show you how to do something useful. ‘How to’ titles are usually a safe bet for this reason. There’s also an element of quirkiness in the second part of the headline which addresses a concern some of us might have and persuades us to read on.
The Stalker’s Guide to Highly Effective Guest Posting
Here the author has created an intriguing title by taking what could be a rather pedestrian headline and imbuing it with a sense of strangeness with the word ‘stalker’. Stalkers are a bit creepy and not something that you would expect to find in an article about guest posting. This makes us want to read on to find out exactly what being a stalker has to do with posting on other people’s blogs. Plays on words sometimes work well to create intrigue too.
Dollar Shave Club: The Unboxing Experience is F***ING GREAT
This is an emphatic title which describes the unboxing experience as not just ‘very good’ but ‘F***ING GREAT’ (capital letters). This bold claim and edgy use of language make us want to click the title setting us up for a strong-minded blog post with fresh ideas. Using the slang and streetwise language of your target audience (e.g. ‘epic’ and ‘awesome’ rather than ‘best’ and ‘great’) can make a big difference. Swearing just to get attention doesn’t work, though, but in this context, it’s a reference to Dollar Shave Club’s viral video.
2. Set the right expectations
A blog title needs to be more descriptive than the title of a magazine article. When someone reads a magazine title they have the whole piece in front of them, the images, captions, everything to help them make a decision to read on. On the web, a blog post title is usually seen in the search results or in a tweet without this additional information. Therefore, it has to do more to convey what the article is about. Be careful not to write a jaw-dropping headline that everyone will want to click on but that has nothing to do with the content. If the reader’s expectations aren’t met by the article, they will have a bad experience and may never come back to your blog.
3. Keep it short and sweet
Generally speaking, the post title will be used as the title tag that appears in the search results. Therefore, it’s a good idea to keep it below Google’s display limit of 70 characters, so that it will appear in its full glory in the SERPs and encourage the reader to click on it. A title of this length can also comfortably fit into a tweet. Some bloggers talk about the ideal title being eight words or less, which I think is a good rule of thumb. However, if your headline needs to be longer than this to get that perfect blend of engaging the reader and setting their expectations, do it!
4. Include a keyword but don’t go crazy
Now more than ever, the emphasis should be on writing for the user rather than for the search engine. That said, it’s worth thinking about what your prospective readers are searching for and including a relevant keyword or two so that you rank in the searches you deserve to be found for. I used Google Adwords Keyword Tool to find some relevant search terms with a reasonable volume. Here they are with a number of global exact match searches:
[blog title ideas] = 880
[blog titles] = 2,400
[catchy headlines] = 720
I opted for the phrase ‘blog titles’ because I thought that a proportion of these users would be looking for content like mine (I myself used the search ‘how to blog titles’ when brainstorming ideas). ‘Blog title ideas’ didn’t accurately describe my content and ‘catchy headlines’ suggested to the reader too much that I was writing about newspapers rather than blogs.
New Ways to Earn money online from Blog:
If you are using contextual advertisement and not making enough that ways, you should try moving to direct advertisement or affiliate advertisement. Apart from the traditional form of Advertising, work on other monetization tricks which works. Instead of just adding ads, work on adding value for your advertiser. It’s better to have 1 high paying ad than 4 low paying ad units.
Sell Digital Products
If you would rather not advertise other people’s products on your site, or if you are looking for another stream of income, consider selling digital products. This can include items like:
- eBooks
- Online courses/workshops
- Images, video, or music people can use in their own content
- Apps, plugins, or themes
Just remember that if you are going to choose one of these avenues that you make it relevant and useful to your readers. A lot of bloggers make the mistake of assuming they are developing a product their readers need; listen to your readers first, and then create a digital product that will meet their needs.
Affiliate Advertisement:
Affiliate advertising is one of the best ways to make money since a single sale will make 10-100$ for you. Especially, if you are in the Blogging niche I suggest you, to look into web hosting affiliates and SEO affiliates. Also, WordPress theme affiliate converts great.
Referral Income:
Most of the advertisement programs like Chitika, info links and many others have pay per referral program. Depend on the advertisement program you are using, you can look for a referral program and refer your readers to that program. This will quickly add some quick dollar in your pocket. Make sure refer to that programs only which work. Though this will work on the niche which talks about making money online or blogging.
Direct Advertisement:
No doubt AdSense is the best advertisement program for bloggers but again it has some limitations like you will not get paid 100% from advertisers and AdSense keep a great cut in between. If you manage to grab direct advertisements, replace AdSense with direct advertisements.
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