Blogging is a form of communication that has grown in popularity in recent years. Many people the world over maintain a blog and the subjects vary greatly. From their family and loved ones to travel to hobbies to careers to saving money to making money to personal finance and much more it is possible to find a blog on almost everything.
Like the subjects of blogs, the variety of reasons for blogging is huge. Some people use it as a way of generating a bit of additional income, some people like to help their fellow countrymen out and use it as a way to educate, some people use writing as a way of relaxing, some people use it as a way of getting things of their chest and expressing their views and some people simply like to share information about anything and everything.
Strictly speaking there is no right or wrong subject to blog about and there is no right or wrong way to maintain a blog and it is totally up to each person how they want to do it. However, the effectiveness of your blog will depend on some unwritten rules that should be followed when blogging. So, you wnat to write a blog, but how to write an effective blog? What is the best blog strategy to adopt?
First and foremost a blog should never contain anything that is likely to offend potential readers. This is a rule that should be adhered to at all times and there are no excuses for not abiding by it. Many people use their blogs to voice an opinion, and whilst there is nothing wrong with this it is important the blog is not racist, sexist, ageist or discriminatory in any way. The blog should not slate, bad mouth, put down or challenge any religious views, and cultural views or anything similar. If your blog may offend any reader it should not be published or made available on the internet for anyone to read.
A blog should be based around something the author is both knowledgeable and passionate about. When reading a blog it is quite easy to tell whether the author is genuinely interested in the subject of the blog, or whether it has been written in super quick time solely to make a dollar or two. It is perfectly acceptable to write a blog in order to generate a bit of pin money providing the quality of the blog is up to scratch that is. When blogging quality should always be borne in mind and any second rate blogs are not acceptable and should not be published.
Where the blog is based around facts, as opposed to an opinion, it is important the blog is factually accurate and correct. An author should always do a bit of research in areas where their knowledge is a bit sketchy. An author should never knowingly publish wrong or misleading information as this does not make a good blog.
A blog is a moving feast and something that required close monitoring. Your blog should be current, up to date and regularly updated as far as possible. Leaving blogs sitting there to stagnate is not a good idea as it leaves more spam on the internet. If you consider your blog finished and cannot be updated in any way it should be shelved for a short while before being deleted.
Once the blog has been published for all to see it is time to market/advertise it and drive traffic and potential readers to the blog. Driving traffic to a blog takes time and effort and should be done in such a way that it does not annoy or aggravate other people, i.e. an author should never spam. Spamming is a big no, so remove any thoughts of automated programs you can buy to market the blog right away.
In order to drive traffic to a blog the author needs to put the blog on social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook, Diggit, Stumble Upon, Red Gage and the like. There are loads of different social networking sites in cyberspace and identifying the best ones can take a bit of time and effort. Posting a link to a blog on a social networking site is a friendly way of letting potential readers it is out there to be viewed. There is no pressure sell or pop up automatically linking a potential reader to the blog and the decision of whether to view the blog or not is at the sole discretion of the potential reader.
As well as social networking sites another good place to market a blog is on a forum related to the subject of the blog. For example, if the blog is about photography then marketing it on a photography forum where the community are interested in photography and photography related matters may generate some traffic to the blog. When posting a link to the blog on these forums it is vital the subject matter of the blog is identical to the area the link is posted. For example, if the subject matter of the blog is Macro photography using extension tubes the link should be posted in the macro section of the forum. If the link is posted in any other section of the forum in addition to, or instead of the macro section it will be viewed as spamming and the author is likely to be banned from the forum. An author should never post a link to their blog all in all sections of a forum as this most definitely is spamming, which is frowned upon. The author is also very likely to be banned f rom the forum, which is not good.
Other places to market the blog using back links is to find other blogs about the same kind of subject matter. So using the Macro photography using extension tubesexample above the author should look for a photography blog and post a back link to their blog. When back linking in this way, it is only right to leave a useful and helpful comment as well as a back link. An author should never just leave a back link. In addition, the author should allow other bloggers to leave back links on its blog, providing the comments are valid and there is no spamming that is. The process of back linking should be treated as a share and share alike, its another unwritten rule that should be adhered to.
So, in order for your blog to be effective it should;
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