Blogging is a profession of the future, as it can bring a dedicated and passionate person a quick profit and a certain influential power over their audience. Although blogging is not a conventional profession, people manage to master the tricks of such a trade and make money from what they love doing.
Blogging is not a profession you can learn in a university or college. It is more of a hobby that becomes one’s labor—so, essentially, doing it may be more fun than obtaining a formal education. Nonetheless, blogging as a serious occupation requires a lot of time, engagement, and awareness of the principles of communication with your audience, which will allow you to grow as a blogger.
Why start a blog in the first place?
Blogging is something that one arrives at personally. There are so far no scenarios in which your parents tell you that you have to become a blogger from the age of ten or even six. But there are several benefits you will enjoy if you start a blog.
It is good for your mental health
You can start blogging or vlogging as a way to write an online diary—namely, as a means to sort out your thoughts. Having a blog about how your day went is a non-commercial and purely self-motivated activity. However, if you get into the habit of explaining your reaction to things that happened to you during the day, week, or at some unusual occasion, you will improve your emotional intelligence, and it will enhance your mental health. Essentially, for your mental health, blogging works just as a diary does. It may require effort to do it regularly, but monitoring something that is important to you will only do good.
You will improve as a writer
If you like writing, having a personal blog will become something like a playground to you. Whatever writing tasks you may receive in university, college, or at the workplace, there are still solid rules you have to follow. If you start a blog, it will be a platform for you to experiment with style, narration, perspectives on the things you are writing about, or your vocabulary. A blog is a safe space where you make the rules. You determine the topic and the length of your writing. It is liberating, and you may be surprised where your creativity can lead you.
You can learn something new in details
Human cognition is an interesting thing. You cannot learn something thoroughly if you only read it once. It improves if you repeat the information several times, and it grows even better if you teach somebody this information. Essentially, it is what your blog may help you with. If you dedicate your blog to a particular topic, you will have no choice but learn about that a lot.
It will look nice in your CV
Even if you decide to leave blogging as a hobby and get a real job, do not be shy about your creation. The fact that you have a blog may say a lot about you to your future employer. If you are engaged in your blog enough, it will demonstrate your abilities in self-management, logic, and creativity. What is more, if your blog is popular among its intended audience, you can support it with data and statistics.
Come up with the topic for the blog
The first feature of something you put effort into is the thematic cohesion of your blog. Unlike writing for magazines or other issuing publishers, blogging is about representing and promoting your own image as a personality. Therefore, you are absolutely free to choose the topic you are interested in and to enlighten your readers about it.
Do not think it must be something purely informative all the time. Conversely, in your blog, you have the power to present a topic in any way you want. You can choose your blog topic as something you are good at, something you are enthusiastic about, or even something you want to discover along with your readers.
For example, a blog about something you are good at gives you plenty of how-to ideas or long descriptive posts, such as “Choosing the right sofa for your living room,” “How to draw a rabbit” or “How to collect a look for $20: a survivor’s guide to fashion.” Such topic orientation means you are experienced in a particular sphere.
If your blog is dedicated to something you are enthusiastic about, you may share your findings and accomplishments in your posts, such as the experience of hiking to a new destination, steam-cooking macaroni, or making a Halloween costume for your dog.
Finally, if you stick to the theme of shared discovery, it may be fun for you to write reviews on things you try doing, watch, or take—even if your blog will eventually be a series of reviews on culinary corners in supermarkets around your city.
Eventually, you will learn the broadness of your topic, and all the formats in which you can present your writing naturally to fit your growing blog.
Mind your readers
If you want people to read your blog, you should figure out what kind of people you will write for. It is impossible to make your blog equally interesting to everyone. For that reason, you may need to focus on a particular group of people that have common traits, interests, and other features.
Apart from the obvious sphere of interests of your reader, you can think about the people of a particular age, education, or related interests. The more you know about your audience, the easier it will be for you to click with them. It is also interesting to think in which circumstances your audience reads your blog and what they expect to find there.
Eventually, you should think of each article of your blog as something that has a practical use for your reader. However, it does not mean that every article must be an instruction manual for life. If you are not into thinking and writing about educational pieces of advice, just remember that entertaining your reader is alsol of practical use to them. There is somebody who will enjoy having a genuine laugh after a long and stressful day. Only make sure that the effect from your articles matches its initial purpose.
Plan your content
When things get serious with your blog, you may need to publish your articles regularly rather than on a whim. For this reason, you will need to plan the blog content to protect yourself from last-minute writer’s block. This does not mean you need to write the whole blog a month ahead. It means you should think about the ideas for your posts.
Not to run out of ideas, find out what your readers are interested in and what they want to learn about. Spend some evening at boards or forums where your potential readers are. Try using public platforms to ask questions, such as Quora, where you can find something you are both interested and knowledgeable in.
Also, if you already have several formats of posts for your blog, make sure to switch them, and mind it in your plan. The change of activity is good for your brain, like the diversification of the content is good for the interest of your readers.
Stick to a tone of voice
As blogging is a space for you to develop as a writer, it is an opportunity for you to develop a distinctive voice your readers will recognize. Surely, it does not come in your very first work, and it does not mean using something fully unfamiliar to readers. Your tone of voice is about the thematic and topical cohesion of your blog.
Start with topics you love and mind your audience. If it is about things concerning something interesting to students, be one of them. Avoid patronizing your readers and anticipate their problems. If you write about serious matters, such devices as colloquialisms or slang will appear irrelevant. Nonetheless, you will eventually figure out the way of expression you are comfortable with on your blog.
Make it understandable
Apart from the thematic and stylistic components of your articles, which will nourish the interest of the readers, ensure the easy perception of what you write. Organize the text of your blog articles so that it is easy to navigate and read.
To do so, use headlines and arrange your writing in logical passages. Remember, a blog article is not a paper—so the simpler you express your thoughts, the easier it is to read. Use short sentences in active voice and make sure the reader understands what the passage is about by adding intelligible headings. Also, avoid making paragraphs too long, as they can tire your reader. Not only does division into sections makes your blog logical, but it also looks better than a simple block of non-formatted text.
Tell the reader who you are
Do not forget to introduce yourself. This point goes last, but it is also important for your readers. Moreover, it might be one of the greatest challenges in starting your blog. Take your time and write something about yourself that will engage your readers.
It may be your background, an outline of the topics your blog is about or, at least, a statement of your personal philosophy. Nonetheless, although your blog is a platform for self-expression, try not to do it fully about yourself and stress the usefulness of your blog for your readers.
Running a blog is not only a meditative hobby, but also a profitable occupation. If you feel you have what it takes to tell people and master your writing skills, starting a blog is a perfect opportunity to do both. As it is not supervised, your activity as a blogger is not limited by format, topic, or style. Thus, you can experiment and try approaches to your readers.
Even though there are certain writing conventions, they are mostly determined by common sense and your own experience as a reader. So, if you want to share your writing with the world, you can start your path at any moment.
