How people use blogs

With millions of blogs in the world — the blog platform Wordpress.com (http://wordpress.com) reports that a new Wordpress.com blog is created every six seconds — it's obvious that blogging is a popular and successful format for publishing a website. Don’t believe me? Stop by the Worldometers site (www.worldometers.info/blogs) to watch the number of blog posts published each day update in real time. It’s mind-boggling! But just what are people doing with blogs? They can't all be posting pictures of their cats!

And they aren't. Bloggers are using the blog format to communicate effectively in all kinds of information spheres, from the personal to the professional. In fact, many blogs serve multiple purposes at the same time, mixing posts about activities at home with news pertaining to work. Your blog can serve many purposes in your life, including creating income!

Documenting your life

A lot of folks use blogs for the same reason they might keep a diary — to chronicle their lives and activities. This urge to communicate appears in all kinds of mediums, from scrapbooking to taking digital photographs. If you're interested in sharing personal details with others, a blog gives you a fast, efficient way to do so.

If you send holiday newsletters every year or email a group of friends and family to let them know about exciting events in your life, you can have a lot of fun with a blog. You can blog as often as you want, and your readers visit when they're ready to get more information. Best of all, each blog post gives your friends and family a quick way to respond to you; they have only to leave a comment on your blog post. You might find you're talking more with your family than ever before!

Of course, not all lives come up roses every day; they can't all be wedding and travel blogs. Personal blogs can be intense when they document rough times. Jennifer Leal (http://savoringthethyme.com), a Rhode Island-based blogger, uses her blog, Savor the Thyme, shown in Figure 1-2, to document her experience with leukemia along with other aspects of her life from family to career. She even uses her blog to raise awareness about the need for bone marrow donors and the Be the Match program (http://join.bethematch.org/jennifersmission).

In your eagerness to let your friends know about what you're up to, don't forget that anyone in the world can access a blog (unlike a real diary or scrapbook), now and in the future. Don't publish anything that you might find embarrassing in the future, and have the same consideration when you talk about others or use photographs.

Exploring a hobby or passion

If you have a passion or hobby that you just love to talk about, consider doing so in a blog. Anyone who shares your interest is a potential reader and is bound to be looking for more information wherever he or she can find it. This is also a great way to find like-minded people and join or build an online community!

You can detail your own experiences, offer advice to others, drum up support for whatever you like to do, or just talk about what you love. Best of all, you might be able to make connections with others who share your infatuation, making friends and finding ways to get involved with your hobby more deeply.

Lisa blogs about one of her biggest passions: Disney. The Castle Run (www.thecastlerun.com) is her personal labor of love where she writes about her family and their love of all things Disney. The Castle Run is also a great way for Lisa to introduce readers to the latest Disney Parks offerings, providing answers to questions from future Disney Parks guests. Check out The Castle Run in Figure 1-3.

Sharing information

Sometimes a blog is all about sharing information. Journalists use blogs to report on local, national, and international news; critics and commentators use the medium to state their opinions and predictions; educators keep parents and students abreast of classroom happenings and dates; coworkers let colleagues in geographically distant offices know what's going on in relation to collaborative projects. The uses of the informational blog are really limitless.

One popular information blog is TechCrunch (www.techcrunch.com). This guide to all things Internet covers everything from the latest startups to the newest tech gadgets and, of course, is a frequently updated home to breaking news in the world of tech. You might not find every post useful, but if you're trying to keep up with the breakneck pace of technological innovation on the Internet, you may find TechCrunch (shown in Figure 1-4) and blogs like it invaluable resources.

Making money

You have spent a lot of time creating, writing, and promoting your blog, and that time has paid off in the form of a large audience. Why not turn that influence into dollars? That's a question many a popular blogger has asked, and you can make it happen in increasingly varied ways. As the online world changes and grows, so do the ways for you to cash in!

A common and straightforward technique involves including advertisements on your blog pages. For example, Google AdSense (www.google.com/adsense) provides in-page advertising that's designed to match the content of your blog and therefore be of interest to your readers. Each time a visitor to your blog clicks one of these advertising links, you earn money from Google. I talk more about making money from advertising programs, affiliate links, sponsorships, and more in Chapter 20.

Of course, brands and public relations firms haven't missed out on the fact that blogs can help drum up interest in their products and services or inform and connect with consumers. In fact, blogs have proven to be a great way to drive purchase decisions. Many companies, small and large, have added blogs to their websites, and they use the blogs to start conversations with their customers and potential customers. Independent bloggers have also transformed into online influencers, partnering with companies in exchange for free product or cash payment. In many cases, use of the informal voice of the blog medium has helped customers connect with the real people who work within these organizations. This personal connection improves a company's credibility and often enhances customer recognition of its brand and values.

Southwest Airlines has taken this approach by creating a blog and online community at www.southwestaircommunity.com. The site (shown in Figure 1-5) covers everything from winter storm updates to upcoming promotional partnerships, all chronicled in frequently updated blog posts. Southwest tries to make sure that the blog represents many voices inside the company, from managers to captains — even the president of the company. As with personal blogs, the tone is light and conversational, making the company seem friendly and accessible and encouraging discussion.

Promoting a cause

For some, creating a blog is less about simply telling a story and more about promoting a cause or mission. Whereas many bloggers first find their voice and later use the influence of their online platform to draw attention to a favorite charity or interest, others create their online home with the express purpose of championing a cause.

Katherine Stone, the founder of the blog Postpartum Progress (www.postpartumprogress.com), created her blog — which has come to include a team of contributors — with the purpose of both raising awareness of postpartum depression and providing support to pregnant and new moms (shown in Figure 1-6). The site has developed into the most widely read blog in the world dealing with the topics of postpartum depression and maternal mental illness.

Creating a community

The world can be a lonely place until you wake up one morning and realize that there are people interacting online 24 hours a day, 7 days a week! Although I’m certainly not encouraging checking out of the IRL — in real life — world in order to live only on the Internet, the fact is that blogs are a wonderful opportunity to connect with like-minded people. Some find their joy in helping birds of a feather flock together. A niche-blog can quickly become a place for lifelong friendships to be made and resources to be shared.

The Craft Blog by Trimcraft (www.thecraftblog.com), shown in Figure 1-7, combines a popular crafting blog with an online store and crafting community through their popular forums (shown in Figure 1-8), where crafters can connect and share ideas and resources.

Recognizing a blog

You've probably already encountered a blog online even if you didn’t recognize it as such at the time. Because the blogger isn't required to put a big This Is a Blog! sticker at the top of the page, you might not have realized that you were looking at a blog. If you’re ready to dive headfirst into the world of blogging, consider becoming familiar with typical blog elements as a way to dip your toe into the water.

Regardless of what the blog is about or who writes it, blogs typically feature

• Frequent updates: Most bloggers update their blogs a few times a week, but some bloggers even update them more than once a day. Some blogs don't have a schedule for publishing; the blogger simply updates the blog when it seems appropriate. Other blogs follow predictable editorial calendars that may include recognizable weekly themes such as a recipe of the week or a round-up of coupon deals.
• Posts or entries: Each time a blogger updates the blog, he or she creates a blog post, or entry, that he or she then adds to the blog.
• Permalinks: Each time a blogger adds a post to his or her blog, that post typically appears on the blog's home page. At the same time, blog software creates a permalink page to contain only that blog post and its comments. (The word permalink is short for “permanent link.”) Permalink pages are a big part of why blogs do so well with search engines — every post adds a new page to your website and provides another opportunity for your blog to come up as a search result.
• Reverse chronological order: When a blogger writes a new blog post, that post typically appears at the top of the blog's first page. For blogs that follow a reverse chronological format, the next time the blogger writes a post, it shows up at the top, and the older posts move down the page.
• Comments: Most (though not all) blogs allow readers to leave comments — short text messages — in response to blog posts. Comments really differentiate a blog from most websites by encouraging interaction and conversation.
• Search feature: Blogs typically feature a search window, allowing readers to locate previous posts quickly by searching past content for specific keywords and topics.
• Social sharing icons: Bloggers generally want readers to be able to connect with them in a variety of ways, including on social media. Most blog owners prominently display social media icons to both connect the blog to the related social media accounts and to allow blog content to be shared by readers via social media platforms.
• Archives: Because blogs are updated so frequently, bloggers often sort their blogs into a date- or theme-based archive so that readers can find older information easily.
• Categories: Bloggers can sort posts by subjects or categories, which allows a blogger to blog about a number of different topics and lets readers focus on the topics that most interest them.

Blog anatomy: Dissecting a typical blog

In this section, I give you a tour of the usual blog elements by using writer Nancy Horn’s blog, The Mama Maven (www.themamamaven.com). Climb in, buckle up, and let’s have a look around! Nancy’s blog has all the usual features that I discuss in this section, as shown in Figure 1-9 — and a few more bells and whistles as well.

Most blogs — no matter what topic they cover — look quite similar because the elements of one blog are common to most blogs. Nancy’s is no exception.

Those common elements are as follows:

• Branding/logo header: A header at the top of the blog displays the name of the blog, often including a logo or other visual element. This header is often visible on every page of the blog, thereby identifying the blog even to a visitor who visits one of the interior pages without first going to the home page. In Figure 1-9, the header contains the name of the blog in a graphic as well as the blog's navigation — the links to the different parts of her site.
• Most recent posts: On many blogs, the most recent post appears at the top of the blog's home page. While you scroll down the home page, you see the next most recent post, and the next most recent post, and so on. New posts are typically at the top, making it easy to find the latest, freshest information when you visit. The number of posts displayed on the first page depends on the blog's style. Some blog home pages are organized by category and show the most recent posts in each of the categories featured. Some display the full text of a post, whereas others show only an introduction or image, requiring readers to click to read the entire post. To read older posts, you can visit the archives or utilize the search field.
• Post information: Along with each entry, blog software displays information about the post. This sort of post information typically appears — but a blogger doesn't have to include it. A blog might be missing an element or two that I list or have others that I don't mention:
  • The date and time the post was published.
  • The name of the post's author. On blogs that have multiple authors, the visitor may find this info especially valuable.
  • The number of comments on the post.
  • A link to the permalink page, usually labeled Permalink. Sometimes, you can both read and write comments on the permalink page.
  • The category in which the blogger has placed the post.
  • Other links to bells and whistles unique to the blog, such as the links to share the permalink via social media or pin a post image on Pinterest.
• Sidebar material: Most blogs are laid out in two or three columns, with the most real estate given to the column that contains the blog posts themselves. The second and/or third columns display organizational material for the blog and peripheral information. Some blogs don't have sidebars at all, and on some blogs, you may see elements that I don't mention in the following list of typical sidebar components:
  • Date-based archives: Nearly every blog archives a post when the blogger publishes that post, both by date and by category. In the sidebar of a blog, you can often access both archive methods. Some date-based archives are broken down by month. Date-based archives can also show weeks and years.
  • Categorized archives: Figure 1-10 shows the drop-down menu category archives of The Mama Maven. By tagging each post with a category at the time that she publishes it, Nancy creates an archive organized by subject, making it easy for you to find the posts that most interest you. Clicking a category link displays only the posts in that subject area, organized in reverse chronological order.
  • Social media buttons: Most bloggers use their sites to build not only a reader base, but also a social media following. This helps bloggers create more than a blog; they create an influencer platform, helping them to turn influence into income, followers into readers. As shown in Figure 1-11, Nancy’s site subtly displays easy ways to click through her blog to her Facebook page, Twitter account, and Pinterest boards, among other platforms.
  • Information about the author: Because blogs can be so personal, sometimes you want to know more about who's writing them. Many bloggers know that their readers are curious, and those bloggers put together short bios and other information for readers. Bloggers sometimes display this information in the sidebar or link to it, as in Figure 1-12.
  • RSS feed link: Readers can use RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, to subscribe to your blog by using a newsreader, such as Flipboard. After a reader subscribes via RSS, he or she can read the latest updates via the newsreader instead of visiting your blog. This way your readers don't have to visit your blog several times a day to see whether you've updated it. A blog often includes an RSS link (identified by an icon, as shown in Figure 1-13) in the sidebar. On The Mama Maven, Nancy includes the link to subscribe to her RSS feed via FeedBlitz along with FeedBlitz links to previously published posts. I talk more about RSS in Chapter 16.

Setting goals

Just as you have many different reasons to blog, so do you have many ways to create a successful blog. Don't forget that your goals and plans might not be the same as another blogger's. Do think about what your goals are, and keep those goals in mind when you start your blog.

The following are ways that you might characterize a successful blog:

• Numbers: Many bloggers are eager to attract readers to their blogs, and they define success by the number of people who visit every day.
• Comments: Some bloggers find the interaction with readers in the comment area of the blog very gratifying. For these bloggers, getting a comment every day or on every post might mean they're successful.
• Personal enjoyment: If you're starting a blog for your own personal enjoyment, you may want to occasionally assess whether it's still fun!
• Income: For some bloggers, turning a hobby into an income source is a primary motivation for the creation of their blog.
• Relationship: Many bloggers are hoping to find community through writing. Some even begin writing with the hope of connecting with a specific brand or favorite tourist destination.
• Authority: There are many bloggers who hold expertise in a certain area but are unable to establish themselves as a notable authority. A blog may provide a platform to help them get noticed and recognized.
• Results: Many bloggers start their blog to accomplish a task (such as raising money for a charity), to sell a product, or even to get a book contract (blogs have done all these things). When these bloggers meet their goal, they know they've succeeded!

When you start your blog, take time to think about how you define success. Do you want to help your entire family keep in touch? Do you want to let your friends back home know more about your college experience? Are you starting a company and trying to get attention in the media? Consider writing your goals into your very first blog post and then returning to that post every few months to see whether your goals have changed and to remind yourself of what you're trying to accomplish.

Writing well

Some people believe that blogs are poorly written, misspelled, and full of grammatical no-no's such as incomplete sentences. Although it’s true that some bloggers do write very casually, paying only cursory attention to formal writing constructs, this informality is part of the charm of the format. Many readers find the colloquial, conversational tone accessible and easy to read, and bloggers who write informally seem approachable and friendly.

With that said, there is no excuse for ignoring all the rules of writing, especially if you hope to achieve the goals you’ve set for your blog. Well-written and correctly spelled posts attract readers just as often (perhaps more often) as those that aren't. You can develop a friendly, personal way of writing without losing touch with the dictionary. I encourage the use of spell-checking, even for very informal blogs intended for friends and family.

For a professional blog, don't even consider writing without paying attention to spelling and grammar. Your readers will roll their eyes, and potential clients will quickly click away.

Most importantly, however, think through your writing and consider your readers. Take the time to practice and develop a voice that sounds personal and conversational while still qualifying as good, engaging writing. Don't let the chatty style of a blog fool you: The best bloggers spend just as much time writing a casual blog post as they would a work memo. You can find tips on how to develop your voice in Chapter 8.

Creating a calendar

Commit yourself to writing new posts on your blog frequently. Ah, frequently is such a deceptive little word — because really, what does it mean?

For some people, frequently means every day. For others, it means three times a day. If you want a blog that doesn't eat up every spare moment in your life but that you still update often enough to keep people interested, define the word frequently as at least two or three times a week. (If you want to blog more often than that, go to town.) This number of updates strikes a good balance for most blogs.

Many bloggers use a little trick to account for periods of writer's block or for when they go on vacation: They write posts ahead of time and then save them for later. Using your blog software, you can schedule a date and time for a post to go live, making it possible for you keep your readers entertained, even while you're having an appendectomy or basking on a beach in Hawaii.

You also need to pace yourself. In the first heady days of having a blog, the posts flow freely and easily, but after a few months, you might find it difficult to be creative. This is where creating a blog calendar comes in handy! Rather than simply post whenever the spirit moves you, consider brainstorming post topics and then scheduling posting dates ahead of time. This intentionality right out of the gate will help you pace yourself on those occasions when you have more to say than you intended. It will also provide you with prewritten content on the weeks when writer’s block comes to call. Learn more about content calendar creation in Chapter 9.

Building community with comments

Comments on blog posts are part of what makes a blog different from a website; the opportunity to interact and converse with the creator of a website and with other readers is unique to blogs.

Forums, sometimes called bulletin boards, offer one way to engage in online conversation on the web, but they aren't as directed by regular posts as blogs. Everyone in the forum community is free to chime in with a topic or question. In fact, some bloggers have chosen to add forums to their blogs as a place for free-flowing conversation. I talk more about how forums can work in Chapter 15.

Visitors to a blog have the opportunity to leave a comment on each post. Sometimes, readers leave comments in reaction to what they read; other times, they might offer a suggestion or pose a question. Because comments are meant to create community among your readers, some readers will leave comments in reply to other comments. Success! When this interaction occurs, you’ve successfully created community in the comments section of your blog.

The comments section of your blog is a great place to get creative. Bloggers who host giveaways often use this area of a post to solicit and collect contest entries. Jenny Lawson, The Bloggess (www.thebloggess.com), occasionally uses the comments section of her blog to encourage readers to send each other free books anonymously! There’s no end to how you might use this area of your site.

Blog posts often include a link directly below each post, indicating how many comments readers have left. Clicking this link takes you to a page that displays the post, any comments that readers have left about that post, and a form that you can use to leave your own comment.

After someone makes a comment, it appears in the comments area of the blog, usually labeled with the comment writer's name, along with the date and time that he or she left the comment. On some popular blogs, readers compete to see who can leave the first comment on a new blog post.

Not every blog allows comments. Many popular bloggers find that they're overwhelmed by the sheer volume of responses that they get and must turn off comments because they can't keep up with them. We should all be so lucky to have that problem. For most bloggers, comments are an important way to develop a dialogue with readers.

I recommend that you keep comments turned on in your blog. They're an easy way to involve your audience in your topic and to get valuable feedback about what you're doing with your blog. Most blog platforms allow you to restrict commenting on a post by post basis, so consider that option should you write a post that you’d prefer remain comment-free.

Unfortunately, spammers can take advantage of comments as easily as they can send you unwanted email. If you keep comments turned on, you will get unwanted comments that have commercial messages. There are wonderfully easy ways to prevent spam comments from appearing, however. If you decide to allow comments on your blog, be sure to read them and delete inappropriate messages. Your readers will thank you. In Chapter 10, I talk at length about encouraging comments — and dealing with those comments that you don't want.

Understanding themes

In Chapter 3, I cover more about the nuts and bolts of creating a blog, your home on the web. In Part 2, I help you get a taste for the various blog platforms that are popular with bloggers today. What all these platforms have in common, however, is the use of blog design themes.

Think of a blog theme as a combination of the floorplan blueprint an architect might use to build a home and the design software that the interior designer uses to decorate that space once it is built. Themes are an easy way for technological novices — or even somewhat seasoned bloggers — to customize the look and feel of their sites without needing to know how to code the site from scratch. Many beautiful themes are available to bloggers for free, and themes available for purchase range from a small one-time fee to a pricey subscription-based recurring cost.

Before selecting a blog platform, spend some time looking at other blogs that already exist on that platform. You don’t want to fall in love with a specific design theme only to find that it isn’t available on the platform you selected.

In future chapters, you learn about the ways you can customize your blog using themes and more, depending on the blog platform you’ve chosen.

Themes have become a very important part of how bloggers define who they are in the blogosphere! Those hoping to focus on their top-notch photography skills can choose a theme that places images front and center. Writers hoping to establish themselves as members of the online media are likely to select a newspaper or magazine style theme where content is king.

Knowing content types

When blogs first entered the World Wide Web, they were word-based, content driven sites that resembeled personal journals or traditional print media. That is no longer necessarily true!

Becoming a blogger no longer means writing paragraph after paragraph of wordy prose. Considering the following content options currently popular in the blogosphere:

• Photography focused blogging: They say that an image is worth a thousand words! Photography based bloggers would certainly agree. Rather than wordy posts, pictures with captions and short explanatory text are the focus of photography based blogs.
• Vlogging: Combining the words video and blogging, vlogging simply means using uploaded video content in place of the written word. Learn more about vlogging in Chapter 14.
• Podcasting: Not interested in typing your thoughts into a post and not comfortable in front of the camera? Consider podcasting! You learn more about how to join the world of podcasting in Chapter 13.

Thinking about audience

While blog design is a very personal decision, you need to consider your audience before making decisions about the look and feel of your site.

If you're blogging for business reasons, either on behalf of a company or to promote yourself, make sure that both the writing and design demonstrate the proper tone. Be sure to select a clean design with appropriate graphics and colors. This is not the time to share your love for wild animal prints and fireworks animation! Seek advice from bloggers in the same blogging space and find out from friends and family members who read blogs frequently what design elements they enjoy. Check out other blogs, especially blogs that reflect the same goals or tone you want to create. What does the design of those blogs say about the blogger and the blog content?

Are you hoping to create a cozy community of like-minded readers? Keep that in mind when planning the layout of your site. Consider warm, inviting colors and conversation encouraging comment software. Be sure to make it easy for readers to learn more about you! Unlike a business-based blog, readers will want to feel like they are getting to know you through the words and images on the screen.