Sharing The Best/Worst Of My World and Pittsburgh, Too
This email will be for bloggers that are interested in helping to post and promote giveaways. It seems I may have 1 or 2 but then I have 10 at the same time. Everyone knows it is hard to promote these by yourself but as a group we all will succeed! All you have to do is leave your email in the comments below. Easy Peasy!
Blogging is a wonderful activity. There are many benefits of blogging such as developing writing skills, networking with new friends and even learning new things. However, as a blogger, you’re usually tasked with coming up with creative ideas or even stories to tell that your audience will be interested in.
Even if all you write about is yourself and your day, being able to frame your blog post with a narrative can help you get more readers and ultimately improve your chances of getting noticed. You might not necessarily care about being noticed as a blogger, but it does come with many unique advantages such as networking with figureheads and industry veterans that could open up more career possibilities in the future.
So whether you’re just a casual blogger or someone that plans to turn their writing into a source of income, here are seven unique ways to get your creative juices flowing.
If you’re only writing your blog posts on a desktop computer then it’s time to go mobile. You can pick up a cheap Chromebook that is lightweight, has excellent battery life and is perfect for blogging. Alternatively, you could use a cheap laptop to type up your blogs, or even a tablet with a keyboard cover such as the iPad. These will allow you to explore and type as you go along. Even if you don’t type up the full blog while outside, you can always jot down ideas and flesh them out when you get home.
Social media is the perfect partner for any blogger. Not only will it allow you to spread your blog posts, but you’ll meet plenty of unique people over the internet that can help you develop fresh new ideas. Discussions with people over social media can inspire you to write new posts on topics that you have spoken about, and it can also help you get involved with different circles that speak about interesting subjects that are worth exploring and turning into blog posts.
Current affairs are always a good place to look when you need ideas. You can always spin something that is relevant to the news and adds your own twist to it or your opinion. The latest discussions on social media or communities that you frequent are also good places to look for inspiration.
If you’re a dedicated blogger then you probably have plenty of other blogs favourited and bookmarked. These can help you generate new ideas and you can even get in touch with those bloggers and suggest collaborations. Many people are in love with House Method because it’s a varied blog with plenty of unique posts and information, and cooperating with such a blog can help you generate lots of new viewers as well as write fresh new content.
If you have knowledge about something then it’s never a bad idea to share it with your blog. Whether it’s a new skill you’ve learned or something you consider yourself an expert in, teaching your viewers something is generally seen as a fantastic way to add new and original content to your blog.
If you blog as a hobby or side activity, then why not take a break from your main career and give yourself some space by going on holiday? To make things better, you could take a portable device with you such as a tablet or laptop, arm yourself with a camera then blog about everything and anything you see. There’s plenty of inspiration to be had when you go exploring, and it could even trigger the start of your very own travel-based blog.
Building engagement on your blog is important if you want to see repeat readers. Your readers and comment sections could spark plenty of useful discussions and they could even give you some useful ideas to help you get started with a new series of blog posts or a fresh category. Asking your users what they want to see can be a great way to build interest and new content, but you need to limit how many times you ask because the last thing you want is to appear incompetent or unoriginal to your viewers.
There are over 440 million blogs on the internet. Two million posts are published every single day, by people all over the world. Blog niches exist in every subject imaginable, and even large businesses are adding blog sections to their websites as they’ve realized how effective they can be. Bloggers can build trusting relationships with their readers, which allows them to create successful businesses, and more people than ever are proudly listing “blogger” as their profession. A serious blogger can work with huge brands, meet celebrities, get to try some of the best products and earn serious cash.
In spite of this, new bloggers continue to make the same mistakes. Whether they want to blog as a hobby or turn it into a career, these mistakes can hold them back and hinder their progress. Let’s take a look at these errors and ways to avoid them if you are starting your own blog.
Thinking it’s Easy
This has got to be the number one mistake new bloggers make. They see others running successful blogs and getting great opportunities and assume it’s easy. They imagine that they are constantly getting approached by brands and that they get sent free things. This couldn’t be further from the truth.
These bloggers work for hours every day, writing, taking photographs, editing and publishing their work. They then spend even longer promoting the posts, growing their social media followings and giving the appearance of being online all of the time. To work with brands, they have to put themselves out there and pitch. To do this they need to find the right contacts and initiate relationships, and even then, they may find that most of their pitches are rejected or ignored. When a company send them a product to review, they have to put hours and hours of work into completing this review and claim the worth of the product as earnings on their tax return. Far from getting something for nothing.
The mistake of thinking that it’s easy sees up to 95% percent of bloggers give up within the first year, as soon as they realize that it’s not as simple as they thought.
Thinking People Will Read It
The second mistake, even for those that get past the idea that it’s easy, and are willing to put in the effort, is assuming that people will read what they write. They won’t. Without promotion, you may find that absolutely no one reads your content. Even with constant social media promotion, as well as finding other places, such as forums, to show off your work, you may find that the viewers trickle in and that most of them spend around 15 seconds on your site, without actually reading anything.
It takes time. Don’t stress over your stats. Write well, take your time, enjoy it and eventually, those numbers will start to increase.
Not Having The Right Help
When you first start your blog, you have to choose your platform. This determines how your blog will work, what you’ll need to do, and how much control you’ll have. You can migrate to another service later, but this can be tough, and you may lose some work and more readers. So, it’s a good idea to get it right in the first place. You could blog on Blogger or WordPress, build a website on Wix or start an ecommerce store with Shopify. Click here for more information about website builders, and try to think about what you hope to achieve with your blog and where you want to take it in the future before making your decision.
Not Creating a Brand
Many new bloggers spend the first year constantly changing their Logo, color scheme and theme if they choose one at all. This is one of the main reasons they struggle to grow; people just don’t know who they are. To be taken seriously and get remembered, you need to create an instantly recognizable brand, and it’s worth doing this at the very beginning. Spend some time thinking about how you want your site to look, make sure it fits your niche, style and writing voice and that it clearly defines you. If you struggle with the creative side of things, hire a freelancer to help you.
Writing Like Everyone Else
It can be very hard to find your voice as a writer. Especially if it’s something that you’ve never done before. Bloggers often start out reading other blogs and trying to write like them. But, it’s important to realize that with millions of blogs, most things that you write, are already out there. What makes your blog different, and your content stand out, is you.
Bloggers Wanted- $50 Giant Eagle GC 3 winners. Starts next week once draft approved. FREE & PAID OPTIONS available. https://t.co/PPYn6L5bgL pic.twitter.com/FhJEqE7OtQ
— Tammie Pankuch (@rn62) March 22, 2019
Blogging and Vlogging is a hugely popular activity in the 21st century. Millions of people post their thoughts online, hoping to capture the attention of an avid audience. When a blog takes off, it can easily reach tens of thousands of people each day. You can also gain the attention of sponsors, which in time will help boost your revenue. However, if you have never started a blog before, you might be wondering what on earth to write about.
Read on for some suggestions on the most popular categories in the blogosphere. These are in no particular order, so take your pick and choose one that resonates best with your interests. After all, it’s truly painful to have to write about a subject you care nothing about, and if you want your blog to be successful, you need to keep it updated as often as possible!
It should come as no surprise that music blogs are enormously popular. Most people love music of one genre or another. A music blog is a great place to review the latest album releases or create fan blog for your favorite artist. You don’t need to stick to popular music genres. Any type of music will do, from classical to hip-hop and rap. Write posts about the music you love and include lots of visual content. You could even upload videos of you singing along to your favorite tracks!
There are loads of fashion blogs online. Fashion is an enduring passion for women, men, and kids. Use your fashion blog to talk about the latest fashion trends, catwalk collections, and your best fashion tips. Fashion blogs need to be image heavy, so take the time to add plenty of high quality photos to your posts, preferably images you have shot yourself.
Personal tips always go down well on a fashion blog. If you have an eye for fashion or you love to create cool vintage looks from garments you make or find in thrift shops, blog about it. Link your blog to social media sites like Instagram and Pinterest. In no time at all, you will have an audience ready and waiting to devour your posts.
Travel blogging has long been a popular way to post about our travels to far-flung places. What better way to keep family and friends abreast of our amazing adventures. Instead of sending text messages, we can write posts and include images of the places we visit and the wonderful experiences we have along the way. Travel blogs often focus on specific locations, but if you are part-way through a round the world trip on a shoestring, feel free to write about the countries you visit and the sights you see. Just make sure you take lots of photos to enrich your descriptions.
The great thing about a travel blog is that it can help fund your travel. This won’t happen overnight, of course, but once you build an audience, you can monetize your blog and use the money you make to pay for new trips. It’s the modern way to travel!
Our wedding day is the best day of our life and, all being well, we only get one bite of the cherry, so we want to make the experience count. Are you planning your dream wedding? If so, start writing a blog and take your readers on an amazing journey from the moment you said “I do” to the day you return from a romantic honeymoon.
Blog about anything wedding related, from the latest wedding dress trends, men’s wedding ring’s to vintage engagement ring settings. As long as it is wedding themed, your readers will love it. You can also invite guest bloggers to contribute content. There is a big market for anything related to weddings, so it will be very easy to find people eager to write posts for your blog.
Parents love to share their pain. Having kids is a life-changing experience and once you become a parent, it is only natural that you want to shout out about the good times or the bad times. Mommy blogs are very popular. Millions of parents use their blog as a way of staying sane and connecting with other parents in a similar stage of life. What you write about is up to you, but the best blogs are authentic and populated with useful, informative content.
Write from the heart and be honest about your experiences as a parent. Other parents look out for blogs that resonate with how they are feeling at a particular moment in time. Parenting is immensely rewarding, but never easy, so be honest and tell it how it is. If you have had a bad day and you want nothing more than a large glass of wine, tell your readers. Engage with them when they talk about their own families; you are all on this crazy journey together.
Are you an expert on tech subjects? Do you spend your free time surfing Amazon for the latest gadgets? If so, a tech blog will be right up your street. Talk about the latest technology and review gadgets. There is a big audience for tech blogs, but technology moves on very quickly, so you need to be willing to keep your blog updated as often as possible. Any technology-related subject will do, so branch out into any tech niche you find interesting.
One of the good things about starting a tech blog is that once you become a well-known blogger, tech companies will invite you to try out their products in return for a review!
Are you a gaming fanatic? If so, a gaming blog is a top choice. There is an avid audience for gaming blogs that cover everything in the gaming world, including the latest console and PC game releases to Minecraft mods and hacks to help you level up faster on WoW. Add a range of content to keep your audience coming back. You can choose to specialize in one niche of gaming, for instance MMOs, mobile gaming, or your chosen console platform, or you can cover game news and reviews from all different sectors of the industry.
A lot of bloggers find great success by creating blogs that focus on their local areas. These can work very well, as you have a very clear target audience. You can write about everything from upcoming local events to reviews of local restaurants and businesses, and you may find that you build up a community quite quickly who are interested in providing more content for you. You can also talk to businesses in the area who may be interested in advertising on your blog or sponsoring you. If you live in a city that already has good local blog coverage, you can consider looking at a specific niche within your local area and focusing on that – for example a blog about local nightlife, or a family oriented local blog.
Whether you are really into fitness, or just starting out on a journey to a better body, a fitness blog can be a great way to keep yourself motivated and also share your thoughts on different fitness related products and topics. You can focus on a specific topic, like crossfit, yoga or bodybuilding, or you can cover a broader range of things, but readers do tend to find personal blogs about fitness really inspiring and useful.
A lot of people look to blogs for information before they buy a product, and so having a site where you talk about and review different things you have bought or tried can be a great way to gain an audience. If you are successful and people come to trust your reviews, you may even find that brands want to offer you products to try and write about, meaning you could get some great free stuff! This can be a really good niche to get into if you want to make videos rather than write, too, as review videos can be simple to make and tend to be trusted more than written reviews.
If you love cooking, and are always experimenting with new recipes, then having your own food blog can be a great way to keep your recipes together and share them with the world. You can put your favorite family recipes online, post recipes you have discovered while traveling, or create special recipes of your own. Whether you pick a niche such as low fat recipes, vegan food, or cuisine from a specific culture, or you just post the stuff you like to eat, you should find an eager audience looking for new cooking inspiration.
These are just a few of the niches that bloggers tend to do well in. In reality, anything you are passionate about or knowledgeable in can make for a good blog topic, so whether you choose one of these or something entirely different, be sure to enjoy creating content and make your blog as authentic and engaging as you can!