Beginner Blogging Tips: Sticking With It

So you’ve decided to start a blog. That’s great and all, but I have some bad news. One year from now, most of you probably won’t have looked at your blog in several months, let alone updated it. Now, I know it can be tough to dedicate some quality time to your blog, especially if you’ve got real life things to deal with. So, what’s a blogger to do? Stick with it!

I tend to do best when I set myself a good schedule. I am most productive in the mornings and the weekends. So, I try to get up an hour earlier than normal a few days out of the week to work in some blog time. My weekends are all over the place, so when I find myself planted on the couch, I’ll boot up the laptop and get to work while watching the latest home decor transformation on HGTV (Did I mention I’m married?). Take a look at your week and see what works best for you. If you can work in a post once a day, great! If you find that you can only get in three good posts per week, that’s great too. The key is to be appear to be consistent in the eyes of the search engines. If you have a light week now and then, don’t fret. Just pick up where you left off and try to get back into the groove.

So, why is consistent blogging so important? The answer holds many truths! First, if you get into a routine of blogging consistently, you’re getting yourself into a habit. If you miss a day or two of blogging, you’ll feel that persistent tug in your head. Before you know it, you’ll make time to blog. Second, consistent blogging sets you apart from all the other blogs out there and this is something that the search engines will notice. So many blogs and other websites are started only to be updated for a few months and then forgotten. It’s the sites that keep pumping out the quality content in a timely manner than take the spot light! The third reason that consistent blogging is important is that if you stick with it, you’ll probably make it to that magical one year mark. If you can keep your blog indexed by the search engines for a year, you’ll start to see more and more search traffic. This means the world to those bloggers who have set up some monetizing measures on their site, especially CPC ads (cost per click, such as Adsense).

If you find that your routine consists of just two hours, once per week, I recommend using WordPress as your platform. With WordPress, you can bang out several posts and save them for later. Also, you can change the publish date to any time in the past and the future. This means that you can write three posts, and then schedule one to be published immediately, one to be published two days later, and the third to be published at the end of the week. Your readers will be oblivious to the fact that you write only once per week![ad name=”250×250″]

If you tend to come down with a case of writer’s block too frequently, don’t let it get to you. Instead, do some reading. Check out other blogs, read some posts, and (most importantly) read through the comments. Often times I will come across a post that generates a lot of comments. This presents the opportunity to get an idea of what people think about a subject. If you agree and have something to say, post a brief comment, and then write a post about it. If you disagree, post a brief comment and then write a post about it! Chances are if your comment has enough punch, people will click on your name and visit your blog. Following this little formula has two great results: 1) you find something to write about, and 2) since you left a comment, you’ll probably get some extra traffic!

In regards to comment posting, let me say this: do not spam. Don’t leave a comment like, “Hey I wrote an awesome post about this! Go to my site to check it out!” Post a comment that adds to the discussion and leave it at that. Now, where were we…

One last point to wrap things up. After a good full year of blogging, you’re going to notice something else besides the tons of traffic and fat Adsense checks. You are going to be a better writer and know some of the “ins and outs” of the online world. That’s an invaluable tool that no one can take away from you and a tool that you can go on to apply to every other blog or website you decide to start up in the future. Now, get to blogging!