On Your Mark, Get Set, Go! 

Writing MachineHello, and welcome to another edition at the Blogging Booth. Today, I am going to instruct you on 'how to start a blog' along with points to watch out for before you begin a blog of your own. Let's learn a little more about the decisions that you need to make now to ensure that your blog is successful as soon as possible after it launches.

Four Questions To Ask Yourself Before Starting a Blog 

What Will You Blog About? 

A good blog is going to have a consistent theme and serve a specific niche. Readers need to know what your content aims at, otherwise they are clueless and will wander away from your blog easily. What you want to do is draw them in, hold their attention and give them something to return back  for more. The more specific the niche, the better off you are going to be. Instead of writing about personal finance in general, you want to write about credit cards or how young people can get an FHA loan. 

Where Will You Blog? 

Which blogging platform will you use? While most people use Wordpress, those who are just starting out may want to use Blogger or Tumblr as a means to get published and start building an audience without spending any money. 

What Will Your Blog Look Like? 

You should choose a layout that is going to be visually attractive yet simple enough to keep your reader’s attention on your content. Remember, with any blog, 'Content' is King. If your content is hard to read or does not lend itself to sharing, you could lose your reader. 

How Will You Keep Track of Site Statistics? 

Do not start a blog if you are not a fan of statistics or interested in gaining insights through statistics. By using your Google analytic page or another stat tracker of your choice, you will see where your visitors are coming from, how they reached your blog and who or what referred them to your blog. Gathering and understanding this data can show you how you are doing in terms of getting social shares for your blog or whether or not a lot of organic traffic is being earned through search engines. 

What Do We Take Away From This? 

The biggest thing to take away from this is that you have a lot of decisions to make before you start your blog. While you should spend the majority of your time focusing on creating great content, don’t forget that you are writing for your audience as much as you are writing for yourself. 

Stay Tuned

Next week, I will discuss a little bit about the importance of creating a two way conversation between your blog and its audience. Keep it right here for a fascinating and informative read every Wednesday.

Image Credit: Write Machine at Wikimedia Commons