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Top Five Absolute Musts for First Time Bloggers


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Myths about bloggingThere is no shortage of tips on how to make your blog successful. In fact, just about every blog post in existence seems to one way or another tell you how to better yours. Guilty as charged. But what’s different about this post is that it’s going to outline how to get your blog started, not how to make it successful.

To be successful requires a recipe that no existing blogger is going to be able to provide. Every blogger’s journey is different, and even if it were true that there was some sort of magic cure-all for fixing an unsuccessful blog, these so-called experts are telling you something so many people already know that any sort of edge is lost in the fray. Instead, focus on the first few steps. It’s upon a strong foundation that you will prop up the “magic” pillars necessary for success.

First Must: Secure SEO Basics

Those among you learned in the basics of Internet marketing are probably wondering why you’re still reading an article about blogging written by someone who just called you a phony. It’s for our mutual best interest that it be made clear that search engine optimization is incredibly important and that by no means does the aforementioned suggest that SEO experts are con artists. They just don’t mean much for those just starting out.

Instead, newbie bloggers need to focus on buying up their name.com (JoePublic.com), creating profiles on Facebook, Twitter, and Google+, and consistently updating them with links to their blogs. This keeps the top search results for specific names and keywords in your control. The rest of SEO “science” is simply taking this initial steam and using it to go farther. For starters, just worry about claiming those search engine “freebies”.

Second Must: Find Your Voice

Are you savvy, sassy, philosophical, nihilistic, authoritative, brazen, or bashful? Whatever “it” is, you must find it, and no it doesn’t have to necessarily be a label nor does it have to be in accordance to the real you. But your writing voice is the character your readers hear speak in their head when they’re reading, and is as unique to a writer as a fingerprint. Writers of all types must learn to be masters of their voice, but bloggers especially, because successful blogs are those that carry an authentic voice for an extended period of time. It is only through a strong voice, and a resulting strong character, that you can ever hope to capture a wide online audience.

Third Must: Be Original

There is endless blog content out there that does nothing but mirror existing online material. Whether word-for-word or a general re-hash, plenty of bloggers looking to use the medium to make a quick buck are eager to replicate another writer’s work. In order to be someone who’s writing draws thousands of readers, you have to write something that’s original. Otherwise, those looking for the information you seek get diluted among the countless repeating sites, and the rest fail to ever find you at all. But more importantly, being original is key to being a good writer. This is something you must value from the very beginning.

Fourth Must: Be Consistent

Over 175 million publicly registered blogs exist on the Internet. But among the many millions, many never get past the 10th, 20th, or 50th post. This is incompatible with dreams of garnering a wide audience, as a blog that ever expects to attract a high volume of visitors is going to have to post on a weekly basis for more than a year at least. Unless you’re already famous, no one is going to care what you have to say right off the bat. It takes many posts, all of them top-notch writing full of insight, until bloggers start to see steady and growing traffic to their site.

Fifth Must: Be Patient

Success is not going to come quickly. You will not establish a million-person readership within 24 hours, or even 24 months. Be ready for many months of feeling like you’re wasting your time writing great content for no one except your friends and family to read. Know this going into it: an inability to accept arduous months of nothing in return for all the hard work means you shouldn’t even bother. Bloggers must possess an extraordinary amount of patience, or else they will never stick around long enough to see the following they always wanted.

Take this as a genuine favor, or believe it to be just another bohunk blogger writing about how to blog. But know this: within this post are not promises of quick and easy success. Blogging to the point of success is a difficult task, with no shortage of pitfalls that make even the most ambitious and talented of writers want to give up and get back to that screenplay or biography they were working on.

The only good advice that can be given to you is to make sure you get involved for the right reasons, and stick to it no matter what. It’s not easy, but it’s the only way to get the readership results you want.

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What To Do To Engage Blog Readers To Keep Them Coming Back

Engage blog readers

A loyal audience is always important for most ventures in the highly connected world to succeed and your efforts count when you engage blog readers. Otherwise, you would be just a one-hit wonder. As a blogger, it is necessary to keep your readers hanging on the edge for your upcoming post. If you are looking to engage blog readers and don’t have enough readership on your post, bellow are the tips to make your blog a must-see.

Understand Your Audience Better To Engage Blog Readers

It is important to understand, who your target audience is and how your blog can help them. The audience is the foundation of a blog, it is the main reason it exists. So it is important to understand exactly who they are and how your blog can help them.

Follow The Plain Language principles

Always keep in mind that you are writing most probably for an international audience and an average reader. Your audience would be readers from an educational background and most of them may have English as their second language.

It is important to use small sentences. You should try to focus on one thing in one sentence and make sure to avoid using riddles and clues. Use simple and easily readable words. Focus on using simple writing style and avoid a distracting look with too many different font sizes, font colors, or widgets. Busy and confusing posts can kill the reader’s interest.

Optimizing Your Blog and Content

If you are really interested in making sure (before sharing your posts) that everything is of top quality, then you are moving in the right direction. Your posts are not doing any good to anyone if they haven’t found the help they need. Have you ever thought to make your blog be easier to find? Much of this happens due to the people you mention and the people who mention you to their posts.

Basically, the blogging world is one big conversation, which you can become a greater part by engaging in discussions with other fellow bloggers. Don’t simply discuss how much you love the work of a certain writer but provide their site links in your content.

Choosing The Right Title

A title is a gateway to the post. It has to be captivating enough to make the audience click and open the post. It is also important to address your readers’ main points in the title. Alternatively, you can also make a title that will make it attractive enough for the readers to read.

Use Listing Methods

It is incredible how our attention intervals are getting shorter and shorter. If your blog focusses on professionals and talks about guides or tips kind of posts that are useful for readers, you need to provide the information out before everyone else.

Long-winded essays or text can put off your readers. Use lists where you want to share more than a couple of things. Lists help readers to scan the content easily and quickly spot what they are looking for.

Do Not Use Pop-ups or Advertisements.

Pop-ups and advertising banners are the most important part of online marketing strategies, but their overuse will surely get you in trouble. Not only the readers will hate such pop-ups and ads but also search engines also dislike that.

Write The Right Headlines

Headlines play an important role in making or breaking of your content’s success. It’s not a surprise that the internet is full of tips that can help you out here. Before considering any online advice, it is important to remember that headlines are the promise that your content must deliver.

Respond To Comments

Responding to comments is necessary If you are really serious to engage blog readers. It can help you to know your readers better and can build a more meaningful connection with them. You will surely get some helpful feedback too. It is possible that you may not be able to respond to them at all but at least you should try to respond to as many as possible.

Include Images

It is really important to provide just like Infographic, relevant images, which will be additional information for your readers and will help them to understand what you are trying to explain. Adding an image will engage your audience and help you to communicate the wonders in a visual language, which will help you engage blog readers more often.

engage blog readers

Make Sure Your Article is Free from Plagiarism and Grammatical Mistakes

The last but not the least tip to engage blog readers to keep coming back to your post is to re-check your article is plagiarism free and do not have any grammatical mistakes. Readers do not tolerate copied content, which is surely a waste of time to them. And if your content is full of grammatical mistakes this will cause the quality of your work, which will end up losing the readers.

Plagiarism can be checked with the help of tools such as Duplichecker, plagiarism checker and etc.

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5 Signs That Show You Could Become a Writer

Signs That Show You Could Become a Writer

If you are the kind of person who spends a great deal of time staring a wall in your room, thinking deep down what challenges life is throwing your way or anything that might not, in any way, matters to the world. If you have these germs in you, along with some others which will be later discussed in this article, you might end up as a writer in some part of your life. Shocked, what I just said? I personally had no self-confidence I could write, even a word, but now working professionally as a writer.

Signs That Show You Could Become a Writer

J.K. Rowling, the famous Harry Potter writer was turned down by 12 publishers just to end up at Bloomsburry. Ever wondered why she was picked there? The story was handed over to the chairperson’s eight years old daughter to go through it and she demanded more and more.

Just once in life have you thought that maybe you belong to the same group? For your ease and realization, let me tell you 5 signs that show you could become a writer.

You are a thinker

As I have said before if you have any symptoms of being a writer, the first one begins with thinking and thinking a lot. A writer just loves to spend a lot of time with own self. They ponder on topics from the first man who touched the moon to how can some people be so insensitive!

fountain-pen-header

You are an adventurer

Whether it is a movie about a young boy or a romantic comedy of two, who fell in love at first sight; from saving money to help a poor to spending thousands on travel and shopping, you are the true adventurer.

freelance vs professional writer

You love to note down everything

Trust me, every writer cannot rely on an electronic device solely. They always note down important and even less important things in journals, diaries, sticky notes or anything that is secure. They mostly forget things quite easily and that’s the time when these posts help a lot.

tired-writer

You have a wide imagination

I, personally, talk a lot and when I don’t, I silently read the person or when bored, make my own stories about that person. Not only me, I can bet every writer does the same when idle. A writer is incomplete without imagination if he can’t make stories of his own. If you are a pro in this aspect, you are going to enter the writing world soon, my friend!eb7e2d266101384f1c8d15946c5b3edb

You mine for words

Sorry, what was that word that you just said? If you hear a person say that loud in a party, get-together, functions, or possibly anywhere, he is a writer by heart. A writer has this very special instinct to hear a unique, new word from any corner of the room. Even if they don’t hear it from someone, they always look for synonyms or spend hours in looking for the most suitable word in a thesaurus.

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There is a possibility that you did realize you have that talent but never had the courage to show it. Why not now? If you think you can change the world with your pen, don’t fear anymore and write your first draft.

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5 Apps That Every Writer Must Use To Increase Productivity

writing apps must use

As a writer myself, I know there are times when you go completely blank, having no clue at all what to write. These times are certainly the hardest for any writer. However, there are always some ways to come out of the dark. Sometimes, a very tiny ray of light out of the tunnel is enough to get back on track. When I am in a good mood, I write flawless and in misery, I take help from these must use writing apps, websites and tools that every writer must use.

Must Use Writing Apps To Try

must use writing apps

Grammarlygrammarly plugin

Grammarly is a service which, as the name depicts, lets you get hands on your mistakes while typing. The service can be used directly on their website or you can download a plugin/extension in your browser which I prefer personally. This way, wherever you write using a browser, Grammarly will catch your errors and will underline them with red or green. An add-on is also available for Microsoft Word.

Thesaurusthesaurus

Whenever I get stuck at a word and my mind keeps shouting, ‘Go Girl! You can do better with that word’, I always open this website. I tell you, this site has magic in it. You write a very common word and the results will be shown comprising of numerous elite words with same meaning. Nothing can beat Thesaurus in the area of synonyms. You can also find some great articles and other information on the website when you get bored.

Writer Appwriter

A writer is never free. Maybe your boss is cruel enough to bother you at a party or a wedding, you can’t deny him! This app will save all the embarrassment that you might be handling if you start writing in a notepad or carry a laptop with you everywhere you go. Just launch the app and start writing. The app lets you choose different editing options, check for the statistics and keep writing in the simplest way possible.

Merrium Webster Dictionary

merrium webster

Merrium Webster is undoubtedly a life saver for me. Does it happen to you that you start writing and a word just clicks your mind which you had heard somewhere? Since I have become a writer, I always listen more carefully to people to know more new words. But the bad thing happens when the word sounds good and you don’t know the meaning to keep it in the personal vocabulary treasure. I use Merrium Webster’s app right away. Once you know the meaning, you can remember it better than ever. You can also get access to its website which contains millions of words.

JotterPadjotterpad

JotterPad is claimed to be the next generation text editor which has some marvelous features you may not find anywhere else. For creative writers, this is heaven on earth. Whether you are writing a novel with loads of characters or simply a poem which tells your story; this app makes you focus more on writing than any other shenanigans. The best part of this app is its voice to text conversion ability. You don’t need to hurt your fingers anymore and pen down the most innovative ideas. Also, JotterPad features the luxury of typography, night mode, in-built dictionary, saving to cloud, sharing of document and much more. All in all, one app contains everything that a writer needs and looks for in one place.

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