Now’s the Time to Start a Blog

Blogging is one of the easiest ways to improve your marketing efforts. Your website ranks higher on Google, you have more content to promote on social media, and your potential customers get a better understanding of your business. It may seem intimidating at first, but once you make a plan and get the ball rolling, it just gets easier, and can even become fun!

Getting Started

The first thing you’ll need is a website. If you don’t have one yet, check out our Website Design Cost Estimator to get started. From there you’ll want to come up with topics to write about. Before you start writing it’s best to have a plan in mind. Start with 5 to 10 topics, you’ll come up with more along the way. These topics can be in-depth answers to common questions, a typical (or extraordinary) day in your business, struggles you’ve dealt with and how you’ve overcome them, tips or recommendations for things related to your business, or anything else you can come up with. If you have trouble finding ideas to start with, go to Google and start typing in your industry or related terms, then look at what gets autofilled.
For example, typing in “web design” brings up the following searches:

  • web design minneapolis
  • web designer salary
  • web design course
  • web design jobs
  • web design trends 2019
  • web design software

Some of these can be turned into topics to write about.

Research

Once you’ve got your topics ready, it’s time to get to work. If you’re writing about a day in your life, there’s not a lot of research to do, but it can help to have an outline to guide you along. If you’re writing about trends in your industry or helpful tips, you may need to do some research. Learn about the topic you’re writing about until you have a good enough understanding of it to be able to put it into your own words for others to understand it.

Writing

Staring at a blank screen with a blinking cursor can be scary, so just start writing. Don’t worry about editing or formatting at first, just let the words flow out, you can go back and edit when you’re finished. If you’re not confident in your editing abilities, we use Grammarly to help with spelling and grammar. Once your done writing, go back and look through any corrections it has for you. It’s also a good idea to have someone else read your work to get some outside feedback. Another set of eyes can catch things you missed and bring up questions you haven’t thought of.

One of the great features of WordPress is the ability to schedule blog posts. If you want to take one day each week or month, get in the zone, and write all your blog posts at once, you can. Then you can schedule them for regular intervals, around specific dates, or randomly.

Benefits

Just like anything else, the more you do something, the better you get. Even if you’re not a strong writer, the more you sit down and do the work, the better you’ll get. The beauty of a blog is that you don’t need to submit it for the approval of anyone else. Put it up, get feedback, make changes, and keep getting better. Improving your communication skills will help you with emails, business communication, and personal communication. You’ll also have a better insight to your business. If you’re writing about a typical day, you’ll look at it more closely and be able to see if there are any areas you can make improvements to work more effectively.

If you’re doubtful about anyone reading your blog, don’t be. There are plenty of people out there in a similar position with their business. Whether you’re just starting out, starting to grow, or are a dominant presence in your industry, there are plenty of people who can benefit from your experiences.

Need help setting up your blog, figuring out topics to write about, or just need someone to do the blogging for you? Drop us a message and we can get some quality wordsmithing started for you!

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