This is what you’ve been waiting for since the start of the tutorial I’m sure. Actually writing your first blog post and putting it all out there. By this time, you have already picked your domain name, registered with your host and are familiar with your dashboard. Writing your blog post is the easiest part of all because you have already laid a good foundation.
Write your first blog post:
From your dashboard, click on “Posts” and then on “Add New”
Start typing! There is no wrong or right way to write. Personally, l like to tell stories on a one to one basis, describe things and “speak” to the viewer as if they were right beside me when l tell stories. Some write from a third person’s perspective. There is no right or wrong way.
Things to remember:
- Write from the heart. Whatever it is you write about, you can be sure there are people out there who are experiencing the same thing and will empathize.
- Connect with your reader. Bring them along on your journey. Share your triumphs or defeats with them. They want to get to know the real you. Life is not always a bed of roses and sharing the stories make you human.
- Be truthful. Most readers are quite adept at sniffing out dishonesty or a hustle. My pet peeve for instance, are travel bloggers who write about places they have never been without disclosing that little bit of information. I stopped reading a few blogs due to that fact. I could no longer trust them. Once you lose trust, you can’t gain it back.
- Don’t write just to write. Make your words count. There is no reason to use twenty words to write something that can be done in four. You are not writing the bible 🙂
- Check your grammar and spelling. If you need to, have somebody else read it to make sure you’re okay. Don’t lose your viewers.
Add Media Button:
If you want to include any images in your post, this is what you would use. Click on the button and you will have the option of uploading media from your library of images. I like to “upload to this post”. Once you blog for a while, you will have a lot of images and it can be time-consuming trying to find specific ones. Upload your image and choose how you want it to appear. You can also choose the size to display. Anything from a thumbnail picture to the full size or in-between.
Permalink:
This is very important and should always be checked. Let’s say your blog post is titled “The family friendly view of Cape Cod from Hyannis Port”. Permalink will default to what it thinks is a suitable title. This may or may not be to your liking. You can use the “edit” button to change it to one you feel people might be search for like “Cape Cod View Hyannis Port”. Think like the viewer who is most likely looking for a view, not necessarily family friendly ones. Your post has a better chance of ranking with good keywords.
Insert/Edit Link Button:
This is used to link part of your post to another article or website. You can see at the top of the post, l have links to previous articles l have written. This not only helps build your authority on google, it also leads to people staying on your website longer to read articles that they might have missed previously. Those is called “Internal linking“. You might also want to link to websites you write about (external links) .. like National Geographic or something. Click on the link, paste the website address or search for your past posts by typing part of the title and then hit the blue arrow key. You must click that arrow for it to work. The next button over removes the link.
Categories:
This is on the right side of your posting area. When you assign a category to your post, it helps your readers find what they are looking for faster. For instance, you can have a “travel”category if that’s what you are writing about.
Tags:
This breaks your category down even further. For instance, say you traveled to Italy and are writing about Rome or Venice, you would add these tags to your post. If a viewer searches Italy for instance, it will bring up the posts tagged as such. They don’t get bogged down with all your travels to 25 other countries. Remember..the aim is to make it easy for viewers.
Before you hit “Publish”, make sure you preview what your blog post looks like. Make sure it’s to your liking. If not, edit it continuously until it does. Make use of you spell checker (the little ABC button). When you like it well enough… Go for it. Congratulations!
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