Blogging is a fabulous way to promote yourself, your business or just a therapeutic medium for getting things off your chest. Whether for creativity, information, education or for money-making purposes, starting a Weblog has never been easier or so rewarding.
Where to begin with my blog
The two main platforms for blog creation are WordPress and Blogger. If you are choosing to blog to be found (commercial purposes) WordPress is very promotional, although blogger is a Google owned tool and therefore has a standing.
Don’t think that these are your only choices as there are massive amounts of independent blog platforms to choose from and each has it’s own benefits.
What extras to add to my blog
Much like a diary your blog posts will show on a roll of information. The date, author and section for comments will usually show and you have the option to allow comments or not in your settings.
There are common ‘widgets’ that most bloggers feature on their site.
Tags- are themes that run through the postings, which show as a list or cloud of words in the sidebar. When your reader clicks on the word all related posts will show in one convenient place.
Search box – handy for finding related topics or particular posts of interest
Blogroll – a list of links that incorporates other blogs of note or particular interest to you and your reader
Social Media links – If you develop a fan base they may want to follow you on certain social media channels, particularly if you are a business
There are many other options to add to your blog and you choose how busy to make your page
How to make your blog look professional
If you have a spare £30 or so to spend on your blog there are lots of professional themes that can be brought, downloaded as a zip file and then uploaded to your blog through the themes section.
Check out Theme forest and Elegant themes for ideas of design and functionality.
Remember to open your themeforest zip and only upload the theme file for successful integration and the results are pretty impressive.
A fantastic looking site for thousands less than a developer would charge!