The Ten Commandments of Blogging

Blogging is very serious business, especially when you blog for business. Your first serious gesture is when you register your domain. You have started to make a commitment. The commitment is to your business and to your audience.

In addition to making a commitment to your business and to your audience, you are also making a commitment to the blog itself. You are committing to consistently and persistently sharing valuable content with other people so that they can grow because of what you have given to them. When you first started blogging, you may not have been that comfortable. Perhaps you didn’t know what to say at first and although you might have understood the concept of how important it is to blog on a very regular (and frequent) basis, it may have felt more like a chore than a pleasure for quite a while.

There are several different rules that you should follow and if you do, you will find that your blogging efforts will pay off and you will enjoy a great deal of success.

1. Never use your blog like a personal journal

As easily as you might be able to fall into it, don’t give in to the temptation of using your blog like a personal soapbox or journal. You should use your blog as it was intended. It should be used to share top-quality, educational, informational and compelling content that helps other people to solve their problems.

2. Never, ever steal someone else’s words

People share concepts but they shouldn’t share words. The voice that you use to express your words is what makes you stand out from everyone else. What you need to do is to take the concepts and truly own them. If you do “borrow” from another writer, it is critical that you give him or her the credit that is deserved. The same thing applies to images. You should try to use images that you know don’t below to anyone else. However, if you need to use someone else’s images, make sure that you obtain permission first. Chances are very good that if you ask, the permission will be granted to you.

3. Never leave your blog unattended

There will undoubtedly be times when you don’t feel like blogging. However, remember that you have made a commitment and you must honor that commitment. It isn’t always easy to sit there and get the words to come spilling out. Sometimes, you have to work hard at getting inspired. Never forget that you are committed to making it work.

4. Always express your creativity

You should regard blogging as something extremely important for your business and, at the same time, something fun and creative and very worthwhile that truly helps others to achieve their goals and to get to where they need to be.

5. Tell stories that touch people

It is very important to humanize your blogs. If you want your readers to react on an emotional level, you need to give the story human qualities. Your blogs should contain anecdotes that are humorous and that demonstrate humanism and human qualities. You should also express what you learned as a result of whichever experience you are sharing. If you can learn from experiences, your readers can learn from them too.

6. Use graphic representation

Sometimes, a picture really is worth a thousand words. Of course, you need the combination of the words and the images to really work harmoniously. Many of your readers are bound to be visual people and they will definitely appreciate you helping them to visualize what you are trying to say through words and images.

7. Be open to feedback and improvement

You should definitely encourage your readers to send you feedback. Between the feedback and reading other people’s blog writing, you are are bound to improve your own writing.

8. Excite your audience by what you are writing

If you are going to be a successful blog writer, you will need to successful connect with people. If you can get inside their heads, they will want to connect with you and will want to continue to come back to you time and time again. Ask your readers questions and leave comments that stimulate them and provoke interesting thoughts in them.

9. Encourage people to interact with you

Your relationship with your readers is so important. Part of that relationship means that you need to come through for them if you make them a promise. It is very important for people to not only have a sense of belonging but to feel that whatever they are spending their time on is valuable and will make some sort of difference in their lives.

10. Build your blog audience to a comfortable number

You should encourage your online connections to subscribe to your content. There are so many helpful social media tools that can help you to achieve this with a minimum of effort. It is a very important part of becoming a successful professional blogger.

Conclusion

The art of blogging is not to be taken lightly. If you follow the commandments, you will see that positive results are yours for the taking. It is important to understand that each blog is important in its own way and that there are always pearls of wisdom that can be gleaned from them. Always focus your blog writing on being the best that it can be and on getting your point across in the clearest, most concise and most exciting way possible. As always, online interactions are all about the relationships that you work so hard on establishing and maintaining. Each and every one of those relationships are valuable and important in their own way.

We are pleased to provide you with the insightful comments contained herein. For a free assessment of your online presence, let’s have coffee.