10 things about blogging- The Basics

1. BE PASSIONATE ABOUT WHAT YOU ARE WRITING

Write a post that isn't a 'just because' post, what I mean by this is that you shouldn't write something just  because you think that is what people want to hear or because other bloggers are writing that style of post. We all probably share our monthly beauty products, books, music or whatever you enjoy, but posts should be something that you're passionate about, which can bring out your personality. Think back to when you started blogging and stay true to your blog and its purpose.

2. YOUR BLOG IS SO 2010! IT'S OUT OF FASHION LIKE SCOOBIES AND TOE SOCKS! 

If you have had your blog for some time like I have, It is likely that your blog has been in need of an update, moving away from them dreadful bold and bright backgrounds and crappy graphics. Thankfully, I have always kept my blog looking fairly clean in style with no hideous sans-serif swirly fonts that you cannot read, let alone your readers. If you have been blogging for 5 years or more, it is likely that you have been a little guilty of it. It was the thing to do, including some awful animation coming off your cursor, like bubbles or glitter you may be thinking what is she talking about... a look..

The image below is obviously not likely the first choice for any blogger, this is just a basic theme for Blogger but it was common to have backgrounds like this from stars, flowers and fluffy clouds. I am so glad that we have moved on from this trend, well, I hope most of us have. If not you seriously need an update. There are plenty of high quality and professional looking blog themes that you can get for free with a little research.

The top title graphic has been with me since my blog was first started, although it was originally very pixelated as I wasn't great at using photoshop and had little understanding of scaling and editing text graphics. Photoshop or Indesign are probably the best for creating a banner for your blog, although when I first got my Mac I used Pixelmator for my current banner. This is a great cheap alternative to Photoshop and it is super easy to use.

Despite experimenting with the design of my banner, I did not want to lose my blog identity, therefore when I did change my banner graphic I decided to keep it as my Signature at the bottom of posts. It is a little reminder to me of where I have come from and where I am today. I feel that I have become a much more confident blogger and better at representing myself through better photography skills and editing.

3. THE IMPORTANCE OF SOCIAL MEDIA 

Even I can learn from this point, It is important to keep up to date with our social media accounts, whether it is sending out a tweet, replying to messages or sharing a picture. There are lots of great tools for updating social media and checking statistics, which can allow us to see what content is most engaging to your viewers/readers.

Visually Iconsquare is great, I use the website to check who is following me, who is interacting with my account without having access to my phone or tablet. This allows you to reply to messages, check out your followers photos, leave comments and like their posts. Great for us bloggers right? It is one to try out, and you just sign into your Instagram account!

If you are a blog analytic fanatic why not try unfollowers.com which is another great tool for seeing those who are your mutual followers, fans aka those who have interacted with your content, whether it is a like or a comment, as well as new followers and unfollowers. It also gives you a time scale of activity too. Unfollowers does give you the option to auto-follow those who have followed you, however, this is not always advisable due to spam followers.

4. IMG_4345!?! WHUATT!? 

Make sure you have named your images instead of leaving the default name IMG_4345, your images are a key component in your blogs success. If someone searches a keyword which includes a word from one of your photographs it can lead them to your blog. Keywords, naming files and images are key!

5. KEEP YOUR FILES ORGANISED

When it comes to writing up a post, you need to ensure that all your images are filed well. It will have you trawling through folders and folders of images in different locations. To save time create folders with the name of your blog, then create folders inside this for different aspects of your blog, for example here is a file map of how I organize my files. 

Documents> Helloscallyblogging> Unedited images> 2015> July2015 

Documents> Helloscallyblogging> Edited images> 2015> July2015 

Documents> Helloscallyblogging> Banners> 2015> PSD (photoshop files)

Documents> Helloscallyblogging> Banners> 2015> Final banners PNG

6. EDITING IMAGES

It is definitely worth taking the time to edit your photographs. Make sure that you have plenty of natural light, whether you are using a mobile phone or a digital camera to take your photos. This will make the images much clearer to start with and can help reduce the amount of editing needed. There are some great mobile Apps that you can use to edit your photographs, if you are a mobile blogger, even if you are not, there are some great beauties for making adjustments to your photographs. My personal favourites are Afterlight, Photoshop Mobile, Square InstaPic & Pixlr. On my Mac I tend to use Photoshop the most, and Pixelmator.

After changing the lighting, adding a filter, text, etc, I always like to straighten my image. Even the slightest tilt can make your images look a hundred times better and professional looking.

7.THE USE OF IMAGES

If you are not using your own photography, firstly I would highly recommend taking your own. Not only do they show off your personality but they show the amount off the time taken into creating your blog, as well as how passionate you are. If you much prefer to use free images, be sure to make sure that you have permissions to use the image and that you have named the owner of the image where applicable. There are plenty of CC Creative Commons sites which allow the use of their images freely for personal and commercial uses. However, be sure to always check!

8. KEEP ORGANISED 

Staying as a whole is very important to the running of any blog, you need time to research, brainstorm ideas and bring them to life through your images and text. It is always best to plan ahead.

• Jot down ideas for post
• Schedule time for your blog, if you have a busy life you need to be tough on yourself and dedicate the time.
• Take photographs in bulk, you may have a few ideas for blog posts that you wish to discuss on your blog in the next coming weeks, why not take plenty of photographs to save yourself time later on.
• If you have lots of ideas for your blog, why not start writing them up, you can always come back to the draft later on when you have the time.
• Keep a diary of the posts you plan to write, whether you have post themes on different days. If you need to gather materials of products for your blog posts, keep lists in your diary.
• Schedule a time for your blog post to go live. This is a really handy tool on Blogger which allows you to set up a time and date of when the post will go live. If you have been really you may have a handful of posts finished before you go on holiday, by setting a schedule your blog will automatically send the posts live. So even when you go away you have no excuse not to keep your content fresh and up to date. Something that even I can learn from, however, circumstances can't always facilitate this. We aren't all perfect are we?

9. ALWAYS CHECK YOUR POST BEFORE HITTING PUBLISH 

It is easy to miss mistakes, if in doubt get someone to check it for you.

10. LOVE YOURSELF & YOUR BLOG :)

Until next time xox