We’re back with another blog — about blogging! Last week, I gave you the foolproof process on how to brainstorm blogging content for an entire year. Today, we’re getting into the nitty gritty of why you should start a blog, how to start your blog and the five best tips for blogging beginners.
Blogging is a great way to have a strong online presence and connect with your audience in a new medium. You’re not always able to provide your students with in-depth explanations about certain methods or your interests. By creating a blog you have the medium to express your interests, answer common student questions and grow a potentially bigger audience through your new online presence.
Make sure you’re up to speed on last week’s blog before diving in today and let’s get your blog up and running today!
Before you start blogging:
In order to blog, you’re going to need a website to blog with! You can either add a page to your already existing business website or start up an entirely new website dedicated to blogging.
First, decide on a domain name. Your domain name can be your name, your business name — make it sure it’s on brand and represents your niche or your business. You can purchase a domain name with GoDaddy or NameCheap.
Today, there are so many ways to create a website. You can create a Wix, Squarespace or Wordpress website for starters. Be sure to check out my interview with Terra Milo where we discuss the differences between website platforms.
Now that you’ve decided on your domain name and which platform you want to blog with, let’s get down to blogging!
5 Yoga Blogging Tips for Beginners
1. Start today!
Sounds simple enough, right? Get started on your blog TODAY. Not tomorrow, not next week. Do it TODAY! Even for one hour today, get your blog up and running using the resources on Terra’s website.
Don’t make any more excuses. If you’ve fallen off the blogging bandwagon, get back on track — today! Trust me, you have more knowledge and important information to share that your students and future students want to hear and learn from you.
Be patient with yourself and that know that it will take time and consistency before you see much traction but all the time and effort will pay off! Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither was your yoga blog.
Lastly, if you don’t get started today, you’ll wish you had! Life only gets crazier and you’ll only get busier — take the time you have today to work on building that blog sooner rather than later.
2. Have a clear message and take-away
After creating your brainstormed list of blog topics, make sure when you’re writing that you identify 3 main points and 1 key take away (what you want them to do with that information). In the blogging world, we call this your call to action.
Don’t just ramble and share your opinion on a subject. Provide your audience with value with key takeaways they can go on and utilize.
3. Use keywords for titles and text
If your aim is to get in front of more eyeballs, use search engine optimized (SEO) keywords when deciding on your blog title. For example the title, “My Personal Experience With Blogging” may not perform in Google as well as “How Blogging Can Grow Your Business: My Personal Experience”. More likely, people are searching for “how blogging can grow a business” than “my personal experience with blogging”.
Keywords can be things like “yoga blogging”, “how to start a blog” or “blogging tips”. They’re a single word or multiple words (long-tail keywords) that people are typing into search engines to answer their burning questions.
It sounds very technical, but have no fear! There are many ways to identify what keywords to use in your title and within your blogging text.
I personally love using BuzzSumo to see what kind of keywords are doing well in Google. KeySearch is another great one, as it identifies how easily it is for your personal domain to rank in the google searches.
Another user-friendly way to identify keywords to use is so go onto Google yourself, start typing what you want to talk about and see what Google predictive text begins to fill out for you.
4. Create and follow a system
You know I love a good system! Even if you don’t think you’re a big process and systems person — having a system for your blogging content will help significantly.
Develop a system for what days your blog goes live and the days/weeks leading up to it. Decide what day of the week you’ll do your keyword research, what day you’ll sit down to write, then edit then post. Or just do it all in one day !
Come up with a system and stick to it. Remember from my blog post last week — consistency is key when blogging.
5. Don’t forget to promote your blog
After you’ve put in all the work of writing, editing and editing some more — go out and promote your piece of work!
Blogging is hard work, so try and get it front of as many eyes as possible. People won’t just stumble across your blog themselves (until you get really good at your Google keywords).
After publishing your blog — share it everywhere! Add a link and a little enticing blurb about it on your Facebook page, your Instagram, your YouTube channel, your email list…
A huge plus of writing a blog is that it gives you the ability to pull content and ideas from the blog post for social media posts through the week or month. It’s a win-win!
There you go, friends! Anyone can blog — don’t let the fancy and more-advanced bloggers on the internet intimidate you. Everyone starts somewhere and sitting down to write and publish using the above steps is a great way to start.
Until next time!
