6 Points to a Successful Blog

This is an article from one of our past newsletters:

1. Choose a topic that you know, like, and are passionate about. This way you will never get bored and will keep your audience always interested and asking for more.
2. Open a Blogger account. It is free and easy to use. You can also use the free WordPress accounts or if you're more internet savvy install Wordpress and host it yourself. Blogger is owned by Google though and because of this, in my experience, you run higher onsearch engines.
3. Almost always post a picture with a blog entry! It adds interest and color. You can easily load photos free with Webshots or Flickr . They can be items, arty, family (crop and be artsy if you want) or whatever relates to your topic.
4. In your blog's sidebar, create links related to your topic. It looks bare without them and it creates more usable content for your readers.
5. Post, post, post! Two or three times a week is ideal. Once a week is the borderline minimum that I recommend to keep your audience engaged and maintain adequate visibility in the search engines. You can "pre-write" posts and post them as you go along. Most blog sites allow you to write drafts - post when you're ready!
6. Make comments on other people's blogs. They will most certainly come to your blog to say hi or see who you are. Community is what's most important in blogging and there are a LOT of blogs out there. Set yours apart from the rest!