What kind of blog should I start? If you are asking that now, I understand, because deciding on a niche took me a long time! You might be ready to explore your writing talents, but still a little unsure about what to blog about. There are so many options!
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Take a minute and bookmark this post on your computer or phone so you can refer back to the resources. Save the pin below and you can click on it whenever you need to check the information again! I keep a board on my Pinterest for blogging resources so that I can refer back to it whenever I need to. So many times I didn’t save the pin and then I regretted it later.
What kind of blog should I start?
- What are my main interests?
- Am I looking to promote my existing business thru a blog?
- What do my friends ask me about (Areas of Expertise)?
- Who will be my target audience and what problem can I solve for them?
- What would I love researching and writing about more than any other topic?
- Is there a topic that comes very easy to me?
So, the answer to “what kind of blog should I start” may seem obvious for some people. Especially if you have very specific skills and interests that you are ready to share! If that is true for you and you know your blog’s purpose, congratulations! That is amazing! You could skim through to the bluehost banner and that will take you to a special bluehost page where you can explore plans to begin your blog.
They have put together simple steps and resources that make getting started simple. You will chose your domain and hosting through bluehost and then they take you to wordpress.org where you can start a blog that will allow you endless opportunity. I say this because I went a different route and it was complicated to make the switch! Learning wordpress takes a little time, but it is worth it.
WordPress.com is great for hobby blogs, WordPress.org offers more monetization opportunities.
For those who know the kind of blog you want to start I’m sharing some tips in the article that I have emphasized in bold type so you can skip ahead and glean from those!
Help Deciding on a Niche for your Blog
What will the purpose of your blog be and who are you writing it for? If you can imagine a very specific person who you would like to write to that is a great start! You have figured out your target market! Next is to decide what are the questions this person has? Is there a problem that they need your solutions to? In other words, it’s the classic find a need and fill it.
What if you don’t have any idea what kind of blog to start? I have a few ideas for you here too! In the past have you read books that help you to discover your talents? If so pull those out! Grab them and jog your memory of any ideas that those books gave you!
Have you taken personality tests that could give you clues into the areas you could blog about? I think it’s also good to consider the types of books you like to read. Of course if you love non-fiction you might like creating a how to blog. This is because you will enjoy doing the research for posts! Show me how to do something and I’m happy.
So with my blog I like sharing how to articles! You may feel the same. If you have talents and skills that friends come to you for advice on… Follow those clues to find a blog topic.
If you need help thinking about skills and talents check out my post How to be more confident! There is a simple exercise in the post to get you thinking about your strengths.
The best blog topic for you!
Look to your friends for clues. What do they turn to you for advice on? Recipes? Travel? Cleaning? When you talk to friends, what topics do you seem to have in common? Do you have fishing, sewing, shopping, cooking or organizing in common? Those interests that you share with a few different friends are likely some of your passions.
Clues to blogging topics could also be magazines you love to read, shows you like to watch… HGTV? how about a DIY blog? Realize that you can blog about something you are still learning about taking a journey to learn about how to wear jewelry, how to build a tiny house etc. These types of blogs are popular, people like following along while you learn about something that they are also interested in.
Narrow your blog topic
The next step is to narrow down your topic! If you can do this it will be easy to kick start the process of your blog being found by more people. Simply stated, that is known as search engine optimization. So what I’m saying is if you know a specific topic you can:
- Pick a .com name that reflects your topic
- Start outlining content
- Collect any information you have on the topic and keeping it accessible for inspiration
- Start posting about the topic on social media to see what questions friends have!
Then narrow your niche again by knowing who you are writing for. That will help you to reach more viewers. This is because most topics are somewhat saturated, but if you can narrow your audience, those people will have an easier time finding you! The phrase you can’t please everyone is true here!
What is a Target Audience?
Don’t be afraid to pick a certain audience. This has a benefit that is almost counter intuitive. Here’s an illustration. At one point I was going to pinpoint my blog to travel packing for women over 40. I had a very specific list of topics for blog posts, how to pack your beauty items etc. So had I narrowed to this point I would have created an audience who came to me for advice about travel packing.
Then 2020 hit. So if I had a general travel packing blog, no one would be clicking on it. However since my audience was women over 40, I would have been able to pivot. I could have continued to write for women over 40, who I love and share interests with!
How do I Build Blog Readership?
In general, it is thought that taking a path of a decided niche may work out better for you. Another reason for this has to do with search engine optimization. Starting with good SEO practices early in your blogging experience will benefit you. You will want to be found on google organically. It takes time, but it it worth the wait. I have read that it takes at least one year for new sites to start getting significant traffic from google. And that is when good SEO is in place. So it is great motivation for deciding on a niche!
Do you feel very confident on your selection of a blog topic? If so you have figured out what kind of blog to start! The next thing to do is search google for those questions that you have the answer to. See if there seem to be others asking that question. It is good if there are people answering those questions too. It is a fine balance, you don’t want a super saturated subject area, but if no one else is talking about your subject, there may not be enough interest to sustain your blog. Don’t give up yet…
Pinterest is a very popular source of traffic! Take your subject to the pinterest search area. When you type in a search for your subject, what comes up? Are there lots of keywords that you can target in the search results that come up? If so that is a good subject matter too!
Resources for Starting a Blog
Bluehost for Domains and Hosting
This is where you can find your domain and purchase it and then buy the hosting for your website. Web hosting is the service that makes your website accessible through the internet. I have always appreciated the fast answers to questions that bluehost provides. They help with taking your blog online and providing SSL security. After you get your hosting in place, bluehost is there to answer questions via a support chat where they answer any questions you may have.
The banner below will take you to bluehost so you can explore their services and check to see if the domain name you are interested is available! You can check this out with no obligation to purchase the domain.
Tailwind
You might know that Pinterest is very effective way to drive traffic to your blog posts! Tailwind is an official Pinterest Partner. They have a scheduling tool that allows you to schedule your pins to boards and then go on to other tasks. It is a wonderful way to connect with other bloggers and have your pinterest pins shared! I use tailwind for my pinterest scheduling. If you plan on using Instagram, there is also a plan that will allow you to link to your blog from your bio regardless of the number of followers you have. I don’t use the scheduler for instagram, but I do like the link in bio tool. It allows me to do things that normally require a certain number of followers.
Tailwind Create is a new feature where you can design multiple pins at once. Then you are able to schedule directly to your tailwind schedule. This feature is new and is still being perfected.
Canva
One of the most popular sites to make graphics on. With a blog one main way you will spend your time is in creating graphics. Canva will have you feeling like a professional when designing pinterest pins and images that you will put on your blog posts. Any graphics you need to create will be easier with canva. They have a free plan and a pro plan that allows you to save blog colors and fonts.
Hautestock
Beautiful images that you can use on your blog articles and social media posts. Here are 3 of my favorites! Hautestock offers a service to each of their subscribers called custom curation! I loved this service, I simply typed in my brand colors and they selected images that fit my brand image and themes. The photos they put together for me included some I hadn’t thought of using before and they all made sense for my blog.
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