How To Start A Successful Blog (7 Tips For 2017)

In the grand scheme of things, the Internet is a relatively young beast. It can still be considered a whippersnapper, but despite its relative young age, the advancements we’ve made with it is absolutely mind-blowing at times.

The sheer amount of tasks that are now achievable thanks to the power of the World Wide Web is quite astonishing to say the least, and along with an increased number of tasks that can be done, the simplicity of doing these things has gotten quite a bit better as well.

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The act of starting a blog at this day in age is fairly simple, but figuring out how to create a successful blog like HTSABO is an entirely different beast.

Anyone can go online and start their own blog, but making one that’s actually successful is quite a bit more difficult.

In this guide, we’re going to be going over successful blog tips to help you see the most success possible with your own blog. We’ve got a lot of ground to cover with this one, so let’s get things started.

Find A Blogging Platform That Works Best For You

Now more than ever before, there’s a huge amount of choice available when it comes to deciding which blogging platform that you want to use for your own blog. Services such as WordPress offer a ton of customization features, but are also a bit more complicated and difficult to use.

You also have options along the lines of SquareSpace, and while the ease-of-use factor is considerably higher here, the included cost and lack of extensive features can be a bit damper for some people.

There isn’t necessarily one single blogging platform out there that’s better than everything else. Some platforms feature more customization tweaks, whereas others are easier to use. Some services might require a monthly fee, but that fee might covering your hosting costs as well for your blog.

We wish we could say “Go with X platform and you’ll be all set”, but that really isn’t something that’s possible. Each person is unique and different in their own way, and since blogs are such personal tools, the platform through which you decide to go with is a very personal and heartfelt choice.

Some services are created to be as easy to use as possible, whereas others strive to offer as many features as they can. There are some guidelines that are easy to follow, but at the end of the day, the platform that you end up choosing will be a big matter of personal preference.

Choose A Theme For Your Blog And Stick With It

We wish starting a successful blog was as simple as choosing a platform of your choice and then calling it good, but unfortunately this is not the case. There are quite a few more steps involved with this process, and the next one that you need to be aware of is the matter of themes.

No matter which blogging platform you end up opting for, you’re going to need to choose a theme for it. Some services have pre-built themes for you to choose from that are turnkey right from the get-go, while others will require you to do a bit of tweaking to get just right.

Either way, you want to make sure that the design you choose is something that’s both visually appealing to your readers and relates nicely to the content that you’re writing about. There are standard guidelines of minimalism and simplicity that are great to follow no matter what you’re writing about, but don’t be afraid to personalize things a bit!

If you’re blogging about gardening and outdoor things, try to incorporate shades of green into your blog’s design. If you’re writing about woodworking, colors of tan and brown would be appropriate as well. These touches aren’t necessary, but they do add a nice personal touch if you’re up for it.

Along with that, simply make sure that the design you pick is coherent and consistent throughout your entire blog/website. This goes a long way in making your blog look as professional as possible, and while it might seem like a small detail to keep track of, it can do wonders for you and your blog in the long run.

Want To Know How To Make A Successful Blog? Add A Twist To Your Content!

With so many people creating blogs nowadays and writing about pretty much every topic imaginable, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to be original with your content with every day that passes. In fact, being 100% original with what you write about is perhaps one of the most difficult tasks that you’ll face with your blog.

While writing about topics that have already been talked about is fine, this won’t bring you as much traffic as you’d probably like to have. In order achieve this, try putting a twist on what you’re writing about. Even if the subject has been talked about before, no one has talked about it with your ideas and thoughts incorporated into it.

This is a skill that will get better with a time, as it has a lot to do with developing your own voice with your writing. The more you write, the better you’ll get in this area. You might not be sure how to go about this at first, but the more you write and write, the faster you’ll discover the writing style that works for you.

Following the discovery of your writing voice, seek out topics and subjects that interest you, and then add your own personal flair to it! If you’re talking about the latest release of a new smartphone, add your own thoughts on it or your experience with the company who makes the phone. If you’re writing about a new entry in a movie series, tell a story of how that series has had an impact on your life while growing up.

There are so many different ways you can go about this particular tip, and while it might seem a bit daunting right off the bat, it’s one of the best tips for successful blogging that you can make use of. Adding your own unique twist goes a long way in differentiating your content from everything else that exists, and it will make it quite a bit more enjoyable for your audience to read. It’ll keep existing readers intrigued, and it will draw new readers in as well.

Continually Kick Out Fresh Content

In addition to adding your own twist to the content you write, you also need to make sure you produce new articles on a regular basis if you’re wondering how to set up a successful blog. Upon first starting your blog, you’ll probably want to write blog posts all the time. This is a great feeling to have, but if you’re like most people, this willingness to write regular content for your site will dwindle away rather quickly.

This is a problem that pretty much every blogger faces after running their blog for some time, but in order to ensure that your blog is and stays successful, you need to make sure that you’re producing posts for it on a regular basis.

When we say that you need to continually kick out fresh content, we don’t mean that you should write and publish ten posts on one day and then take a 5-day hiatus. The best way to keep your blog updated with a lot of content on a regular basis is by establishing a form of content schedule.

Take some time to sit down and and see how much time your current schedule will allow for you to write for your blog. Everyone’s schedule is different, but something we’d suggest is start off by advertising that you’ll write and publish one blog post every week. Even if you think that you’re capable of writing more, don’t oversell yourself. It’s much better to say you’ll write one post a week, and then kick out two.

So many new bloggers get overambitious and advertise that they’ll be posting a new blog article each and every day, and while they might keep up with this for a little bit, they’ll likely burn out after a week or two and then go to posting maybe once a week - if not less.

Start out with a small amount of regular content, keep up with it, and then gradually progress to kick out more as you get comfortable with posting on a steady and continuous basis. In this case, slow and steady wins the race.

Encourage Feedback From Your Audience

When you want to start a successful blog, another important tip to be aware of is making sure that you encourage feedback from your audience. Lots of bloggers focus all of their time and attention on the content and the content only. Content certainly is key with a blog, but it’s only part of the story. Your readers are the reason you do what you do, and if you don’t interact with them, they’re going to get bored and eventually leave.

To make sure that this doesn’t happen, try to frequently encourage your readers to comment on your posts and leave feedback. If you try a new style of writing, ask your audience to leave a comment in regards to what they liked and didn’t like about it. If you’re writing a list of your top 10 favorite movies, encourage your readers to comment their own list as well.

Asking your readers for their feedback and thoughts on the stuff you’re writing will make them feel much more involved with your blog, and it will provide them with another incentive to read your content and keep coming back on a regular basis. And, when they do comment, try to reply to as many of their responses as you can! This is something that can be a bit difficult as your blog grows and gets more traffic, but if you can keep up with it, it means a lot to your readers.

Along with all of this, it’s also important to make sure that you make it very easy for your readers to share the content that they’re consuming. This can be done by placing easily accessible buttons and links for sharing your articles on social media sites along the likes of Twitter and Facebook, and most blogging services will have these sort of extensions built right into them.

If a reader of yours is particularly enthralled with something of your’s that they’ve read, they’ll likely want to share you work with their friends. By doing so, they’re promoting not only that one article, but your blog as a whole. This is how word of mouth marketing works nowadays, and when implemented properly, it can create for a huge influx in additional traffic.

Only Write About What Your Audience Wants To Read About

This one ties in nicely with the above tip, as you’ll only know what your audience wants to read about by engaging them and asking “What would you all like for me to write about?”

It can often be difficult to continuously come up with topics to write about, and if you find yourself hitting a dead end, reaching out to the people that are consuming your content and asking them for ideas rather than writing about some off the wall subject will be a lot more beneficial for both your audience and your blog overall.

Reaching out to your audience and asking them what they’d like to read about will not only ensure that you’re going to be writing about something that your audience is genuinely interested in, but it will also help you establish a good working relationship them. They’ll appreciate the fact that you actually asked them for their opinion, and it will make the author and reader relationship a lot more personal.

This is something that a lot of bloggers don’t think of doing, but it reality, it’s one of the most important tips to keep in mind. If you really want to know how to start a successful blog, you need to regularly interact with the people that are eating up your articles. It’s rally a simple thing to do, and when put to good use, it can do absolute wonders for your blog. 

Promote, Promote, Promote!

A lot of the success that your blog sees is dependent on how many people actually decide to visit it and read the content that you’re producing. You might like to think that all you need to do is create quality content and that the readers will come, but this isn’t how the world works. Your content on its own will attract some readers, but for the majority of people, you’re going to need to do a bit of promoting and advertising.

The idea of actively promoting your blog might sound a bit intimidating, but thanks to the awesome tool that is social media, doing so is now easier than ever before. Sites such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Google+ have made it easier than ever before to share and promote content with millions of people, but the way you go about this is incredibly important.

A lot of people are under the impression that spamming social media with links to their content is the best way to get traffic, but we can tell you right now that this is not something you want to do.

When you’re just starting out with your blog, take to your personal social media account and share links to new content that you’re producing on a frequent yet modest basis. Once you build up a bit of an audience this way, it might be time to take your advertising to the next level.

Both Facebook and Twitter make it incredibly easy to promote posts that you produce, and while this will require you to hand over a bit of cash, the amount of views that it will allow you content to receive is tremendous.

And, along with all of this, you might eventually decide to create a social media profile that’s used just for your blog. This can be a great move for further interacting with your audience out side of your blog, and it is also a great tool for allowing your readers to easily contact you if they have any questions or suggestions for blog ideas.

Final Thoughts

If you came into this guide wondering how to start a successful blog, hopefully the info we’ve gone over has helped give you a better idea of what to do and what not to do in order to make sure your own blog is as successful as humanly possible. All of these tips work well on their own, but you’re going to see the most success when they’re used in conjunction with one another. It might take some time to master them, but in the end, it’s well worth the effort!