Monday, February 25, 2013

Sharing: HOW TO BLOG


A few of my new author-friends from Indireads were keen to know how to blog. I have created this article especially for them and of course, for anyone else who is interested.

What’s a Blog?

A blog is a personal space where you can jot down whatever you feel like. You can keep it private, share it with just some friends or open it to the public. It’s basically like an e-diary where you can pour whatever runs through your mind. There is also the extra facility for adding photos, videos and links.

Better yet, the blog space is absolutely free of cost. So what are you waiting for?

Blogspot and WordPress are the most popular forms of blog spaces available on the internet. Having never used it I have no idea how WordPress functions, but I am sure there is a whole load of information that you can find on the internet.

I will call myself an expert on Blogspot offered by Google. I used this blogspace for my blogs.

How to set up a blog on Blogspot?

Go to www.blogspot.com and sign in with your gmail id. Click on Create a new blog and the screen will show you Title & Address.

The Title can be changed whenever you please but the address cannot be. Think well and come up with one. Mine goes like this – sundarivenkatraman.blogspot.com.

Then are a number of standard templates to choose from. Explore and check them all out. That can be quite a cheering experience as there is a wide variety to select from. And it can be changed at will too.

Explore all the buttons and keep experimenting with the design. That’s the only way to improve your blog.

You can fit the settings to your taste on whom you want to see your blogs – only yourself, specific email ids of friends that you can invite or the whole world.

How to post articles?

You have a title for your article and then the blog itself. Type this out on a word document. Many people do it in a notepad, but please note that a notepad does not offer spell-grammar check and that’s the reason why you find a lot of typos on blogs. Reading a badly spelt article can be quite irritating. Don’t be lazy! Use a word document to type out your blog. Check for spelling & grammar and then copy paste the whole thing on a notepad.

Why do we do this? Sometimes, the web does not accept symbols and punctuations used from the different kind of TEXTS (Eg.: Georgia, Comic Sans, Calibri, Bookman Old Style) that we use on word. These may show as gibberish on your blog. That’s the reason it’s important to paste the whole matter on a notepad and then paste the title in the box meant for it and then the blog into the body space meant for it.

Labels or Tags

There are also Labels or Tags as they are commonly called. These are very important in any article posted on the web. Generally, your article or blog has a unique title; then there is your name (author’s name) and of course, more labels can be used depending on the article posted.

For example, when I write a film review for Special Chabbis, my tags will be:

Film Review, Special 26, Special Chabbis, Akshay Kumar, Anupam Kher, Manoj Bajpai, Kajal Aggarwal, Jimmy Shergill, Divya Dutta, Neeraj Pandey, Viacom 18, Sundari Venkatraman, 

Ensure that all tags are separated by commas and the last one is also followed by a comma. Automatically, the labels will be listed alphabetically.

The labels are important for your blog to get picked up on Google when someone searches using different keywords. That’s the reason why I have used two different versions of the film’s name Special 26 as well as Special Chabbis. Try to cover as many suitable words as possible and make sure that you get your spellings right. That’s the way to enhance the chances of your blog getting picked up on Google Search.

Posting a picture

There is no compulsion to post a picture. But if you do it, it definitely garners the reader’s attention. If you are picking the picture from the internet, do give credit to the host website. It’s only polite.

Umpteen features to make your blog attractive

There are a number of features that can make your blog interesting and all the tools are available at the back end at the click of a button. Every feature is self explanatory and don’t hesitate to explore. Keep checking out the tools, use them and see the final product instantaneously. You can keep adding and deleting to your heart’s content.

Making your blog popular

You can post the link on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn and a host of other social media networks. Make the effort and email the article link to all your contacts. Invite your friends to follow your blog.

Well, I think I have managed to cover the basics. You are welcome to get back to me for any queries via the comments form.

Happy Blogging! It’s a whole new colourful world out there.

5 comments:

  1. Thanks for this, Sundari, most useful! Mimmy

    ReplyDelete
  2. This is a long lasting article. Thanks for giving me such type of useful information Photographs and pictures of sun

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  3. Thanks Sundari, I was wondering how to give tag... you cleared by doubts:)

    Any suggestion how to make people comment on the blogs. I am getting PM's regarding my blog or people saying they like it in forums but not in the acutal blog. I have enabled commenting..still...any suggestions?

    Regards
    Rubina

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You are welcome Rubina! And thanks for stopping by my blog and posting a comment. Actually, I don't have a method to it. I send the link to all my email contacts. I happen to get comments at times. It's quite haphazard :)
      Posting comments on other people's blog encourages comments. Also, some trending topics receive comments.
      You need a lot of patience! Well written blogs on interesting topics, simple, clean language and speaking (writing) from the heart are some of the things that will encourage readers.
      I hope this is of use to you. Wish you luck!

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