For those of you who want to take your blog to the next level in 2011 (perhaps you’ve stepped up to the Post a Day or Post a Week challenge), we’ve got your back.
From now on, we’ll be offering tips on blogging best practices to help you produce high-quality content, boost your readership, and make the most of all the fabulous WordPress.com features.
Here’s a handful of resources to get you started:
Need an idea?
Check out The Daily Post for a daily dose of writing tips and encouragement, or browse the Freshly Pressed posts or tag pages for inspiration. You can also combat writer’s block by tackling a thought-provoking Plinky prompt.
Keep in mind that the some of the best blogs are focused on one main subject and often target a specific audience. If you feel like you’re losing your focus, think about the reason why you started blogging in the first place, and how you define blogging success. Still feeling lost? Give these brainstorming exercises a shot.
Think you don’t have time to post?
Sure you do — WordPress.com users publish about half a million new posts every day. If so many others can find time, you can, too!
If you’re in a pinch, keep it simple with QuickPress. If you’re on the go, use WordPress.com on your mobile phone or create a post by email. You can even phone in an audio post! Writing posts in advance and setting them to automatically publish in the future is also a great idea for times when you’re going to be busy.
Want more visitors?
As long as you’re enjoying your blog, you’re successful. But if you want to draw a larger audience and interact more with other bloggers, there are plenty of ways to do so. Here’s one suggestion to get you started.
Consider this: You probably search the web for information frequently, and you’re able to find what you need pretty quickly (most of the time), right? That’s because you don’t carefully peruse all the information on a given topic, you rapidly scan page titles and headlines for specific keywords and phrases. Even when you’re leisurely browsing the web with no specific destination in mind, you use page titles to quickly determine whether or not a link is worth clicking.
Your blog post titles show up in a variety of places on the web and in the WordPress.com community. So if you want to boost traffic to your site, take the time to write descriptive, captivating headlines for your posts. For example, a post titled “Summer Vacation 2010″ might be descriptive enough for you and your friends, but “Beaches, Bungee Jumping, and Backpacking: My Adventures in Costa Rica” has a much better chance of attracting new visitors.
Check out Are You Writing Rockin’ Blog Post Titles? for tips on how to write better headlines.
Make 2011 your best blogging year ever!
Remember that you’re a part of a huge community of people who are passionate about blogging. We hope you’ll utilize comments and likes to offer feedback, support, and encouragement to one another as you work toward your blogging goals for 2011.
