Create your own blog

If you're a new blogger, welcome to the wonderful world of blogging. Blogging has opened website creation to almost everyone, as it takes very little technical or designing know-how to get a blog up and running.

A Blog, or Weblog to give it its full name, can be about almost anything you want it to be. In its simplest form it’s an online diary or journal where you can record your personal thoughts and observations about any topic you wish.

Below is the steps to take to get started :
Step 1 : Decide on what you would like to write about, it might be about your hobby or to do with business.
Step 2 : Choose a blog site.
Step 3 : Join up free
Step 4 : Decide on a name for your blog using your main keywords.
Step 5 : Choose from the templates they provide as your blog background.
Step 6 : Write your first blog

Blogging Platform : So how would you start a blog? Whether you decide to start a blog for money or just for fun, you should probably do so without spending any money. The easiest was is to sign up with one of the many free blog platforms available around. Two of the most popular blog hosts are Blogger.com, now owned by Google, and Wordpress.com. Their service is completely free, not even advertisements will appear on your blog.

The ability to customize your blog is limited with the free services, so you can try Typepad.com, which will host your blog for you on their servers. Purchase a hosting account where WordPress can be installed. The downloadable version of WordPress is located at Wordpress.org and is free of charge if you need to install Wordpress yourself on your hosting account.

If you are newbie, then choose a platform you can learn easily. Don’t choose a popular platform just because it’s popular. If you can’t figure out how to use it, your blog will be over before it starts. So select a blogging platform according to your preference.

Naming your Blog : Blog names tend to be attention-getting and off-beat. If you are your blog is for business, service, product, I would like to suggest to incorporate important keywords to their business when naming their blog.

Look & Layout : Select a layout that doesn’t require a lot of technical changes or adjustments. The best way to determine the look of your blog is to look at the layout of other blogs and determine what appeals to you. Should you use one of the templates provided or have something custom
designed? Do you want your blog archives displayed? Do you want to be the only author or do you want to permit others to make posts, as well? There are many questions you'll be asked in the startup phase about the look of your blog.

Widgets : There are a number of widgets, or add-on programs, that you can incorporate into your blog. Check your blog software's site for more info about what features you'd like add to your blog. At a minimum you'll want to give visitors a couple of ways in which they can receive blog updates through various updaters, or feeder services, as mentioned earlier.

Comments : Set your comments to moderated, which means that you have to approve any comments to your blog before the post goes live. You'll save yourself a great many headaches and time by choosing to moderate the comments. This will protect your blog from spam posts.

Blog content : Content, content, content! That's the secret to writing a good blog. To create content, you must find a subject or subjects that you are passionate about. If you want to develop a readership for your blog then the topics you write about have to be ones which people will find interesting.

Content should be fresh and writen in simple & concise way. Keep your posts and blog entries clear and easy to understand. There’s a time and place for long posts, but if you want to generate comments, keep your posts as short as possible.

You can post content rich articles of interest to your target market, comment on a current event, answer questions from your visitors. Keep your eyes and ears open for information relevant to your audience. Relevance is important for getting targeted search engine traffic to visit your blog

Also, before you start writing about a topic, make sure you understand it and that what you’re writing is fact. The quickest way to lose readership, or never gain one at all, is to write blogs that are false or misleading.

Posting frequency : Blogs are just like gardens -- they need watering regularly and require some care and attention. For maximum effectiveness, you need to post several times a week to your blog. You should respond to reader's comments - blogs provide a great forum for ongoing discussions. If your blog content is updated frequently, search engines will tend to spider the pages at regular intervals.

Blog Traffic : Now the great question is from where the audience of your blog will come. The whole topic is explained comprehensively with resources under heading "Blog Promotion".

Now you have created your own blog, it is wise to know what writing skills and tips makes your blog popular one.