Blogging: 10 Tips to Get You Started

Seminars@Hadley

Blogging:

10 Tips to Get You Started

Presented by

Dawn

Mirabel Steel

Maureen Duffy

May 6, 2015

Mirabel Steel

Thanks Dawn and I really want to thank you and Maureen for inviting me today, this is very exciting. Thank you for the introduction, I think you said a lot of stuff there about me. Yes, I've got Retinitis Pigmentosa since I was a teenager, mother of four children and I'm a writer, blogger, and speaker.

So, what I'd like to do actually because I really do have 10 tips and maybe more, I'm going to launch straight into what I'd like to share today. So, basically why I began a blog in 2011 I had been writing my auto biography, and as everyone knows writing is a fairly solitary affair. And I think my family was wondering what on earth I was doing all the time.

And when I gave my first chapters of my book to a writing mentor she replied by saying yeah it’s okay for a first draft. And I really thought that I had finished it, so I thought oh well while I keep writing the book maybe I could share some little snippets of my pieces. So, my family and friends could comment, and what came from that was I started to blog with a friend who set me up which I'll talk about in a minute. But, the unexpected gain was that other people started to comment, people from around the world that I had never met really liked my stories.

So, that gave me a wonderful feeling of being able to plot a course of content, and I really thought about what I could write for others based on my own life experiences of a vision impaired person. About life and travel what would be good for them, so at the gateway to blindness is the name of my blog was born. So, what I want to say is for all of us who are blogging or thinking of blogging.

As blind or vision impaired people, I believe that we already are at an advantage for setting up our blogs and for blogging. Because we already are very adaptable people we face being out of our comfort zone every day. We have learned special skills that help us to solve problems, and because we don't give up easily and I believe these attributes are what can really help us get into blogging.

So, I'm looking at some notes here, I use a CCTV. I have a little bit of vision to be able to do this. And I'm also using JAWS. So, I’ve just got some notes and I'm clicking a page. Okay, so when we start a blog what I'd like to say is it’s good to be realistic with your personal expectations.

Creating a blog does really take time, so starting with small steps and making them achievable is a really good way of not giving yourself too much of a headache. Your blog and your skills will improve as you progress, and as you get into blogging. So, the first thing to do obviously is to prepare your blog, and I would say know your niche’.

So, who are you writing for, and what do you want to share? At the core of why you would begin a blog. How do you move into your comfort zone? How do you find your niche’? So, as a blogger I would say the way to do this is be aware of your talents. It’s interesting because we tend to overlook our talents very easily, its things that come to us so second nature that we don't realize that they are actually talents.

And these talents and your strengths are what can help you really work well within your blog. So, for instance if you’re a friendly person you might find that networking comes very easily, or if your punctuality matters to you most probably posting regularly will be something that your very good at. So, here's tip number one finding your talent plus your passion will equal your niche’.

So, I have a little exercise here for you, so after the seminar you can try this. You make a list, list one is note down your strengths make a list of those personality traits that define you. So, you'll friendly, you're punctional, organized, tenantious, whatever they are. You make your list then list two is you name your passions, so jot down those things that you really-that really inspire you.

It could be cooking, travels, sports, writing, technology because when you blog you really need to be passionate about the topic that your blogging about. You'll need this passion to keep you going at those times when you think you’ve ran out of inspired ideas. So, if you try to match your talents with your passion you'll be able to come up with a niche’. Mine for instance is memoir writing as a vision impaired person and I love to share stories.

So, that's what I present on my blog. I might come up for air right now and just check that this is all working, so I'll just check in with you Dawn. I take good I'm not in a void, alright so look there's a lot to talk about and it is – I feel like I'm going [inaudible 00:10:18] at this. So, once you've decided on a blog name which I will say I can’t help you with. But you do a google search and you make sure that that has been-that you can take that name as your blog name.

When you’re doing this it’s really good to know what your tagline is. And I've got here what's a tag line? Simply it’s a mini synopsis about you and your blog, so a catchy tagline makes you memorable while building your profile if this is want you want to do. If you’re looking at building more of an audience then this sort of catchy tagline is very important. And I've got tip number two, how to define your blog in a nutshell.

So, to get your tagline this is great to try writing under 12 words what you do and what your reader will gain. It’s very important to understand that we’re also-we are attracting an audience, and what am I going to learn and benefit by coming to your blog. So, if you can write that in your tagline it’s really telling me straight away no doubt what I'm coming to expect, so mine for instance is I have Mirabel Steel helping people to master the art of being blind.

And I use that a lot it helps define me, and I find that people are starting to learn that’s what I write about. So, you can add it to your email signature and it’s good to maybe put it on your business card, and splash it around all your social media sites. So, that people remember your mini mission statement, so now that we've done that moving on. I've got number two point two avoiding frustration try collaboration.

I feel like I'm doing a jingle ad, so I began in blog spot.com and Maureen is going to talk to us more about platforms, because she is the social media expert. I just want to say that I manage to do blogging on my own in the early days my posts were purely texts, and I followed the prompts with JAWS. And I could with my assisted TV do everything by myself, but it was a little stressful.

A girlfriend set me up with a template we found the easiest-what I had to do and then after that I took it on by myself. So, I would say that if you are setting up it could be worthwhile having someone if you have no vision at all to help you just check out the templates, and get an idea of what's there. What happened for my blog is that later on I began a travel writing series, and naturally we had some great photos from my travel with my partner.

And he suggested we put some visuals up to take advantage of these pictures. What I found was two things I suddenly had a collaboration so that post publish became his task, and I could let go of worrying about the design and all the technical stuff. So, I was very fortunate that it then seemed to be our collaborative journey. I also felt that I was now the CEO of my own blog, and I could delegate the task to my team member who very kindly took-shared this role with me.

And to this day this is how we work together. But I'm still in control of all the content and the writing, and all the decisions that we make. But he's very generously helps me by seeing that it’s all correct on the screen. The other thing I found by using visuals for me was that my readers enjoyed it too. It suddenly brought a lot of the stories to life for my sighted audience.

And also the content was still inspiring my blind and vision impaired readers, so honestly having a collaborator you both take pride in the work. And it’s quite an ideal situation so I do encourage you if you can find someone to help you from time to time it’s a great idea. Simply ask your family, ask your friends there maybe someone who really doesn't mind.

And I have tip three here which is if you are trying to enroll someone I would suggest offering them something of value to them in return. So basically you’re swapping favors. Can you take them out to lunch or buy them a coffee. Can you get them a box of chocolates, or buy them a little book voucher. Something that just rewards their time for-for your time.

So, naturally though there are other frustrations that you will face when you’re working with another person. For instance what if your collaborator is busy? What if they’re not available when you are? So I would suggest as a solution is to give them plenty of time, and warning of your upcoming post, so they can fit it into their weekly schedule.

So, I would say try to be clear as possible as to what the job entails, how long you think it’s going to take, and have everything ready to go so that together you can really do it very efficiently. So, we're moving on and I'm sorry if I'm going a bit fast, I'm just trying to cover all these topics. Next is writing the content which is the bulk, and the important part of blogging. Whatever you’re going to write, I think it’s important to have quality content and before we get to the quality, it’s what I am going to write.

I have a thing called an editorial calendar which is where you write down ideas, when you might want to post, are you doing a series, what is the series. And it’s a real – it’s like a road map to your blog, and your blog content, so it’s a travel destination it’s good to have an idea of where you’re going. But you also allow for detours because you may get other ideas that come in, and you can write on those.

So tip number four is map out a list of possible story ideas so this includes the titles, the dates, and the series, what I just said. And tip five which seems very quick after tip four, if you are finding keeping track of lots of ideas overwhelming as I do in my head. I find I get a lot of ideas and it’s hard to capture them all down, what I do is I just put them into bullet form in a file.

And then I can come back and work on them later so that there just simply jotted down and I can fill in the gaps later. So, quality is essential as I said its being accurate and clear and every word counts. I think when you have a blog it’s a very self-disciplined work. You need to be aware of even having your own word count limit, and having a structure, how often you want to blog, and the size of your articles.

Which I'll talk about in a little while you are the editor and the writer, so you need to be willing to say no to some of your content. Not everything you write will go on your blog. I think if you produce great content it will get shared. So my motto is when in doubt leave it out you can always come back and improve it, and add it to a blog purse later. Again with files and folders being a blogger is also about being organized and I think as vision impaired people, blind people we're very used to knowing where things are and being very organized.

And keeping files and folders very specifically, clearly labeled is one of the attributes of blogging. So just having a very good filing system with your blog titles is important. Tip number six how to get into the blogging spirit. So there are times of days when we all can write our best creations. I would say find out what time of day best suites your creative flow. I would talk to your family members to explain why it is important to you to create a special space, where you can feel free to have the time to write and to blog.

I feel empowered to claim your writing space it is important and I think we tend to put a lot of things before blogging. If we’re-especially as mothers and people with busy careers. But it’s important to grab a spot during the wait which is your writing and blogging time. And I would definitely switch off all your email and Facebook distractions. So don't check your social media – sorry Maureen, before you start blogging.

Because you just got to clear your head and write and that is one of the worst distractions actually checking our social media? As a blogger you need to self-critique before plubshing avoid the urge to get that quick publish because tip seven is right and settle. So like [inaudible 00:21:00] a loaf of bread blog posts need time to settle. So you can write them put them in a draft leave them to one side, and then come back to them.

By doing that you actually will pick up things you didn't notice before, and you'll be very pleased you didn't publish and you'll be able to craft a much better post. So once you have an article ready also it’s important to proof read now proof reading with Jaws is not a second editor, he can miss things, capital letters can jump onto the screen, and a tab may shift your font elsewhere. So I highly suggest a proofreader in your family, or a friend just to check that the visuals and the typing hasn’t gone all skewish.

I do have-I'm very fortunate that my father who is a writer and editor looks at my work, and makes sure that it is all ready to go. So I’m very fortunate about that. I am going to now come back to Maureen before I launch into strategy and networking. So if we want to ask questions and how we're going for time.

Maureen Duffy

Hi everyone. This is Maureen and I am a professional blogger in other words this is how I earn my living. I think Dawn wanted me to start with telling you how I got here. It’s a long journey I've been blogging for a total of 11 years, when I thought about it it made me tired. I have gone from being a personal blogger to a professional blogger, I write on line professionally.