Archive for May 13th, 2010

What Is A Blog?

What is a blog? What can you do with a blog and how do you get started?

A blog, in the shortest possible answer, is any thoughts that you want it to be. It could be you talking about what you have done that day to a technical blog detailing latest releases and news from your organisation. In all probability, it is somewhere in the middle.

A blog is what you want it to be. If you just want to get into writing down your thoughts each dayand sharing them with the world then there is no harm in doing that. If you are training for a mass participation event and raising money for charity, such as the London Marathon or the New York Marathon, you might find that documenting your training and fund raising inspires you to keep up with both, whilst giving sponsors a point of contact.

For someone wanting to raise a bit of extra pocket money, a blog can be anything from a general chit chat to an ongoing discussion about a particular topic that the writer is a specialist on. Mommy blogging, where the writer talks about what she is doing and topics that are affecting her can generate good followings and, therefore, significant payments from sponsors. Whilst if you are qualified in a certain field then blogging about that field could generate highly specific traffic, which would generate less specific adverts, but highly profitable at that.

A blog can be anything from an online diary to a help desk to support a huge organisation, as long as you can get it onto a website. It is anything that you wish to use it for – the sky is your limit.

But, how do you get started? Well, there are plenty of popular blogging tools available, depending on how complicated you want to get. You can use simple tools such as Blogger or WordPress.com to get online and blogging instantly, using their free services, or you can buy your own domain name, download the latest version from WordPress.org and arrange some hosting and have a very powerful tool.

You can also have your blog look just as you want it to look. There are plenty of off the shelf designs, or themes, to use on your website, depending on what you are using. And there are also loads of plugins that you can use to give it all of the extra functions you might want. From easy to bookmark with Facebook to showing your Twitter status on the site to surveys and contact forms.

The world really is your oyster when it comes to blogging. You have it your way, talking about whatever you want to talk about and doing whatever you want with it. At best, your readers will also interact with you and leave comments, then you can also reply to. It makes it excellent fun, potentially very rewarding and something that everything should be joining in with.

So, that is what a blog is – whatever you want it to be!

Digg This
Reddit This
Stumble Now!
Buzz This
Vote on DZone
Share on Facebook
Bookmark this on Delicious
Kick It on DotNetKicks.com
Shout it
Share on LinkedIn
Bookmark this on Technorati
Post on Twitter
Google Buzz (aka. Google Reader)

If you want to start work from home, then it is potential that you will need some kind of site. But you might want to stay away from the high costs of a professional designer. Can you still get a website?

Yes, you might get yourself a website for your own working from home scheme. There are a lot of DIY site tools, but I do not really rate ample of these. For those wanting to get an internet presence quickly and simply, then blogging is the answer?

Not convinced? Well, the best site tools have everything that you need, including:

  • straightforward to update via content management systems
  • professional templates for the design of your website, free to download and straightforward to activate
  • loads of added features to include, via plugins, for stacks of extra functions

But isn’t a weblog merely for blogging?
But, surely a website merely means that you might then merely keep blogging around your products? Well actually no, with the best blogging software you could add a range of pages to your web site, with a hierarchy of pages if you want to add a lot. Then, you could add weblog posts on top of these, which is another extraordinary benefit.

What is the best blogging software?
So, which is the best blogging software to use? Which should you be using? Well, my recommendation is WordPress. If you are slightly technical, then you will be able to sort yourself a domain name and suitable PHP hosting with a MySQL database and upload the latest version of WordPress.

Does all of that sound foreign to you? Do not worry – only look around for a host that offers straightforward WordPress installation. You might pay a touch more, but with a press of a button or two, the entire site will be created for you in WordPress.

Customise WordPress
Then, start working on your website! Select a suitable theme that matches what you want to sell and has a good navigation structure.

If you are promoting merely a small handful of products then you just need to create a page for each and link to every page from the main navigation area. This should happen automatically if you are careful selecting your theme. If you need ample of pages, then create high level category pages and then create the product pages as sub pages for these. Again, with a decent theme, all of this will be managed for you, or you could only talk round the products in the category pages and link to them manually.

WordPress is the best
WordPress is wonderful for quickly and easily building your own website. I do not know of an simpler to use tool available on the market, it beats all of the DIY site tools that I have ever tried. Plus, because it is a blogging tool, it has all of the indispensable weblog tools built in, which means that you site can also include a website. This is essential for the ultimate success of your site.

So, find yourself a domain name, buy some hosting, activate WordPress and customise it and you have your own simple to build web site!

Digg This
Reddit This
Stumble Now!
Buzz This
Vote on DZone
Share on Facebook
Bookmark this on Delicious
Kick It on DotNetKicks.com
Shout it
Share on LinkedIn
Bookmark this on Technorati
Post on Twitter
Google Buzz (aka. Google Reader)