I remember that cold day in December 2014, when I purchased my website domain and I tackled the art of blogging. I had no idea what I was doing. I spent hours and hours googling tips about being a blogger and how to set up coding for my site. Some helpful tips, some not. Looking back, at my first year of blogging, I wish I had done some of these steps right away. So, for those of you that are aspiring bloggers, here is my Survival Starter Kit to Being a Blogger for the newbies out there.
Survival Starter Kit to Being a Blogger
- The name of your blog is important. Choose wisely.
- Define your brand; colour scheme, fonts, logo, blog layout etc. What is the vibe of your brand?
- Hire a professional designer to design your website. There are also tons of templates on Etsy you can choose from to ensure your site looks polished.
- Think about your blog categories; style, lifestyle, recipes… What will it be?
- Make blogger friends. No one will understand your struggles better.
- Blogger friends will also help you stay motivated and provide you with useful tips.
- Visuals are everything; Invest in a good quality camera or hire a photographer.
- Purchase a photoshop program. Turn photos from blah to fab.
- Stick to a few social media platforms. Don’t over extend yourself.
- Be consistent with posting on both your blog and social media.
- Engage with your audience on Instagram, but don’t be on your phone 24/7. Life balance.
- Invest in automatic scheduling where possible. I use Buffer and Tailwind a lot.
- Create folders on your phone with photo categories for posting on IG for rapid retrieval.
- Create a media kit and think about your rates right away.
- Evaluate and update your rates at the end of each quarter depending on analytics.
- Create an invoice template.
- Organize your emails into folders and sub-folders right away.
- Start a contact list.
- Keep spreadsheets of all your collaborations.
- Focus on building relationships with PR companies.
- The fact that a brand is reaching out to you automatically means they love your brand.
- If you reach out to a brand for a collaboration, follow up if you haven’t heard back from them within a week.
- Don’t take it personally if a brand does not want to collaborate.
- Don’t let brands take advantage of you.
- You can and should negotiate your compensation and expectations of campaigns.
- It is ok to say no to collaborations, and you should say no where you feel the fit is not right.
- Don’t ever post about a product you don’t like or would never use.
- Read through influencer agreements carefully.
- Find your niche: Who are your followers? What do they like?
- If it takes you longer than an hour to write a blog post then there is a problem. Time yourself.
- Dedicate 3-4 hours on the weekend and write next week’s blog posts.
- Create a yearly strategy. What is your aim each year?Each month?
- Breathe. Have fun. Be yourself.
Love this! Very helpful. 🙂