Are you excited to dive into the blog writing world? You’ve decided you want to write, or you want to promote your thoughts and ideas with a blog and that’s great! Whatever your reason may be for starting a blog, you’re embarking on an exciting journey and I’m excited for you! I discovered blog writing about 4 years ago and I love it! It’s a great way to be creative, share information, and even meet new people. So now that you’ve got that fresh blank piece screen in front of you, how do you actually start getting those ideas out? It’s not uncommon to end up staring at that blank screen for what feels like forever. If this is where you are, you’re not alone! I was there once too. That’s why I’ve written this post on 3 great types of blog posts to get you going!
Listicles
Listicles are probably the easiest type of blog post to write and are a great way to get your feet wet in the blog writing world! What is a listicle? Have you ever looked up what to get your mother-in-law for Mother’s Day? Or search for the best smartphones? Any blog that lists something can be a listicle. If you have a great gift guide in mind or a favorite family recipe you’d like to share, start by making a list of all the elements that are important to that guide. What do people need to know about it? Once you have your list written out, add more information to each point. You don’t have to, but just one of two additional lines of information for each point can help your audience better understand it. For example, with a gift guide, why would your mother-in-law love that lounge set? Perhaps she deserves a break and to be pampered. It’s as simple as that!
How-To Posts
How many times have you typed the words “how-to” into a search engine to find something? I have many times. “How to make homemade waffles”. “How to change a tire”. “How to Write a Blog Post”. There are so many things we look up every day to learn how to do something. Writing your own “How-To” blog post is a great way to get your blog noticed! Is there something you are really good at? This may be the reason for your blog in the first place. You may not realize it, but your knowledge and experience can help others, even if you are just getting started on your own journey. Everyone is just getting started at some point and bringing people in along for the ride when you are first starting out is a great way to build a community of support! So how do you write a how-to blog? A how-to blog is basically a step-by-step guide to something. Put yourself in your reader’s shoes. Think of all the steps of how to change a tire that are essential to your audience and make those steps your subtitles. For each subtitle, write a little paragraph with more description and important information. If you want to go the extra mile, you can ask someone who is not familiar with your topic to read it over for you and let you know if it’s enough information and if they could change a tire just by reading your blog and following your steps. That’s it! You have your how-to blog!
Storytelling
Storytelling is probably my favorite way to write a blog post. If your blog is more geared towards being creative than informative, then storytelling is a great way to write your posts. It doesn’t just have to be for creative purposes though! Storytelling is also a great way for businesses to speak to their audience and promote their brand! Either way, it can be so much fun to write a creative story to showcase your thoughts, ideas, brand, poems, and so much more. There’s no limit to what kind of story you can tell! Personally, I like telling stories about my life and connecting with people who have similar experiences. It’s you want to see what that looks like, check out my personal blog here. People love stories. Even if you don’t think your story is important or unique, someone else will! You never know where your story will take you.
The most important thing when you start a blog is to just start! I’m sure you may have heard that before, but when it comes to writing it’s absolutely true! You don’t have to have all of your thoughts perfectly organized before you start writing them down. Just get started and organize things after. Sometimes starting to write can be the key to coming up with more ideas. Before you know it, you’ll be filling up that blank screen!
Laura Bradley 