Any advice for starting a blog?

[naomisorge]

I want to start a blog! I'm an ESL teacher, and I am trying to build a career as a proofreader/editor. I know that an online presence would really help my chances of getting work in all these areas. I even logged on to Wordpress and bought a domain/website, which I never touched again. AND I have a super long commute to work, which would be perfect for writing content.

But although I have no problem journalling, writing reviews, or producing content according to client briefs, I'm really struggling to come up with ideas for my blog or even to get started writing. I just feel like every idea I have is not quite right.

Does anyone have any tips for getting over myself and just getting started? If so, I would love to hear them!

[TopaAzul062]

Go with what you know and or have a passion for. My first blog was on funding higher education and each post focused on different topics ranging from financial aid to side gigs. My second blog focused on electronic games which were either played by myself personally or is due to be released.

A possible direction you could go in is to share your experiences proofing and editing ESL course work. Since you're working with dual languages, this experience can help others improve their approach to writing. If sharing experiences doesn't sound appealing then you can go the route of sharing tips to help ESL learners improve their writing skills and vice versa.

You can even share tips in how to properly translate text from one language to another without losing the intended meaning; especially where slang and idioms are concerned. Once you choose a direction to go in for your blog, you'll then have to determine the frequency of your posts; at least one post a week will help show that you're consistent with your work.

Hopefully this information is helpful and happy blogging in advance.

[naomisorge]

Go with what you know and or have a passion for. My first blog was on funding higher education and each post focused on different topics ranging from financial aid to side gigs. My second blog focused on electronic games which were either played by myself personally or is due to be released.

A possible direction you could go in is to share your experiences proofing and editing ESL course work. Since you're working with dual languages, this experience can help others improve their approach to writing. If sharing experiences doesn't sound appealing then you can go the route of sharing tips to help ESL learners improve their writing skills and vice versa.

You can even share tips in how to properly translate text from one language to another without losing the intended meaning; especially where slang and idioms are concerned. Once you choose a direction to go in for your blog, you'll then have to determine the frequency of your posts; at least one post a week will help show that you're consistent with your work.

Hopefully this information is helpful and happy blogging in advance.

Thanks for your response! This is great advice.

[vermontelf]

To get started, I found some prompts for blogs and Instagram posts on Pinterest. I found that when I really struggled this gave me an ok idea to run with, more often it led to an idea that led to an idea that I could write with enthusiasm. Then life happened and I got way behind. I have started reblogging now and my goal is to post once a week. I generally have a couple of posts in various stages of writing and some, like this week, lead from the original post to another post or tutorial, so there is actually quite a lot of work in that "one" post.

By no means am I an expert, but I do believe the best advice about blogging is like writing in general, just keep writing even if you think it's trash keep writing. Eventually you will find the piece or put together several sections that you do like.

[AdamRedWolf]

You should really have a theme or area of expertise for your blog. If you're just trying to think of things to talk about, you're going to end up all over the place.

But, that's just advice on finding material to blog about... Promoting a blog is more difficult. Do some Google searches on best practices and tips, you'll find a lot of good info.

[Art West]

I briefly tried blogging unsuccessfully, so my advice comes from learning what NOT to do more than what to do.

As has been stated before, find a theme or a particular area to blog about. That will make it easier to find your blog when people do a search.

Promoting your blog is key. Unfortunately, I never got the hang of that.

Something else you may want to consider is to look at HubPages. It is a place to write short articles and they can help you promote them.

[supraja_prasad]

I am an on and off blogger myself. I had to hold a workshop like class on blogging once and the students asked the same thing. How do you make it regularly? You told you had no problem with journaling, and following up with @vermontelf solid advice, I'll tell you what I told them - take up a writing challenge. They are all over internet. Images and PDFs with prompts for every single day. Take it from there, mix it up with your journaling. And once you nail the first few months, you are good to go. It need not necessarily be daily, once in a week works too, but once it becomes a habit, you'll carry on forever, hopefully...

[vermontelf]

..., but once it becomes a habit, you'll carry on forever, hopefully...

This is the goal of many writers, I think. It is certainly one of my goals.

[supraja_prasad]

..., but once it becomes a habit, you'll carry on forever, hopefully...

This is the goal of many writers, I think.

True, but it's something that I am working on as well. And so far it seems to work.