It’s a question I’ve been getting a lot lately: what advice do you have for a blogger who’s just starting out? Or, better yet, what’s your advice on how to start a successful blog? To be completely honest with you – these are humbling questions to receive.. and they come with a lot of pressure!

Blogging means the world to me. This corner of the internet has been my passion project, my creative outlet and my baby since 2014. It’s afforded me so many amazing opportunities and even helped me to make a career change in the corporate world in 2015. Now that I’m a mom, I’m able to contribute financially to my family while staying at home with my babies – which is what my goal for all this was from the very beginning. I’m so grateful I started when and where I did. BUT I’m nowhere near where I want to be with it and I still have so much to learn too!

That being said, the past five years have afforded me so much knowledge, insight and advice and I do have a lot to share with you! So, grab a cup of coffee, get comfy and take a second to save this post for future reference!

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If you’d like to read more about my start as a blogger and where it’s taken me, click here!

Define your audience & identify your niche.

Before you even decide on a name for your blog, your first priorities should be defining your audience and identifying your niche. Trust me, clearly identifying who it is you intend to speak to (and you SHOULD be speaking to SOMEONE) will save you so much headache down the road. Establishing an audience in your mind will help direct your content to where it needs to go – aka, your niche. How do you do this? Ask yourself questions like:

• What are you passionate about?
• What do your friends and family come to you for advice for?
• In your spare time, what do you enjoy doing?
• What are your hobbies?

Now, this isn’t to say that it can’t change down the road. You may have one plan for your content, only to find as you go that the people you actually resonate with take you into a different direction. That’s OK. The point is, your audience and how you can serve them should always be at the forefront of your mind.

Which brings me to my next point.

Blog with a service mentality.

This is HUGE. Don’t go into blogging thinking about how much money you can make or how many brands you want to work with. That all may come down the road, but it shouldn’t be why you get into this business. Why? Because blogging is HARD. It takes a LOT OF TIME, dedication and RESILIENCE and if you’re in it just to make a dollar, you’re going to get frustrated fast. But there are two main reasons you should come into blogging from a place of service rather than focusing on a money-making venture.

First, it’s easy to come off as really ‘salesy’ as a blogger or influencer. By trade, sales are important whether you’re trying to make affiliate commissions or sell your own product or service. However, it’s really hard to connect with anyone when they feel like all you’re trying to do is make them spend money on something.

Second, brands will not want to work with you if your pitch to them is all about what you want from them. They want to know their products and their image will be represented well and expect some sort of benefit in return for free products and/or payment. It’s a pretty basic idea, right? That whole idea JFK was trying to get across when he said, “..ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.” Blogging and partnerships should be mutually beneficial for you, your audience and the brands you want to work with. The only way to do that effectively is by asking yourself what you can do for your followers.

Got it? Let’s move on.

Choose a name.. carefully.

Don’t do what I did! I rebranded 3 times in as many years and I know it really did me a disservice. Why’d I do it? I wasn’t happy with my blog name. The first name I used got tired on my tongue. I started to get annoyed when I would hear people say it and it wasn’t fully representative of me and what I wanted my blog to be about. The second name – same thing. After about a year I started to realize I, again, hadn’t chosen wisely. Which brought me to my third and current blog name and I’m not sure why I didn’t choose this to begin with. It represents me (because it IS me, lol) and the content I share on my blog. It’s self-entitled because so is my blog. I share my life, my family and the things I’m interested in.

It may seem obvious to some people – but choosing your brand’s name is super important and should take a good amount of thought! Think about how you want to be represented and where you want to be with your blog 5, 10 – however many years down the road. Don’t get caught up in trendy ideals or phrases. Stick to what make you.. you!

Pick the right platform.

This goes for your website – your actual blog – but also for your social media platforms!

First, let’s talk website. When I first started out, I knew I wanted a real .com website. I wanted to own my content in a secure way and I wanted the legitimacy that I think owning your own website affords you as opposed to hosting directly on a platform like WordPress or Blogger. What’s the difference? Hosting your blog directly on WordPress or Blogger is cheaper, but it gives you that yourblogname.wordpress.com because your hosting directly on their platform. Personally, I didn’t want that. I knew I wanted this thing to be around for a long time and I wanted it to be more official.

So, what do I use? Currently, my website is hosted by Bluehost and I highly recommend them! I’ve actually yet to have any issues, but if I were to have one, they have 24/7 customer support available – along with a ton of other perks. It was also VERY easy for me to transfer data and content to their servers and setting up WordPress as my content management system (the place where I actually write and post my blog posts) was super simple and straightforward. In short, they make it easy and effortless and charge a fair price! That being said, Bluehost isn’t the cheapest place to host your website. But this is one of those areas where the lowest price option isn’t necessarily the best!

Now, I could go way more in detail about how to actually set up your blog once you’ve picked a host and what all goes into creating content. And I plan to! But that’s a different post for a different time 😉

In terms of social media..

When it comes to social media, my best advice is: don’t try to do it all. I have a Facebook and Twitter page, but my main focus are the two that bring me the most traffic, engagement and the ones that I ENJOY using more. I put most of my effort into my Instagram and Pinterest accounts and that’s ok. Why? Because, to be honest, trying to do them all is only going to suck up large portions of your time that can be better spent doing other things.

How do you know which social media platforms to choose?

It all goes back to audience. Think of your ideal client or follower – where are they likely to spend more time? If you’re a mommy blogger, you might focus a little more on Facebook and Pinterest. If you’re a designer, I’d recommend Pinterest and Instagram. Use your analytics and insights as you go and pay attention to where your audience is coming from and what they like!

Post quality from the beginning.

This is really important, you guys. Of course, you’re going to learn things about photography and writing style and how you want to connect with your audience as you go. Only experience can divulge some of that information to you. However, things like photos and subject matter in general are really important to get right and they’re worth putting in the effort for! Why? Because these are the things that are going to qualify you to other people!

Amanda, what do you mean by that?

Basically, what I mean is that appearances matter. Photos are the FIRST thing that stand out to someone on the internet. They’re you’re in with people and your blog/social media photos are NOTHING like books. People WILL judge your work by its cover – because that’s all they have to go off of! I’m not saying you have to go out and buy a $2,000 camera, take photoshop classes or even hire a professional photographer. Quality photos are easy enough to take and, with the technology afforded to us in our smartphones these days, are perfectly attainable with what you’ve already got access to! On that note, there’s plenty of free resources online to help you take better photos and create an aesthetic that you and your audience will be happy with. Do your research, learn form YouTube videos and put effort into your photos!

But it’s not just photos!

But I’m not just talking about photos. It’s content too. Words, subject matter, what you have to say. Again, this is where the ‘place of service’ comes in. Ask yourself what will be beneficial to your audience to ‘hear’? What will help them in their day-to-day lives? Yes, you should be interested in what you’re writing about too, but you’re voice will reach further if your’e coming to the scene with a servant mentality! On that note, pay attention to trending topics. I’ll get more into this in a future post about SEO, but keep relevance in mind. Something likes seasons are a good compass. Don’t post about backyard decor in the dead of winter when most of the world is buried in snow. That would just be silly.. ya know? 😉

Use the right tools.

This is going to be my last point for this post – but it’s an important one! There are tons of tools on the internet geared toward helping brands and bloggers succeed online. Not all of them are free, but the tools below are the ones I use personally and HIGHLY recommend.

Tailwind

I can’t stress enough how much this platform has helped me grow as a blogger. Not only that, but it makes my life SO MUCH EASIER. This is the only application that I currently know of which will automatically post to Instagram for you. They have a relationship with Facebook that allows them to do so and it’s. a. game. changer. I don’t even use this feature as often as I should and I still find Tailwind the most helpful thing. Currently, I pay for the first tier of their service which is $15 a month. If you’d like to try Tailwind for yourself, your first month is free when you click here!

These are some of my favorite features afforded to me through my subscription:

• Automatic posting and planning to Instagram
• Automatic pinning and scheduling on Pinterest
• Tons of useful analytics and audience insights
• A community of fellow bloggers at my fingertips
• Relevant hashtag generation

Trust me when I say that just those five features are HUGE when it comes to gaining growth as a blogger! I can’t recommend Tailwind enough and credit it tenfold for where I am today.

Preview

Preview is an app on my iPhone that simply helps me to visualize my Instagram feed as I go along. It gives you the ability to add photos and see (preview) what they will look like on your Instagram gallery before you actually post to your feed. I’m super visual and prefer my feed to be as cohesive-looking as possible – so this FREE app is one of my best friends!

Canva

There’s a reason why you hear bloggers talk about Canva all the time. It’s an online platform that makes creating graphics for your blog, Pinterest and social media accounts so easy! It also offers easy-to-use templates that take the guesswork out of correct sizing and dimensions. This helps to ensure you’re not posting grainy or blurry photos or graphics. Canva has paid subscription options but they offer their basic version for free and that’s what I use! They also offer a library of stock photos which can come in really handy for both free and paid users.

Lightroom

I happen to pay for the ability to use Adobe’s Creative Suite which gives me access to both Photoshop and Lightroom on my laptop. However, there is a FREE Lightroom app that makes editing photos a breeze. I also highly recommend the use of presets (whether paid for or made by yourself) to help give your brand a cohesive feel and style. It’s really easy to make your own preset (just google it, you’ll see) or you can find a plethora of premade ones online for purchase! They’re very affordable and insanely helpful!

That’s a wrap!

Well, my friends, that’s all I have for you. Did you learn anything? Do you have any questions? Feel free to leave any feedback in the comments below! Also, if you’d like to see more of my blogging-related posts, click here to find the ones I’ve written so far. More to come!