Writing Tips for First-Time Bloggers

How to get your blog off the ground quickly and effortlessly.

This guide is for total noob bloggers who can’t seem to write their very first post. It just seems like too many obstacles in the way. So many things to do and worry about before the very first post…

• The website design.
• The thumbnail.
• The logo.
• The title.
• The keyword research.
• The outline.
• The pictures.

And on and on and on. Maybe you’re a perfectionist. Or maybe you’re just overwhelmed. Either way…the more you prepare, the more that first post just never gets written.

Hotdangit…it ain’t gotta be that hard. Just listen to me on this one!

1. Write a very short post.

3-4 short shitty paragraphs. That’s it. Nothing more! Do you want to write 10 pages? Please don’t. Save that energy to do multiple (short) posts. Then you can always come back later and add more to each one. Otherwise, you’re forever stuck on not releasing the one you have because it’s “gotta be perfect”.

2. Release your unfinished blog post.

I mean it! Write whatever you can in one sitting and just post it! Whatever doesn’t come to mind will just have to be in another post with another title later. *YAY! More content!* Stop incubating content in draft mode.

3. Getting rid of insecurity.

Some of you are never going to start because you think you’re not good enough. I’ve watched every newbie blogger come up with endless excuses like a 12-year old boy who won’t talk to his crush. Maybe your writing sucks. Maybe your English ain’t good enough. Or that your writing isn’t interesting. Who gives a crap. It’ll never be good enough if you don’t start somewhere and work at it.

4. Streamline your workflow.

The worst thing you can do for your writing rhythm is to title, outline, write, and typo/grammar correct all in one session. It’ll take forever because your brain has to switch modes constantly. I suggest one day (or casually), you come up with titles and some keywords (to help you remember things). Then another day you write and publish. Then a week after that, you come back to polish and make corrections.

5. Chop difficult posts into smaller posts.

Anytime that your post feels too overwhelming to write and outline, you should chop it up! Instead of “Travel Guide to Mexico”….break it up into “Planning a Mexico trip”, “Safety tips in Mexico”, “Mexican food tour”, etc. You get the point.

6. SEO research shouldn’t take any time.

I sincerely mean this. If you don’t know the keywords in your industry, you probably shouldn’t even be blogging in it. And if you do know your industry, then just write off the top of your head. You’ll be fine, I promise. You don’t need to look up anything. If ever in doubt, just look at the bigger blogs in your space and take note of their headlines.

7. Don’t worry about images/thumbnails.

Do you need to spend a whole day making the perfect image for the article you haven’t written yet? No. Don’t even worry about that shit. Please just write. Stop worrying about things only big sites with dedicated bloggers do. You focus on writing and only do the extra stuff when you have tons of writing done. Ok? (You can always come back later and update your image when your traffic picks up.)

8. Ignore social media pressure.

You don’t need to worry about Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, etc. People ask me, “but how will I get traffic if I don’t use those?” And to me it’s like…”how will you get followers if your site doesn’t offer anything of value”. So please go focus on offering value (which is blogging). Unless you want to focus on creating Instagram pictures…which is a different kind of blogging value.

9. Choose a simple website theme.

I see people wasting so much time trying to decide how their blogging website should look. And it’s stupid because your site should fit your writing. And if you haven’t written yet, you really shouldn’t make big design choices. It’s much smarter if you get straight to writing and then after a while…you’ll see how your voice and personal tone evolves and can then decide on the best design, color, fonts that fit that personality.

10. Write off the top of your head.

No checking with other sites, dictionary, thesaurus. All that crap makes writing take so much longer and doesn’t really add value IMO. No thinking. No planning. Outlining, etc. Just spit it out. Are you afraid it won’t be complete or comprehensive? That’s great! It means you now have that much more material for other posts.