In the OU course I am studying (H817), we have been asked to start a blog and share any tips to help our fellow students.
My tips would be:
1) Don’t feel you need to write a complete thing at once. Consider doing bits of a post at intervals and then publishing. I sometimes part publish and then continue later.
2) Use whatever tool you are comfortable with to draft, then “copy & paste” to your blog. (some platforms like WordPress have an offline writer, which you can write in and then sync to upload)
3) Try and use an image in every post. This captures and engages the reader. Many sites offer royalty free images and allow people to use them. THIS articles has a good list. I tend to use FreeImages.com. Look to cite source.
4)Look to ask questions somewhere in a post. Aiming to get a dialogue going is a good thing as it engages the reader.
5) Find your own style. There is no one way to blog or any prescribed style.
6)Take up a 30 day blogging challenge. Many people have produced these and I think they are a good way of exploring and pushing your boundaries on blogging.
7) Share your blog posts. This means you will get more readership and hopefully it may make you more accountable.
8) Don’t get hung up on length. Blogging is not a novel writing contest.
9) Speak your truth. I like to read blogs where people show and share their opinion, rather than carry the expected line of thinking.
10) Subscribe and read others blogs, even people outside of your area of study/work. It should inspire you and fertilise your thinking. One of my favourites is “Living an awesome life” by Sacha Chua. I like a lot of her ideas and philosophies.
I am not an expert, but those are the tips I would pass on. I am sure if you search the internet, there will be a million more.
What would yours top tips be?
[Image Credit: FreeImage.com – Author Svilen Milev]
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