How to Set Up a Blog

Got something to say? Start a blog. Millions of people around the world use blogs to talk about everything from what they had for dinner to the hottest political topics. You don't need to be a journalist to jump into the blogosphere. Everyday people from all walks of life use their blogs to discuss hobbies, family events or just to share interests, and starting a blog can help you meet people who share an interest in the things you enjoy.

What Is a Blog?
Blog is short for Web log, or an online journal you can use to discuss a range of topics. Blogs today serve a multitude of purposes, including as an online diary, updating friends and family on your activities, commenting on popular culture and current events or even promoting a business. Some popular providers host blog sites that can have your blog running in as little as five minutes. Corporate and professional bloggers sometimes choose to add a customized blog to their own Web sites for news or marketing. There are as many types of blogs as there are things to blog about, so choosing a blog host can be a difficult decision.

Major Blog Hosts
If you're looking for a free blog-hosting site, check out Blogger, WordPress, OpenDiary or LiveJournal. You can also set up a blog through a social networking site, such as MySpace or Facebook, but these blogs may only be visible to other members of that site.

Some blog hosts, such as LiveJournal and WordPress, offer both a free version with a few basic features and a paid version with premium features that you can't access from the free platform. These paid features may include the ability to customize your blog design and layout, additional photo uploads and advanced content management options.

Other blog hosts are entirely paid, such as TypePad, because they offer features typically used in commercial blogging applications. TypePad features impressive amounts of storage, different bandwidth options, the ability to map your blog to a custom Web address and extra customization and design options.

Blog Features
Features vary from blog to blog, so it's worth looking under the hood to find out if a particular service will provide everything you need. The ability to write and edit posts is standard, and all blogs offer some sort of comment feature that allows others to reply to your posts.

RSS feeds are valuable as they give people a way to subscribe to your blog and receive notifications when you publish new posts. If you're writing just for friends and family, look for privacy settings that let you control who can see your blog. For any blog, a feature that only allows authorized comments is helpful, as this will prevent spambots from filling your comments with advertising.

In general, blogs don't give you storage space for multimedia files, so you'll need to find a place to keep photos, videos and music files that you want to include in your posts. Any host will do, as most blogs allow you to embed HTML code that displays multimedia content.

If You Build it, They Will Come
A blog isn't an invitation for ghosts to come play in your formerly abandoned Midwestern field, but the same principle applies. If you follow your vision to create an interesting blog, you could gather thousands or even hundreds of thousands of regular readers. This can translate to simply the gratification of reaching people, or even earning revenue by selling advertising space.

How do you get people to come to your blog? First, write an interesting blog. A blog detailing your personal life probably won't gather a large following unless your personal life is unique and exciting or you have an absolutely stellar sense of humor. Choose a topic that people can't resist. If you have an interest that isn't well-covered on the Web, it might be a great starting point for a blog. If your blog idea is already well-covered, you'll need to come up with a unique angle or twist to the idea to make people want to read your blog.

Make it Look Pretty
Designing an attractive blog is one way to encourage readers to come back again and again. If your blog is attractive and easy to navigate, readers will be comfortable spending time browsing your posts.

Blog hosts feature free blog layouts that are often simple but add a level of customization to your blog. For a more unique look, do a Web search for blog layouts. Some Web designers now offer layouts for popular blog formats, such as WordPress. You'll find both free blog layouts and paid custom designs, so you're sure to find something for any budget and taste.

How to Get Traffic
There are a lot of advanced methods to drive traffic to your blog, but the most important one is to get the word out. Create links to your blog. Search engines can't find your blog if there aren't any links to it, and no one will read even the most brilliant blog if they don't know it's there.

Add your blog's address to your e-mail signature. If you post on Web forums, add the address to your forum signature. Generate interest in your blog by being interesting around the Web. Find popular Web sites and add valuable or insightful comments, remembering to include a link back to your blog. Get an article posted in an ezine and have them add your blog link to the byline. Pretty soon, people will start to notice you and want to find out more about you. If you've been doing your work on getting blog links out across the Web, they'll be able to find you.

Word of mouth is one of the single biggest ways to grow blog readership. If a few people find your work and think it's interesting or relevant, they'll send the link to their friends. Search engines are a tougher source of traffic. Most search engines won't index blogs for the first few months that they're online; posting on a regular basis, generating some traffic and links on your own and waiting it out are the only ways to get search engines to index your blog.