Use your blog like a newsletter - a guide for new Bloggers

Use your blog like a newsletter - a guide for new Bloggers

Hi There.

As some of our regular readers will know, when it comes to social bookmarking and networking, I'm a bit of a fan.

I was speaking with a friend the other day – he runs a successful martial arts school – and he was asking my advice on how to attract more members.

Do you have a Blog and RSS? I asked. No was the reply and so began a very stimulating conversation on the merits of these two mediums.

His biggest concern is time as he doesn't have a lot spare. I suggested the Blogger platform as we use it and have never had any problems (yet – touch wood), but for content he was not so sure.

So we went through his daily business activity. Being a 'club', content could be aimed at the 'members' but open for anyone interested to comment on and read also – a kind of online newsletter.

I suggested that he might like to promote this through his membership. He admits that many already have myspace and facebook profiles and whilst he was unsure of using them himself I explained that if his members started linking back to his blog then he would quickly build up a steady following that might actually attract new recruits.

It all sounded good in theory and should perform well in practice to.

The key to beginning is not to make it too complicated or time consuming as if you neglect something, then it will quickly fall off the radar of possible regular readers. Once it's established, then you can start to expand upon the content.

If you're a club or group, then it gets even easier. Why not consider handing the day to day writing and posting over to a few trusted members to update? That way, not only have you solved the time issue, but you'll also have a much better mix of articles and posts from different perspectives and styles, which should make for a better reading experience for the visitor.

So what are you waiting for? Go get a blog today and start posting.

You can visit blogger.com and use their really easy interface to set up your blog in a matter of minutes. Once its up and running, then you can explore adding more features and functionality as time and programming skill will allow. The best bit is that whilst you're doing this, you'll already be attracting readers and search engines alike.

Note: There are other blogging platforms out there e.g Wordpress. Please satisfy yourself that the platform you are choosing meets your needs. Its worth spending a little bit of time on a who knows where your blog will be this time next year?

Jonathan C Crouch

About the author – Jonathan is webmaster for “Fabulous Photo Gifts – personalised photo gifts. In between, tasks, he writes a number of SEO articles aimed at smaller businesses which are published and socially bookmarked across a variety of directories.
If you would like a website designing, or feel that your present site could perform better, then contact Jonathan at Fabulous Photo Gifts.

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