A beginners guide to starting a craft blog.
It seems that writing a blog has become de riguer when it comes to selling your craft online. However for many crafters the idea of blogging may seem technically challenging, timewasting or you may just believe that you don’t have anything interesting to say – so why bother? This series of posts is a brief introduction, hopefully dispelling your worries, exciting you about the prospect of a blog and answering a few technical queries too. We will talk about what a blog is, why it’s a useful marketing tool for your online shop and a few tips to make your blog more successful – or at least begin to understand why it is not already drawing in the readers in their 1000′s!
At the foot of this post is a really useful list of all of the free blogging platforms available to you.
Please get involved and ask any questions on whatever aspect of blogging you like – even ones you think are stupid, everyone has to start somewhere and there are bound to be other crafters thinking the exact same thing. Perhaps you think blogs are a big waste of time ? Or maybe you have a really successful blog and you want to tell us about it – leave a comment or email hilary@folksy.co.uk and we can get you involved.
“So what is a blog?”
Lets start today at the very beginning! Blog is short for ‘web log’, it is an online public diary, a place where individuals, groups or organisations can very simply share any piece of information they like, as regularly as they like. From a few simple words to a huge piece of social discourse, or even just an image with no words. There are no boundaries or standards, blogging is available to everybody and anybody who can type. As a result there are millions of blogs out there that make up the ‘blogosphere’, that thronging mass of online humanity, complete with all its weird and wonderful varieties (albeit a much more concentrated version)
Blogs are often favoured over websites by crafters who use market places like ours to sell their work as it affords them a bit of free online space to share more about themselves and their work – it’s an economical way of starting off and helping to build an online presence.
“and social marketing / SMO – what’s that ?”
Blogging falls into the realms of social media (twitter and facebook etc), or when used as a promotional tool – social marketing or social media optimisation (SMO). SMO is the process of using social networks and blogs to engage with your target audience. ‘Engage’ meaning, getting on their wavelength and giving them something great to remember you by and something fun to interact with. It can be as simple as something to read, a post they will enjoy and share with their own network of friends on and offline. Using these networks is a way of letting your potential customers know more about the continuing background story of your business – an ear to the door of the staff room and a peep into the workshop, all the interesting happenings behind the scenes as well as the latest news and promotions.
Through the content you share and the updates you make you are building a relationship with these readers, fans and followers increasing the chances of them sharing with their friends. People trust word of mouth and that’s why the biggest businesses now have social media departments – whole areas of their business dedicated to getting their messages across in an informal, friendly way – it’s a little like the ‘I’m not wearing any make-up’ make-up, if you get it right it is flawlessly natural. Not even high court super injunctions can stop people sharing gossip on twitter, so you can see why these businesses care.
“That all sounds like typical marketing waffle – it doesn’t explain what I do when I start a blog, do I need to know anything technical or have a degree in marketing?”
No technical know-how required. The content is what’s important and most blogging platforms give you easy ways to style your blog to make it look professional – you just have to follow very simple steps and they all have lots of help pages and resources. The only caveat to that statement is that it’s a good idea to brush up on your photographic skills, as craft blogging can be quite a visual affair and good sharp images are a definite plus on any blog.
“What sort of blog do I need?”
What sort of blog you want? It’s your blog and the ‘feel’ of your blog needs to come from you, or a concentrated version of you at least. Read other blogs to find this out - is it the look of the blog that you like or the content, what is it about a blog that makes you inclined to read or subscribe to it. Subscribing to a blog is using a feed reader like Google Reader or having a blog post delivered directly to you via email. This is what every blogger wants – lots of regular and loyal readers who come back over and over and leave comments or share the posts, building the readership and the ‘link juice’ to help their posts appear in google searches (see this post on ‘growing your network‘). That is the goal of blogging (isn’t it? let me know if you disagree!), once you have achieved that goal you will be organically driving good targeted traffic to your shop. (in internet speak organic traffic means FREE traffic and ‘targeted’ means, a customer who may actually buy something!)
“Help – I need links”
The following is a list of the most popular blogging platforms available for free.
Blogger
WordPress
Tumblr
Twitter (micro blogging)
Facebook Notes
Do you already use any of the above, do you have any others to share? – we’d love to hear your critique of these blog platforms listed above, positives and negatives :)
Next time we will be talking all about what’s stopping you from blogging and how blogs can help to motivate you and improve your crafting – and also how not to get addicted! If you are looking for a bit of reading in between, take a look at ‘Craft Blog UK’, which I also write – it has lots of useful tips for craft bloggers.
Remember please ask a question, we are all ears!
16 Responses to Craft blogging – how to start a blog
Thanks for this. I am currently experimenting with and learning by doing and found this both useful and encouraging.
I do a daily blog,using blogger, and the viewing figures are climbing steadily. It is all about finding your “thing” as my daughter puts it and going with it. To really get the viewing figures climbing, I think you need to publish daily.
Linda
http://myblogfinallymadeit.blogspot.com/2011/05/mayhem-on-folksy.html
Looking forward to this series. I am one of those who love reading craft blogs, but can’t see me having anything to share on a blog of my own
Great series for anyone new to blogging.
I was sceptical about it at first (what will I write, will anyone be interested, how much time will it take that I’d rather be using crafting) but now to be honest, it’s just a way of life. You can get great interaction with other crafters, and I’m sure it’s great for SEO too.
Alison x
Really enjoy Folksy blogs & this one is no exception. I enjoy dipping in & out of blogs both personal ones and crafty ones.
I know it can seem difficult at first but believe me, when you start you’ll suddenly find lots of things to write about. I have two – a personal one & a crafty one. For craft I don’t just write about me, what I’ve made and fairs I’ll be at; I enjoy writing about handmade items I’ve bought, crafty events and I’ve just started simple reviews of books I’ve bought.
Im not saying i get everything right but here’s my blog http://craftyfrayededges.wordpress.com if you fancy a look.
Jules
PS most blogging sites allow you to schedule your entries so why not write two at once and schedule one for later in the week.
This was really helpful, and I’m going to follow the rest of the series and check out Craft Blog as I’m in desperate need of a little direction! Thanks Hilary and thanks Folksy!
I started craft blogging a week or two ago, and I’m a nervous, self-conscious state over it. Is it just me who gets like that? At the same time I really enjoy doing it, and I really hope I’ll just toughen up a bit and get over myself ;).
http://www.polkadotblue.blogspot.com
Leonie
xox
hi everyone,
I’m fairly new to the world of making and selling so so far I don’t have anything to sell but I am currently in the designing and making phase, however I have been blogging for several years now for my old job and also for myself.
It’s great fun I find, when you get into it, when ever you find something new or you have some news you blog about it and it’s like telling all your friends.
I also subscribe to a ton of blogs through google reader which I save up and read on a saturday morning or whenever i feel like being inspired.
I use wordpress and it’s taken me a while to get the hang of it but now i have the app on my iphone and can blog anything from anywhere.
Have a look at my blog, I don’t know if it’s wrong or right but I have fun writing it, happy blogging!
http://www.mellielang.com
Mellie xx
I’ve been blogging since May 2008 – just checked, doesn’t seem possible. I use blogger but have just recently given it a facelift and redirected it to my own domain http://www.niftyknits.co.uk/
I’m really pleased about that, it means everything is in one place and I only need one link on cards etc, but annoyingly there’s a bug which means my archived posts aren’t searchable at the moment. There are a couple of workarounds, but be warned!
As for content, I don’t stick to a rigid schedule, and I blog about all sorts. As a reader, I get bored by blogs which are just about the blogger’s craft and shop, so I write about whatever comes to mind. Sometimes it’s craft related, sometimes not. Yesterday it was about the fossil shark teeth I found on the beach.
Back again ;-)
I just read an excellent post about blogging, thought it’d be good to share here http://lilaclace.blogspot.com/2011/05/blogging-tips-from-pro-you-have-to-read.html
Hi, great post, looking forward to the next ones. I have recently started a blog myself, and while not updating daily or sometimes even weekly, I have found that it’s a really enjoyable process!
As I said, I’m new to blogging, so any tips or feedback would be very welcome:
http://www.petitsbijouxjewellery.blogspot.com
Hello, good post, and also good comments above (which I will read more carefully when I am on hols next week). I too am new to blogging, I like it but I am slow, would love it if you could take a look, maybe leave a comment, let me know what you think.
http://catamongthepigeonspress.wordpress.com/blog/
Thanks!
Seems you’ll be having an interesting blogging series. This all makes me remember when I was starting out not too long ago. I wish all the new bloggers a happy session here.
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Excellent post for new bloggers.
For a newby to our world, this blog is excellent.
Thank you for taking the time to do it
Thanks for sharing. Blog actually works as a community where participants express their opinion about the topic or theme that blog talks about. They interact to each other and share meaningful thoughts like what we do right here. :)