What is a blog and how to create it using the free WordPress engine, optimization and making money on your online diary. What is a blog, why is it needed and how to create one

We've released a new book, Social Media Content Marketing: How to Get Inside Your Followers' Heads and Make Them Fall in Love with Your Brand.

A blog is a website on which copyrighted materials can be published.

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A blog is a diary. For example, a person is engaged in wood burning. And he just wants to share his crafts with people on the Internet. Sometimes talk about some burning techniques, show how he does it.

This will be a blog on the Internet. You can publish content on different platforms. For example, a popular resource is LiveJournal, where everyone can maintain their own.

Types of blogs

You can divide blogs according to the method of maintaining - using a paid and free service, by the number of authors - personal, collective, by the method of presentation - podcast, text, video.

They can also be classified according to the purposes for which they are conducted:

• thematic;
• general;
• image;
• business resource.

Thematic blog

It is dedicated to one topic. For example, cats. And all the content - it can be different - is somehow related to pets. An interested reader comes here. If he ends up on a thematic blog, it means that this is the content that interests him. And you already know what your target audience needs.

Image

It is especially popular among famous personalities - musicians, athletes, actors. Here you can find information about the most interesting events in the life of the idol, his attitude towards certain incidents, ask a question, find out about upcoming events, and so on. A public figure does not always maintain his personal blog on the Internet on his own; often this is done by specially hired people.

Business blog

It serves to promote a product or service, as well as an entire business project. Despite the variety of topics covered in his publications, they will all revolve around the advertised product. The publications of such an online magazine are hidden or overt advertising, but if presented correctly, they provide certain benefits to readers and can be interesting.

Other types of blogs

Depending on the nature and type of content, online blogs are divided into several types:

• Photo blogs – the basis will be photos, pictures, gifs;
• Vlog – short videos and interviews according to the chosen topic;
• Text – contact with readers occurs through text articles and comments;
• Musical – the content will be based on musical works;
• Blog podcast - the blogger communicates with subscribers by posting audio recordings (or video recordings) of his messages;
• Tlog – uses any type of content, but different types of content are not combined in one entry.

If an online magazine is run by one person, such a blog is individual; if it is co-authored by a group of people, it is collective.

How to maintain your blog and promote it

Having figured out what a blog is, let’s move on to the question of how to create one. Anyone can become an author and creator using accessible and simple programs that are in the public domain. There are free platforms for creating an online blog (Blogger), but to create an offline blog you need to use paid hosting (Wix for example). Each program has detailed instructions, so there are no difficulties.

Website maintenance

The main thing in maintaining and promoting your online magazine is high-quality content and regular publication. Keeping a blog means posting information that is relevant and interesting to subscribers, entertaining them and providing useful and unique material.

Feedback from readers and timely responses to comments and questions are also important. Even a small audience can provide good traffic to the resource if subscribers are interested. And this, in turn, will allow you to effectively promote your blog and in the future extract maximum profit from it.

Website promotion

A free method of promotion is to attract subscribers to your website through active communication with them on various forums and social networks. Before looking for your readers, you need to understand who is interested in the content. And then find out where you can find such a person.

Then you need to create the effect of an active presence - leave comments on the necessary forums, ask questions and give answers, communicate correctly and be interesting. This will ensure an influx of first readers.

Paid promotion comes down to placing an advertisement with a link to a website, and the effectiveness in this case depends on the correct settings and advertising budget.
Ways to make money on a blog

There are many options for making a profit, let’s look at the simplest and most effective ones.

• Contextual advertising.
• Teaser advertising.
• Partnership programs.
• Recurring income.
• Services.
• Virtual products.
• Selling a blog.

How to register a blog

Registering a blog on various resources allows you to attract third-party subscribers through search. Registration on one or more platforms is possible, and the choice of platform depends on the content of the blog.
How to make a quality blog

The main indicator of quality for any online diary is relevant, useful, interesting and unique content. It must meet all quality criteria. Otherwise, simply no one will be interested in the blog.

When choosing a specific topic, you must stick to it, but you can also write on related topics, for example, a cooking blog allows articles on festive table setting or interesting facts from history.

High-quality content, relevant information and a constant sense of presence will make the blog interesting for readers. And this, in turn, will allow you to effectively promote it and receive good dividends.

We've released a new book, Social Media Content Marketing: How to Get Inside Your Followers' Heads and Make Them Fall in Love with Your Brand.

A personal blog on Instagram is a popular platform on a social network for expressing your thoughts, communicating about interests and promoting your products/services.

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Today, more than 800 million people are registered in it. Some people simply share their impressions and news with friends and acquaintances. And some people prefer to present for a large audience. Such people are called .

If you are not yet a member, but you want to expand your target audience’s reach, show and sell your products, and earn money from advertising, we advise you to register right now. The promotion process takes a lot of time and the sooner you start, the better.

How to make a personal blog on Instagram

It's very easy to create. You can work from a smartphone or laptop or computer. It will be more convenient to use your phone while maintaining a social network. All you need is an email. Enter it, the name by which you will be known and the password. Or log in with your Facebook account if you have one.

Then the system will ask you to post a photo and connect the page to Facebook. Skip this moment or do it. If you tie it right away, you will save yourself from unnecessary actions in the future. So, everything is ready, you can talk about your life, hobbies, post beautiful pictures, look for readers and even become popular. But still, your profile at this moment is deprived of some opportunities for development.

What does a personal blog on Instagram mean for a company?

There are two types of accounts: simple and commercial. The second is more functional and allows you to recognize and attract more target audience. What is the difference? Outwardly, a regular Instagram page is almost no different from a personal blog, except for the gray mark under the username and a few advantages that it provides.

Why is this necessary?

• Choose the appropriate category and title. Click next.
• Add your contacts (one is enough).
  Ready.

If you later decide to switch back to the regular version, just go to the menu again and click “Switch to account.” Gray mark and all options will disappear.

Themes for Instagram for personal blog

To attract people and gain thousands of subscribers, just beautiful photos are not enough. It is necessary to develop a promotion strategy and profile concept. One of the components of a successful Instagram is. You need to publish posts regularly and at a certain time. Marketers advise posting no more than 1-2 posts a day, morning and evening. Try to make the page lively and in the same style.

If you're creating an account to make money from advertising and don't have a theme chosen yet, stick with the one you like. The second important factor is that you must understand what you want to talk about if we are talking about serious areas (nutrition, sports, medicine). The most popular are invariably blogs about the beauty industry, travel, lifestyle (about life), cooking, fitness, and handicrafts. But you can develop your niche. If they are interesting, you will find your audience.

What posts to include in your content plan

There are several varieties. Often one note combines two materials.

Entertainment

They are needed to increase your engagement rate. They show how many likes they give you and comments. What does this include:

• Polls.
• News.
• Humor.
• Competitions and promotions.
• Motivational stories.
• Congratulations.
• Collections of films and books.
• Texts from users.
• Distracted thoughts or ideas that you want to talk about.

You can add commercial elements to them. For example, in surveys, find out about customer preferences, arrange a draw for your products.

Useful (educational)

Such materials are suitable for Instagram advertising services. Let's say you are a psychologist or designer. In this case, you need to build trust with your audience since they don't know you yet. Such posts will also be useful for goods. Tell us about new products or how to maintain the quality of an item for a long time. Write a short, meaningful text. If it takes up a lot of space, be sure to break it up into blocks.

• Adviсe.
• Instructions.
• Interview.
• Comparative reviews.

Selling

What to write? Your proposal should be readable (paragraphs, graphic elements). Complete it with a beautiful, appropriate photo. Style and presentation depend only on your target audience and what you are advertising.

• Description of the service or product.
• Reviews.
• Story about the company.
• Work with objections.
• Presentation of a new product.
• Announcement of competitions and promotions.

Where to get ideas

If your muse has left you, don't be upset. Finding a topic is easy. One of the most common ways is to ask account visitors. By the way, this can even become an entertainment and commercial post. Ask your audience what they would like to read about. There are several other ways to get out of creative stagnation:

• Competitors. Look through them, but do not copy, but tell us about your view of the events.
• Groups on other social networks and YouTube channels.
• Your old texts. Rework them, write how your point of view has changed.
• Meeting newly arrived users.
• Interview.
• Show off your favorite places in your city.
• Visit a park, botanical garden or animal nursery and film a mini-report.

How to create a personal blog on Instagram and gain subscribers from scratch

Before you can emerge from the shadows with a new page, it needs to be filled. Friends, relatives and acquaintances will be your first visitors. If you already have a business and are developing it, add Instagram to business cards, flyers, and website. In order to increase your audience, come up with some beautiful, meaningful notes that will interest your target audience.

Do this even if you don't have a single reader. No one will pay attention to an empty account. Be sure to fill out the profile header. It is important to write down who you are and what your personal blog is about. List the main topics – there shouldn’t be too many of them. Choose one, two, three. Use emojis, but in moderation. Add links to other resources if you have them. A good example is in the screenshot. The craftswoman indicated that she makes jewelry and loves wildlife. Indeed, both themes can be seen on her Instagram. Added contacts that make it clear where the order will come from and a link to the Etsy store.

Subscribe to pages that interest you, leave comments, participate in (). Follow the statistics. Which texts and photos are responded to most often, at what time. Experiment. For example, if you see that there is no user response during the recommended morning hours, try early evening. Communicate with those who read you, respond to comments. Promoting Instagram requires daily engagement.

• Take photos in good light. The best is during the day, without direct sunlight.
• Use filters from third party apps. For example, VSCO, Snapseed.
• Don't post just photos, no text. Today, the text format is becoming increasingly popular in this social network. Often people subscribe because of interesting thoughts.
• Do not put the most popular ones, only those relevant to your topic. Come up with your own.
• Make a video. There are also statistics on it and they say that short posts are liked by other users.
• Be yourself. Don't copy famous accounts or competitors. Add humor and zest to your posts.

So, you have learned what a personal blog on Instagram is, how to create it and connect additional functions. With its help, you can promote your products and services and earn money from advertising. The key to success is a well-thought-out strategy and lively, entertaining content. Instagram is not easy. In order to achieve your goals, you will need patience and regular work on texts and photographs. However, nothing is impossible, make a content plan, watch the statistics, be inspired by successful accounts and you will succeed.

Today, we will return a little to the basics of blogging, namely, we will talk about what a blog is. So, let's begin!

Do you want to express your thoughts daily in an electronic diary and at the same time see the opinions of people who keep similar diaries? Create a blog! You will not only learn to express your thoughts beautifully, but you will also find many like-minded people and even friends. But they use a blog for different purposes, some just want to post the latest news and attach relevant links to them. But it is better to share your thoughts and attract the opinions of others, however, many do not know why this is necessary and consider such an activity pointless.

To begin with, it should be noted that only you choose the appearance of the blog, as well as its content, all this does not depend on anyone else. This is a simple version of your own website, where you can regularly update it in the form of unique materials. Your visitors will immediately see new posts as they are published at the top of the page. Then the most interesting thing happens: visitors comment on your posts, someone agrees with the author’s thoughts, and someone disagrees, a discussion and exchange of thoughts begins, which brings even more people to the blog.

Article content:

What types of blogs are there or what is it for?

There are basically several types of blogs which we will list below.

1. Personal;
2. Professional;
3. Supportive image;
4. News.

As the name suggests, each blog is intended for specific purposes.

Personal blog

About the same as a personal diary for your thoughts. In it, you describe the brightest days of your life, supporting it all with images or videos. Users' attention can be attracted by different headlines, for example: “Which pizza dough is better? Italian or American? or “How long did your laptop last?” Often such blogs are intended only for friends or for oneself, which is why their traffic is very low. Of course, if a person is very famous, for example, is a politician, actor or athlete, then thousands, or even millions of people will come there every day to look at the changes in the life of their idol. If you want to see similar diaries in a search engine, you can enter the query: star blogs. As a rule, these are free blogs that are posted on LiveJournal, or, more simply, LJ.

Professional blog

If you are a professional in something, you can start a thematic blog. If you are involved in an extreme sport, for example, snowboarding, you can share new achievements with people, talk about trick techniques and much more. You can tell us about the equipment, which boards are better, find out who has which board. But even a professional lawyer or surgeon can start such a blog; another question is whether he wants to share his experience for free and whether it is beneficial for him.

The attendance of such diaries is quite high, mostly people from the same professional field come to them. They study all the author’s notes, write comments, criticize something, and thanks to this they attract the author to the conversation. But if personal diaries are needed only to express thoughts, then professional ones are started to make a profit. Of course, to make money, you need to have at least a little understanding of contextual advertising from Yandex Direct or Google Adsense. You can make money through affiliate programs, for example, if you snowboard, you can agree with an online store to sell equipment for amateurs and professionals, and get a percentage of each sale when you click through a link.

Subsequently, people begin to earn good amounts of money from blogs, completely abandoning regular office work. There are a lot of such people in the USA and Europe, but here it is only flourishing and becoming very popular. Although there are a lot of low-quality blogs, any non-professional tries to share his knowledge and at the same time writes in an incomprehensible and terrible language; of course, such blogs do not bring profit. If you really understand something, create a blog, share your knowledge, promote it, perhaps you will earn good money from it.

Blog for image

Such blogs are needed only to enhance the image of a particular person or company. The main purpose of the blog is to attract business partners, clients, and so on. Depending on the segment in which the company operates, you need to take into account some nuances when creating such a blog. All the author’s articles are devoted to one problem or another, of course, then the author tells how he solved this problem in a matter of seconds. But the information must be truly useful; after all, the blog was created to maintain an image, and if it contains false or useless information, there can be no question of any image. Gradually, regular readers will begin to use the author’s services and recommend him to their friends. Many people who work for themselves create such blogs, such as dentists and lawyers who decided to quit their regular jobs and create their own business to increase profits.

News blog

Such a blog can be run by just one person, but more often it is a group of people who have common interests. They can write about politics or about resorts, or, more simply, about anything as long as it is interesting for visitors. Perhaps news on the blog will appear faster than on other resources, so the number of visitors will increase sharply. In the future, when there are a lot of readers, you can agree on affiliate programs or contextual advertising. You can earn a lot, but income directly depends on the number of visitors.

What is a microblog

The main feature of these blogs is that visitors can write many messages, but they have to express their thoughts briefly because there is a 150 character limit. Visitors can respond to each message left, but you decide who can leave comments. This is somewhat reminiscent of a chat, only a microblog is much more comfortable. It’s also very nice that you can leave comments via SMS, browser, email, etc., thanks to which you can connect more people to the conversation.

But why do people still create microblogs? Their main goal is to inform people, but not to publish detailed reports or news. You can give an example with the work of construction workers, for example, a worker is doing something on the 5th floor, and the foreman is below and does not see what he is doing, then the following dialogue occurs:

• Sergey, what are you doing there?!
• I'm laying tiles!
• Do you need help?!
• No, for now I can handle it myself, if anything happens, I’ll shout!

At the same time, information was exchanged and everyone understood what was happening. There were no particular specifics or explanations; the worker did not go into detail and said that he poured the solution into a bucket of such and such material, ran for tools, and so on. Although it was possible to stretch out the story and tell everything in great detail, and then discuss it for several hours. Of course, we can jokingly say that builders could communicate via microblog from a tablet computer, but it would take the same amount of time.

What is the purpose of using a microblog? There are several main ways:

1. Maintain contacts with acquaintances and friends, briefly discuss something, and so on;
2. Use as a chat in which links to site or blog news with a brief description of the materials will be published;
3. Briefly post information about something, for example, popular personalities post short messages every day and talk about their lives;
4. Create a way for site visitors to quickly exchange their thoughts and maintain contact.

The best microblog at the moment is Twitter. It was created in 2006, after which it gained high popularity and had a stable viewership of one million people around the beginning of 2008. It further attracted the attention of an audience from Russia, so in 2009 about 76,000 Russians were registered in it. Thanks to Twitter, a lot of plagiarism appeared; to put it simply, sites had a similar interface, but were inferior to it in popularity. That is why no one was able to compete with him. If you still want to inform site or blog visitors through a separate microblog, prefer Twitter, as it is the most visited and popular at the moment.

How to create a blog?

Everything is much simpler than it seems at first glance. You can choose a ready-made service, where there are many templates to choose from. Next, you must constantly post news to the blog so that the administration does not consider it unvisited. Finding the service is not difficult; you can type the phrase “LJ” or “LiveJournal” into a search engine.

You can create a blog through the WordPress content management system; it is very convenient for maintaining your diary. Next, you will need hosting; hosting in our country is very cheap. Of course, the hosting should work fine with PHP and MySQL databases. Choosing a design for a blog is quite simple, since WordPress is an intuitive CMS. If you still don’t want to spend money on paid hosting, order free one. But in this case, you may experience discomfort due to advertising; as a rule, advertising blocks can be very large and distract users. Clarify this nuance in advance, besides, the hosters may not be very conscientious and post an advertisement on an XXX site or something similar, this will not make the best impression on people. Of course, promoting such a blog is much more difficult, since search robots do not take sites on free hosting seriously.

We have already written in more detail about how to create a blog, so I advise you to go to this article.

Have you also heard the news that another 17-year-old blogger earned 20 million rubles in one year? Just a second, an average person with an average salary would need to work 55 years (that is, their whole life) to earn the same amount.

What is a blog, why is it needed and how to create one? And is it possible to earn a few lyams a month from this? Or maybe everyone is lying to us?

In this article we will analyze all the options in simple terms. Maybe you will eventually become a successful 17-year-old millionaire blogger, who knows =)

To warm up, let’s briefly look at what a blog is “in general” and why it is needed.

What is a blog in simple words, why and who needs it?

The word "blog" comes from the English " weblog" This literally translates as “a diary/magazine posted on the Internet.” That is, in Old Slavonic it would be called “zhurnet” or “interviewnik”. But let's use the term "blog" better.

The point is simple. You create an account for yourself on one of the platforms for creating an electronic magazine, and start posting something there every day. Depending on the site, these can be short text posts, long articles, videos, pictures, or all at once.

People don't become bloggers because they have a good life. If a person decides to start a blog, then he has at least two goals. The first is to become popular. The second is to make money on your popularity.

Each blogging platform has its own mechanism for collecting subscribers or “followers” ​​(followers/readers). The more interesting your posts are, the more people will gather around you to read you again and again.

1. Advertising
2. Partnership programs
3. Selling your goods or services

Below we will analyze all these methods in detail, in the context of each specific site. For now, you just need to understand the direct connection - the more subscribers you have, the more money you can earn.

And in order to gather many subscribers, you need to create content that would appeal to a very wide range of people. How to do this correctly? This depends on the specific type of blog you will be running. For micro-blogs, topics and content need one type, but for youtube – a completely different one.

And let’s, by the way, look at what types of blogs exist today and what their features are.

Classic text blogs – graphomania in its purest form

Initially, there was only one type of blog – text. People wrote quite large texts on these blogs. Today there are two main platforms for those who love to write. This is the good old LJ (Live Journal) and the new fashionable Yandex.Zen.

These platforms are best suited for expressing your personal opinion on some controversial issues. For example, you can write analytical articles about what is happening in society today. Or keep a blog with text notes about your (or someone else’s) family life.

The advantage of the text format is that you do not need any additional resources to start blogging. If you have a computer and you know how to type, then this will be enough for a start.

If you doubt your writing abilities, take our free training (opens in a new tab).

Please note - you don’t even have to be some kind of expert in the topic you are writing about. The text blog format means that you express your opinion on a particular issue.

What is better – LiveJournal or Yandex.Zen?

If you choose between LiveJournal and Yandex.Zen, then I would personally choose the second option.

Unfortunately, LiveJournal is almost not developing today. There is an established audience (since 2007), its own stars, who have already gained popularity with their posts. But it will be very difficult for a new author to break through there. Simply because the mechanisms for distributing content are poorly developed.

Yandex.Zen is a completely different story.

Here Yandex itself takes over the promotion of your new blog. You just need to start writing articles on some topic, and Yandex will show them to those people who might be interested (from its point of view).

In just a week, tens or hundreds of thousands of people may start reading your notes. Of course, Zen has its own characteristics. Read more about this in the article (opens in a new tab).

How to make money on a blog in Yandex.Zen

Yandex.Zen offers you a very simple and transparent way to monetize your blog. When you reach 7,000 reads of your articles in one week, you will have the opportunity to show ads to readers.

You won’t have to negotiate with advertisers or take money from anyone. Yandex has already taken care of everything. You simply check the box next to the “Simple monetization” option in the channel settings, and from that moment contextual advertising will begin to appear in your posts.

Every 1000 reads of your articles will bring you an average of 50 rubles. At first glance, not very much. But with an increase in your audience, you can reach quite decent incomes (say, from 30 thousand rubles per month).

Yes, not millions. And you will have to sweat a lot. Writing every day is not like moving bags (in the sense that writing is much harder). Thank God there are other interesting blog formats today.

Micro-blogs - for those who do not like to write, but love money

Micro-blogs are a conventional name for sites where it is not customary to write long texts. Today there are two main such platforms - Twitter and Instagram.

Based on the features of this blog format, an appropriate audience gathers there. These are people who don’t like “a lot of books”. Bright pictures, short entertaining videos shot on an iPhone - this is the basis of all content on such blogs. And, of course, beautiful girls in outfits that leave almost no room for imagination =))

Accordingly, the best topics here are about travel, beautiful lifestyle, sports lifestyle, healthy nutrition (with obligatory photos of containers with this very healthy nutrition).

Yes, by the way, all this now mainly applies to Instagram. Because nothing has anything to do with Twitter anymore)

Which is better - Twitter or Instagram?

The story here is about the same as with LiveJournal and Yandex.Zen. Twitter is more of an echo of the past than a real way to promote your blog.

Previously, it was really interesting to subscribe to a couple of dozen of your idols and receive news from their lives “first-hand.” Twitter was also often used as a kind of social “messenger”. Any news that appeared on Twitter immediately became very widespread, thanks to the peculiarity of the “following” structure.

But then Instagram appeared with its bright photos. Twitter came under close surveillance by intelligence agencies (to ensure that only the right news was spread). And in general, as it turned out, it is very difficult to make money there. The 140 character limit per post is strict.

Here you can’t even express one thought properly, and you still need to somehow squeeze in an advertising message (if suddenly someone orders you an advertisement). In general, boring and inconvenient.

Another thing is Instagram. There you can literally gather tens of thousands of subscribers in just six months and become a local star yourself. And here I will order advertising for you a lot and with pleasure.

This will be direct advertising from direct advertisers. That is, you will just have to independently negotiate the price, timing, formats, etc. But “Insta-chicks” today charge 10–100 thousand rubles for one advertising post in their feed. There is something to try for.

For more information on this topic, see the articles - and (will open in new tabs).

To be fair, it must be said that creating a high-quality channel on Instagram is not as easy as in article blogs. Here you already need to take beautiful photos in beautiful and interesting places (at least).

But there are even more demanding blogging platforms.

Video blog - here it is, big money

If you don’t like writing or taking photos at all, then perhaps the video blog format is suitable for you. Unfortunately, there is no choice here at all - there is only YouTube.

Today, viewers are becoming more and more demanding of the quality of content. For video, this means good sound, bright picture, high resolution, dynamic video. That is, you won’t be able to take pictures of yourself on the front camera of your iPhone like on Instagram, post it on YouTube and collect millions of views (of course there are exceptions, but we’re not talking about them now).

If you enter the world of video blogging, you must be prepared to bear the associated costs. You need a room for filming, you need powerful equipment for video processing, you need professional lighting. Yes, a lot of things are needed so that your video does not look like footage from a family archive, shot on film in the 90s.

Just keep in mind that not all topics are suitable for the video blog format. It should be something that people would rather “see once than hear a hundred times.” Travel - yes. Review of technical innovations – yes too. Review of new products on the car market - yes again. But for example, “the general political situation in the world” is probably not the case anymore.

When is it better NOT to start a YouTube channel?

If you can simply write about something without losing its meaning, then it’s better to write. I'll tell you a secret - people don't really like watching videos (surprise!) Do you want proof?

Why do you think videos have practically disappeared from entertainment public pages on VKontakte, and only “gifs” with automatic inclusion remain? Yes, because no one turned on the video anymore. The same explanation is why in all social networks the video now starts automatically when scrolling. This is the only way to preserve the chance that at least someone will watch this video (since it has already been played for them).

This is how it turns out that they watch videos only if they absolutely cannot do without it. Keep this in mind when choosing a topic for your vlog.

As for making money on YouTube, this is a separate big topic. In short, you can enable monetization through contextual advertising (as in Yandex.Zen). But this is a cheap method. Direct advertising will bring in the most money.

For starters, here are a couple of options for creating blogs that aren’t actually blogs.

Blogs that aren't really blogs

Today there is a little confusion in the concepts of what is a platform for a blog and what is a social network. Actually, these are different things, and they have different tasks and tools.

It's the same with Twitter and LiveJournal. They all have some signs of a social network, but they are not. It also works the other way around.

Why VK and FB are not platforms for blogging

Formally, you can also write some notes there, post photos, even videos. But in fact, the number of your subscribers does not guarantee that all of them will see your new posts.

For example, VKontakte introduced a new algorithm “Prometheus”, which shows people only those posts that may be interesting to them (from its point of view).

That is, if you have, say, 10,000 “friends,” but the topic of your new post is interesting to only 5% of them, then only these 5% will see it in their feed.

1. Communication with friends (or with those they want to meet);
2. Entertainment.

Of course, there is an option to create your own community (public) or a separate page on Facebook. Then your regular posting of new posts will become more like blogging. There are people who even manage to blog on their VKontakte wall (see in the new tab -). But think about whether you should fight all the restrictions of social networks if there are other, more convenient options.

Do you want to go free and not depend on any blogging platform at all? There is one cool option.

The coolest way to create your own blog and make money (hardcore!)

Do you know what the main disadvantage of all these blogging platforms is? You will have to create a really lot of content every day. If you decide to “rest”, you will very quickly lose ratings and subscribers. Blogging requires you to work every day.

In addition, each site has its own limitations. And your content doesn't actually belong to you. Through your efforts, you promote the platform you have chosen to work on. For violating the rules, you can simply be banned - and you will lose everything you worked for so long on.

It's another matter if you make your own website. It’s that simple - buy a unique domain name, buy a place on some quality hosting, install regular WordPress (an engine for creating blog sites), and write a couple of dozen high-quality articles.

The main advantage of your own website

If you write the right articles for specific search queries, people will start coming to you from search engines (such as Yandex and Google). You will no longer need to write every day to stay afloat.

You write 30-40 articles one time - and this will be enough for your site to become a “thousander” in just six months or a year. That is, more than a thousand unique visitors will read it every day.

And here you will set your own rules - which advertisements to place and which ones not to. What to write about, what format to choose. This is the version of work that I love, when the result of your work accumulates.

Important! If you now have a vague idea of ​​what it’s like to make your own website (why, on what topic, how to make money from it later) - download my free book. There I tell you my experience of creating a popular and profitable blog.

This is exactly the question that novice users ask. Some of them have an idea of ​​what a blog is, but will not understand how a blog differs from a website.

Well, let's figure it out, it's actually simple.

A blog is a type of website. There are news sites, there are forums, there are online stores, and there are blogs. These are all types of websites.

How does a blog stand out from other sites and why is it usually started?

To answer this question, it is important to say that blogs are divided into 5 types and each of them has a specific purpose for its creation.

These are the 5 types:

1. Personal blog.
2. Professional blog.
3. Brand blog.
4. News blog.
5. Non-traditional blogs.

Now let's look at each type in more detail.

Personal blog– is an ordinary Internet diary. This type of blog is usually written about personal events. Entries in such a diary most often have titles like “Yesterday I went to the cinema, I liked it”, “I bought jeans - check it out”, etc.

Basically, such diaries are kept for oneself and are usually visited only by the author himself and a dozen of his friends, who also keep such diaries.

If a person is public and writes interesting notes, then his magazine is visited by many other people with whom the author does not know personally. An example of such a personality is the actor Evgeny Grishkovets and his diary

As a rule, such blogs are maintained on free services, for example, “Live Journal”, popularly simply LJ (www.livejournal.ru)

Professional blog.

Typically, such blogs gather a large audience of people who are also interested in this topic. They read articles, comment on them, and give the author new ideas on what to write about.

When such a blog begins to gain momentum in terms of traffic, it begins to bring profit to its owner. Money usually comes from the sale of advertising, as well as through the use of contextual advertising systems like Yandex.Direct and Google.Adsense on the blog.

You can also use information products on your topic to make money on such blogs.

As a result, a professional blog turns into an additional source of income. Ideally, the blog becomes the main activity and the main source of income. There are many such bloggers in the West. And in 1-2 years we will have a lot.

If a person is engaged, for example, in construction, then he can freely create his own professional blog. For example, here is a blog dedicated to construction: Build It Yourself.

Brand blog.

Such a blog is usually used to promote the brand of a specific person or an entire company. This is the type of blog I use in my work.

I have a main business that brings me money through websites and selling training courses. And the blog is a place for me where I can post more personal content.

Why not post them on the main site?

Because the format of entries that are posted on a blog is usually different from the format of materials that are posted on content sites.

If on the main site I post lessons and articles on website building, then on the blog I write notes of a more personal nature, which are also related to this topic.

For example, I will post the lesson “How to create a registration system on a website” on the main website, but I will post a report from some conference on web design with my photos on the blog.

Do you notice the difference?

A blog usually also focuses on useful material, but most often it is tied to the author - either it is an expression of a point of view, or a description of an event, or simply a useful experience.

And such a blog is great for promoting the author’s name. Many people begin to learn about him, who subsequently turn into regular customers in the main business of such a person.

At least that's how it happens for me.

Another option for using a blog brand is to use the blog as your main website.

A good example is the blog of the famous Western copywriter Michel Fortin - http://www.michelfortin.com

Its main activity is writing sales texts for various goods and services. And he uses the blog to promote his name and earn extra income. He writes useful articles and posts them on his blog. This blog gathers its potential clients around itself, and when one of them needs advertising text, they already know who to contact.

News blog.

If the authors write a lot and of high quality, then such a blog usually becomes the center of niche news and begins to be visited by a large number of people who are interested in this topic and want to keep abreast of all the new products and news.

When the blog promotion stage has passed and the target audience has been recruited, the blog owners begin monetizing it (generating income from the blog). Advertisers are searched for on the blog, contextual advertising is hung, affiliate programs and other ways to make money on the blog are used.

Other variations of blogs.

This engine is so flexible that it allows you to create many different blog options. Therefore, on the Internet you can find photo blogs, portfolio blogs, catalog blogs and other blog options that differ from the classic blog.

How to create your own blog?

As for the technical side of creating your own blog, this is a topic for a separate article.

Here I will only say that the most popular solutions today are the aforementioned WordPress blog engine, which is deservedly considered a leader in this area, and the Movable Type script, which has held second position for many years.

That’s basically all I wanted to tell you about blogs in this article. I hope I was able to convey to you the concept of a blog, and perhaps you have already outlined for yourself some of the blog options that you would like to start.

Good luck!!!

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