There’s one huge mistake that I see bloggers make that makes me want to shout at them from the rooftops. One thing that I think is hurting not only how shareable their post is, but is preventing them from getting a lot of traffic to their site. And it’s a lot easier to fix than you might think.

To show you what I mean, here’s a quick shot of the kids category on Pinterest.

Which images stand out to you? The long vertical ones, or the short horizontal ones? Which ones take up more space when you are scrolling? Which ones do you see longer when you are scrolling through Pinterest?

Exactly. The long, vertical images.

The biggest mistake bloggers make is that they don’t include a long, vertical Pinterest image within their post.

Now I’ve been blogging for less than three years, so I am by no means an expert. But since a little over 60% of my readers (about 10,000 readers per day) are coming to my site from Pinterest, I think it’s safe to say that I know the impact that a vertical image can have.

Here’s an example. Tell me which pin you are most likely to repin:

I’m guessing you said the long, vertical image. If you said the horizontal one, let’s look at it again, only surrounded by similar pins like you would see it scrolling through Pinterest.

Could you even find it? Our eyes are drawn to the best photography and the longest image, right? The one that takes up the most space? I found this out pretty quickly when I started blogging, and every time I see bloggers with great content but no vertical images for pinning, I cringe.

If you want people to pin your content, you need to make vertical Pinterest-worthy images.

I like to do my very first shot a vertical one (I always do 900×1200 in case you are wondering), and then sometimes, depending on the post, I also do a longer vertical one that has multiple pictures and is specifically for pinning (you can see examples here, here, and here).

And if you want people to be finding your content when they search on Pinterest, you better give your images descriptive and appealing titles.

Let’s say that I am looking for a chili recipe. But I want one that’s easy and fast. I type “fast easy chili” into the Pinterest search bar, and here’s what comes up. Look at the descriptions of the pins. They are full of words that people would search for, and they make the recipes sound delicious.

People are way more likely to repin your stuff if you have good descriptions in combination with vertical images. Don’t believe me? Which pin are you more likely to repin, just based on the description?

The second one, right? So how do you make your images that pull from your site have awesome descriptions? You obviously can’t control it if someone changes your description, but how often do you really do that yourself when you are pinning? Rarely.

To write your own awesome descriptions for every photo on your site (especially and most-importantly the vertical, Pinterest shot), the key is ALTERNATIVE TEXT. On WordPress, you insert your photo and then go to edit, and you type your description where it says “TYPE YOUR IMAGE DESCRIPTION RIGHT HERE.”

It’s that simple. And then, anytime someone pins that image from your site, the description you want will automatically be put as the description on the pin. And people who are searching for tips or recipes or crafts related to your post will find it.

So, what have we learned? That the biggest mistake bloggers make is to not include a long, vertical Pinterest-worthy photo in their posts, especially one that has a description all ready to go because of the alternative text option.

Now go back through your favorite or most popular posts, and update them!! Get your content out there and start growing your blog!

And if you liked this post, be sure to check out the rest of my Blogging 101 series here. Good luck bloggers!

The post Blogging 101: The Biggest Mistake Bloggers Make appeared first on Life With My Littles.

This post contains affiliate links.

Welcome to part four in my Blogging 101 series, how to monetize your blog. I’ve loved sharing my blogging tips with you, and I’ve had a lot of people tell me how helpful they have been! So I can’t wait to share this final part in my series and tell you how to make money blogging.

If you haven’t seen my other posts, I have also written How to Start a Blog, How to Grow Your Blog, and Using Pinterest to Grow Your Blog. They are most helpful in order, so go check those out before you read this one!

Right now I make around $1,000 per month. Some months are better than others, and some months are worse. It depends on lots of different factors like season, pageviews, and how well you work things into your posts.

As far as monetizing goes, there are a few different ways to go. You can write sponsored posts, you can place ads on your site, or you can use affiliate links in your posts. I am going to talk about where I started and where I am now so you can see sort of how I have worked to monetize my blog. Then I want to talk more specifically about the different ways I monetize my blog.

Some tips when monetizing your blog.

1. Work with companies you like and actually endorse so that you can be honest and real when you promote them. If a company reaches out to you that you have never heard of or that you don’t use, it’s going to be harder to promote them. I have had a few companies reach out to me that sell pregnancy things, but since I am not pregnant right now, I’m not going to promote them because I want a chance to try them out first. If you lie or sound fake in your promotion, people are going to be turned off by your blog.

2. Make sure you promote companies that are going to be relevant to your readers. If you write a parenting blog, it might not be relevant to promote a company that sells men’s clothing. But it would be relevant to promote a kids’ clothing company or a mom and baby deal site like Zulily. Think about what your readers are coming to your site for and then figure out what kinds of companies fit that.

3. Reach out to companies. It took me a long time to build up the courage to ask a company if I could write a sponsored post for them. But they had something I wanted and I knew it would be something my readers would be interested in, so I asked. Sometimes companies will say no (or not even respond at all, which is super annoying), but sometimes they will say yes, and it’s awesome!

4. Be patient. It’s going to take time before companies start reaching out to you. But they will if you are good at blogging and if you keep working hard to write amazing content. So don’t give up, and if they aren’t contacting you, contact them!

5. Be cautious when someone contacts you. When someone contacts me I always look up the actual product on Amazon or some legit source. If their website seems sketchy or the product seems fake, then politely tell them you are not interested, and thank them for contacting you. I’ve had companies contact me who essentially sell magic pregnancy pills. One look at the email and I know I’m not going to write for them. So be cautious, and pick products that you trust.

6. Include a privacy policy/disclosure page on your blog. And also make sure you put a disclaimer before any posts with affiliate links. It’s the law, so make sure you do it. This is what my disclosure page looks like.

Okay, so now I want to share with you some of the companies I have worked with in monetizing my blog. I work with different companies (mostly) now than I did when I started, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t good companies. And if you are looking for a place to start, these are super helpful.

1. AdSense. When I started my blog in August 2013, I first put a few AdSense banners on my site. The first month I made $4.71, the second month $15.54, the third month $27.85, and the fourth month jumped to $66.91. You get money when people click on the ad banners with AdSense, so the more pageviews you get, ideally the more clicks you will get. I do not use AdSense any more, but it was a great place for me to start, and I would recommend it.

2. Shareasale. I learned about shareasale.com from when I was working as an administrative assistant for a popular apron company. When I started my blog, I decided I would check it out and see what kinds of things  I could do with it. You apply for programs that you are interested in, and then once you are approved, you can put coupons, affiliate links, and ad banners on your site for those companies. You get a commission when someone clicks on your link and then buys something. You have to manage your own stuff, but if you are good at working links in, it can really pay off. I don’t use this anymore because all the companies I used to use switched to a different affiliate site, but it’s definitely worth checking out.

3. Collective Bias/Social Fabric. I just started working with them in November of last year, and it has been a lot of fun. Essentially you apply to work on campaigns for different companies in order to promote their product. I love it because it gives me a chance to figure out ways to be creative and tie the products into something that I want to write about. One example is my New Dad Kit where I wrote about Irish Spring Signature soap and body wash. You get reimbursed for the products, and then you also get paid on top of that for your post/social media promotion. It’s great for bloggers just starting out, but I rarely work with them anymore because they don’t pay much compared to other companies I work with.

4. Amazon Affiliate Program. I just started using this recently, but I am loving it so far. The idea is you link to products on Amazon, and you get a commission when someone buys something after clicking your link. The thing I love about it is that if you are already recommending a product (like I do in my Best Baby Purchases post), you can link to it so people can buy it themselves if they want. This works great if you are already talking about a certain product. You can use links, pictures, or text and pictures.

5. Private ad companies. Currently I use AdThrive, and I love them. You get an account manager who works to help you optimize your ads so you can make the most money. Before that I was using a different company that was super inconsistent and really tough to contact and get answers from. I would recommend asking other bloggers who they work with before signing up with someone, because I’m sure if I had done that with the first company, I would’ve have signed up. But I love using AdThrive and I am making really good money with them so far.

7. Other sponsorship websites. Some of these that I work with include Izea, TapInfluence, Massive Sway, and Clever. There are a lot of them, and you just have to find ones that work for you.

Okay, so that’s a lot of information, but if you are here because you want to monetize your blog (which, if you are still reading, is why you are here), then those are my not-so-secret tips to help you out. I hope they help. You can make money blogging, even if it does take some time. I am so glad that I’ve been able to monetize my blog because it has been such a huge help to our family while the Mister has been in med school. I hope that you are able to use these tips and make some money, too! Good luck!

Do you have any other tips on how to make money blogging? Let me know!

The post Blogging 101: How to Monetize Your Blog appeared first on Life With My Littles.

Welcome to another post in my “Blogging 101” series! I have already had several people tell me that this series has helped them, and I am so glad! That is exactly what I want to do with these posts, and I am glad that people like them! Today we are going to talk about using Pinterest to grow your blog.

An alternate title for this post could be “How I cleaned up my Pinterest account and got more followers,” or simply “how to get more followers on Pinterest,” because honestly, that is what I want to share with you. Pinterest is such an important tool for bloggers. Pinterest is the whole reason that my blog started taking off in the first place, and it is where more than half my traffic comes from every day. If you know how to use Pinterest well, then you can definitely grow your blog, increase your pageviews, and get people coming back to your site.

On February 11th, I had 2,666 followers on Pinterest. That might sound like a lot, but keep in mind that I had been blogging for over a year at that point. I noticed one day that a lot of my pins weren’t getting any repins, which I thought was weird with that many followers. I read an article someone posted about how their account got marked as spam, so I thought I would check and see if mine had been, too. It turns out, my account had been marked as a false positive and my pins weren’t getting shown to people. So the person at Pinterest fixed it, and I have seen a lot more growth in the last three months. As of today, I have 3,723 followers on Pinterest. So how did I clean up my account and get over 1,000 new followers in just three months? Let me tell you!

1. I turned my account into more of a business account and made a separate personal account. Yes, this was annoying and meant I had to go through and delete nonprofessional looking pins and move pins that I had for personal things (like my son’s birthday party inspiration board) to a separate account. But it actually cleaned up my Pinterest account and made it look a lot nicer. And Pinterest just came out with a feature so you can move big groups of pins, so I just made all my boards group boards, added my personal account to them, copied all my pins to boards on my personal account, and then took my personal account off my business account boards so they weren’t group boards anymore. I know, complicated. But it worked! Now if I am looking for a specific thing that doesn’t really fit my blog (like how to grow basil on a patio) I can pin it to my personal account. It’s actually super helpful and now my Pinterest account for Life With My Littles looks a lot nicer.

2. I changed my profile’s description. When you first go to a person’s Pinterest profile, you see their picture, their name, and then their description. I cut down and cleaned up my description so it was more to-the-point and clear what followers could expect from my boards. It now reads “Hi! I’m Chelsea, the mommy blogger behind Life With My Littles! I love all things related to pregnancy, babies, desserts, and DIY!” It used to be longer and more sloppy, and now it’s a lot more direct. Now, when people follow me, they know what the majority of my pins are going to look like.

3. I renamed my boards. A lot of my boards were named clever things that I thought were cute. Instead of just “Christmas,” my Christmas board was called “We Love the Holidays: Christmas.” Think for a minute what people are going to be searching for when they search for a board. Is it going to have a cute, clever title or is it going to be straightforward and direct? Exactly. So I renamed my boards to simple things like “Pregnancy” and “Desserts” and “DIY & Crafts.” Now they are more likely to show up in search results when people are looking for new boards to follow.

4. I changed my board descriptions and added categories. Did you know that when you click on a board, it shows a description of what that board is about? Did you know that you can assign boards to a category? When a board has a category, the pins you pin to it show up in the general Pinterest categories. So if your board is under the “Food and Drink” category, when people go to the “Food and Drink” page on Pinterest, those pins will show up there. So if you want more exposure for your pins, assign them categories and assign them correctly.

5. I reorganized my boards. When you go to a store are the ugliest things in the window? No. You want your best things up front so people can see them walking by or when they first come in. Same with Pinterest. You want your most popular and best Pinterest boards at the top so that when people come to your Pinterest profile, those are the first ones they see. If you blog about life with your kids and the top boards on your profile deal with home improvement, inspirational quotes, and men’s fashion, people are probably going to be a little confused and not sure what your profile is offering. So put your best boards at the top.

6. I deleted pins. I went through all of my pins (yeah, it was a beast) and deleted pins that had less than 3 repins. I actually probably need to do this again, but it really cleaned up my boards. Not only did it delete pins that weren’t getting any action, it showed Pinterest that the pins I had on my profile were popular and getting repinned. This article from Sarah Titus explains why you should be deleting your pins. It’s super helpful and I won’t go into details, but if you are serious about growing your blog and using Pinterest to do it, you should read that post.

7. I added the “Hello Bar” to my blog page. See that little bar at the top of my blog that says “Like what you see? Follow me on Pinterest for more!” That is called a Hello Bar and you can get one for your own blog. I chose to make mine Pinterest-related, but you can do it for Facebook, Twitter, your email newsletter, lots of things. I have seen a lot of new traffic coming to my Pinterest profile because I just installed that simple little bar. I actually think this might be the biggest reason that my Pinterest followers have grown so fast in the last three months. So I highly recommend trying it out. If you don’t like it, take it off. But it’s not very obstructive and it makes a big difference.

8. I started using Tailwind to schedule my pins. I was using Ahalogy, but you had to pin things from their content network and you also couldn’t pick specific times to pin things unless you manually scheduled all of them. With Tailwind, I just schedule things I would normally pin using their bookmarklet tool, and then I add them to my schedule along with my own pins. I can pick how many pins I want each day of the week, and what times I want them each day of the week. You do have to pay to use it, but it is worth it, I promise. Also, if you aren’t already using something to schedule your pins, start now. There’s no way you can be expected to pin constantly throughout the day or during the night when people are online. Your life should not be controlled my social media. Schedulers are the bomb.

9. I utilized more group boards. Getting on my first group board was one of the best things that happened. Group boards allow for multiple pinners, so you ideally get more followers since the board shows up on more people’s Pinterest profiles. I am on a few group boards, and it has helped me get my content in front of new viewers, and I also just started a new board for pregnancy and baby tips which I am super stoked for. So find some group boards that are popular, and try to join. You won’t be able to join every group board you find, but I think they help you grow your blog.

If you do all of these things and after a month you are still seeing incredibly low (or nonexistent) repins, try contacting Pinterest to see if your account has been marked as spam. It happened to me, and it happened to another blogger, so I think it might be more common than Pinterest thinks. I’m not saying that must be the reason you aren’t seeing more Pinterest interaction, but there is a chance.

So are you all pumped up now and ready to get pinning? Even after writing this I’m all ready to go back in and clean up my account even more! If you want to check out my profile to get tips for your own, you can see it here. And don’t forget to follow me while you are there!

And if you missed the rest of the posts in my Blogging 101 series, you can read How to Start a Blog and How to Grow Your Blog, and How to Monetize Your Blog. Happy blogging, friends!

The post Blogging 101: Using Pinterest to Grow Your Blog appeared first on Life With My Littles.

Two weeks ago I started my Blogging 101 series to share some of the tips I have learned about blogging. Blogging is one of my favorite things to do, and I don’t think being successful should be a secret!

Last time I talked about how to start a blog, and this week I want to talk about how to grow your blog. Because you might have a super awesome amazing blog, but if you aren’t working on sharing it and growing it, then it’s not going to be successful.

1. Pinterest. Pinterest accounts for over half of my blog’s visitors, and it is the reason my blog started to grow in the first place. I am going to do a separate Blogging 101 post about how to use Pinterest, but here are some basic tips. Again, make your images pinnable. If your feature image isn’t great, then nobody is going to want to pin it. Second, pin your stuff a lot. If you aren’t trying to get your content pinned, then chances are, it’s not going to be. And third, find other bloggers who write about similar topics and pin their content. Try and pin a lot of the same type of content that you are writing. That’s what people are coming to your site for, and that’s what they want to see.

2. Reach out to other bloggers. When I was first starting out, I reached out to a few bloggers for tips, and the things they told me were really helpful. If you have questions, ask other bloggers who are already doing what you want to do. Sometimes they may not respond, but sometimes they will and it’s awesome. I have had people reach out to me (which is the whole reason I started this series) and I am happy to share tips with other people. Plus, when you get on other bloggers’ radar, they may start following you and sharing your content as well.

3. Join groups on Facebook. I am a member of a few great blogging groups on Facebook, and they provide opportunities for me to get my content read and shared, as well as give me a chance to ask questions and get opinions from a bunch of other bloggers at once. Some groups are private and you have to request to be added, but others you can just search for and be added automatically. My friend Carisa and I actually thought Facebook groups were so helpful that we started our own with some of our favorite bloggers, and it has been really great.

4. Link parties. I don’t do these as much anymore, but if you can find a good one then they are a great way to get your content in front of other bloggers and to get featured on other sites. When I was first starting out, Six Sisters’ Stuff had a link party and my Cook-off Winning Chili recipe got featured on their site. It brought a lot of new visitors to my site and was super exciting! So find a link party in your niche and link up!

5. Interact with other bloggers. Share their content, comment on their posts, follow them on social media. If you share other people’s content, they are going to start sharing yours. It may take a while, but most bloggers are aware when someone is consistently coming back to their site or sharing their posts. And people appreciate that! Blogging is a lot more than just writing awesome posts. It is about sharing those posts, and sharing posts from other blogs, too. If you aren’t interacting with other bloggers, nobody is going to interact with you.

6. Use scheduling tools for social media. Chances are, you don’t want to be pinning, tweeting, and posting to Facebook and Instagram all day. Scheduling tools like Hootsuite and Tailwind (along with Facebook’s scheduling tool) are really helpful. I always schedule my pins, tweets, and posts so that I can relax and actually spend time with my family while still posting at peak times. I think Hootsuite works great for Twitter, and I have tried a few Pinterest schedulers and Tailwind is my favorite. I just use Facebook’s scheduler because I have heard that they penalize outside schedulers like Hootsuite (not sure if it’s true, but it works great), and I have yet to find a good Instagram scheduler. But if that is the only thing I have to post to on a daily basis, then that is great. It might sound bad, but you want to give the impression that you are present, even when you might not be. And scheduling tools are great for this. Posting on social media is a great way to connect with followers, and schedulers are the best way to do that without feeling like social media is taking over your schedule.

7. Make friends. It might sound weird, but I have made some great friends through blogging. Some of my favorite people are bloggers who I interact with on my blog and their blog, through email and social media. If you make friends through blogging, those people are going to share your content, and you will be able to ask them questions, they can ask you questions, and it’s just nice to have someone you can talk to when your husband doesn’t understand why you want to get on The Huffington Post so bad. Not only does making blog friends help grow your blog, but it helps when you have someone to talk to about things nobody else understands. So put yourself out there and you will meet some amazing people.

Blogging is incredibly fun, a lot of work, but so rewarding. And if you are able to grow your blog, more opportunities will open up to you and you will be able to do things you didn’t think were possible. I love being able to blog and share tips and ideas with people, and I hope that this series will inspire you to do the same!

For the rest of the posts in this series, check out how to start a blog, how to use Pinterest to grow your blog, and how to monetize your blog.

The post Blogging 101: How to Grow Your Blog appeared first on Life With My Littles.

Since I started blogging in August 2013, I have had several people ask me for blogging tips. Some asking me how to start a blog, some asking me how to grow their blog, and some asking me how I make money blogging. I thought it would be helpful for any new (or older!) bloggers if I wrote a series with my tips! I would love to help out in any way I can, and if sharing what I am doing to make my blog work can help, then I am all for it! How to be successful shouldn’t be a secret, so I want to share what has worked for me.

This is going to be a four part series, with part one (this part) about how to actually start your blog, part two about how to grow your blog, part three about how to use Pinterest to grow your blog, and part four all about how to monetize your blog.

Blogging is a great way for me to do everything I love, and if I can help other people do that too, then I will be so happy!

Okay, so here are my top tips for how to start a blog!

1. Decide what you want to write about and stick to it. When I first started writing, my blog was called “Crafty Chelsea” and I wrote about the crafts I was making. After my son was born and I started seriously blogging, I wrote a lot more about pregnancy and babies. My most popular posts became (and still are) ones about pregnancy and raising kids. Last year I changed my blog name to “Life With My Littles” because I decided that “Crafty Chelsea” wasn’t really capturing what I was writing about anymore. I still post a few crafts, but the bulk of what I write is more about life with my kids. Recently I have been working on focusing more of my blog on that, and I actually just picked a few categories that I am going to try to stick to. Basically, it’s been a journey for me to figure out exactly what I want to write about. It would have been so much easier if I had just figured that out in the beginning. So my tip from this is that you should pick what you are passionate about early on, and then stick to writing that. It will be easier and it will help a lot to have a clear direction with your blog. It also helps a ton when you are brainstorming ideas.

2. Decide how much personal information you want to share. I only share my name and the state we live in on my blog. I don’t share my children’s names, or the Mister’s name. I also don’t share the town we live in. I know some people who share everything, and if that is your deal, then that is fine. I mean it is up to you, but I try to protect my children even if my name is out there. It just makes me feel better having little nicknames for my family.

3. Decide how often you want to post. One thing that I have noticed is that blogs that have a regular posting schedule are a lot easier to follow along with than blogs that are random and post all over the place. Right now, I post two times a week, but as we get settled into our new home I am going to post three times a week. It just depends on how often you can spare the time to blog. Some bloggers post every day, but as a stay-at-home mom who only gets naptime and early in the morning to work on her blog, that just isn’t an option for me. So really consider how much time you are willing to spend on blogging and then figure out how often you want to post. Just keep it regular.

4. Pick a blog name and buy the domain. I brainstormed for several days trying to come up with a name that encompassed Life With My Littles. I thought about names nonstop and wrote down everything that popped into my head (even the bad ones). Once you come up with the perfect name (and make sure it isn’t taken already), buy the domain. AKA, the .com. Yeah you could be cheap and do the .blogspot.com or .wordpress.com version of your name, but if you are really serious about blogging, you want people to be able to find your site easily, and you don’t want someone else to take your website domain. I use GoDaddy.com and I would definitely recommend them.

5. Brainstorm ideas and write them down. In my blog planner, I have a few pages specifically for post ideas. Any time I get an idea, I write it down there under the category it goes with (pregnancy, baby, toddlers, recipes, motherhood, crafts, or blogging). This is such a huge help because I can look at all the things I might want to write about and schedule them on my calendar (see #6). I get my best ideas later at night (especially while I’m getting ready for bed) and I always make sure to write them down before I forget. It’s super helpful to be able to look in one place when you are ready to schedule your next blog post.

6. Make a blogging schedule. Otherwise known as an editorial calendar. I definitely could never be one of those people who doesn’t have things scheduled at least a month in advance. And in the blogging world, you need to have time to write, take photos, edit, and get everything ready to be published. So making a schedule helps you know what is coming up, what you should be working on, and what kinds of seasonal posts you may want to schedule. I love having a blogging schedule and I would recommend it to anyone who is starting a blog.

7. Set up your blog. Once you have some ideas and your domain and know exactly what you want your site to be about, you need to actually set up your blog. I started my blog on Blogger, but WordPress is definitely more popular because they have a lot of great plug-ins that can enhance your blog and make it user-friendly. I wish I had started on WordPress, but I am in the process of switching so it’s okay. When you set up your blog, look at other blogs and see what you like and don’t like about them. Do you like the title of the blog across the whole page, or just on the side? Do you want a nice toolbar with all of your post categories and links? What colors do you want to do? Do you want your picture on the side? Do you want one sidebar, or one on each side of the content? Where do you want your social media links? There are so many ways to personalize your blog and make it yours. Don’t settle for anything less than what you want. I recommend checking out StudioPress and the Genesis Framework. I think most major blogs use it, and it’s really user-friendly.

8. Start writing. Okay so you have your blog ready, you have ideas, you have your schedule. Now write! Content is the most important part of blogging. I am realizing this more and more! So start writing your posts and getting pictures for them and asking questions. Write what you are passionate about, what you are the expert of, what you have learned, and what you want to share with people. And along with this, make sure you PROOFREAD! I am a huge grammar crazy so when I am on a big blog and I find an error it drives me crazy. If people consistently find poor grammar or misspelled words, they aren’t going to want to read what you write. So write well.

9. Be real. If you are brutally honest in real life, be brutally honest on your blog. If you are sarcastic in real life, let that shine through on your blog. Don’t pretend to be someone else just to get readers. People want the real you. My favorite bloggers share bits and pieces of their real lives mixed in with what they are writing about. I just recently started trying to include more about my life, because I realized that people get drawn in when they feel like they know you who are. So be real, be you, and don’t try to be someone else. Nobody likes fake people.

10. Make your images pin-worthy. All of my posts include one “hero shot” at the beginning that I have put together specifically for Pinterest. Vertical images work best, and I always put the title on my picture (because sometimes the descriptions on Pinterest get changed by other pinners). Not all of my pictures in the rest of the post are vertical, but I always make sure that my top hero shot is vertical. You are competing with all of the other beautiful pictures on Pinterest to get people to come to your site, so you want the best of the best when you make that pin-worthy photo. And obviously you want the rest of your pictures to be great, too, but make sure you have one really good photo with your title and make sure it’s at the beginning so it’s what people see when they come to your blog.

11. Create social media accounts. I will talk more about this in the next Blogging 101 post, but if you are serious about blogging, you need to have at least a Pinterest account, a Facebook page, and a Twitter account. And I love Instagram, so I would recommend that, too. I am going to write a whole post about how I use Pinterest, but that’s another story. So to start, create your social media accounts and try to make them your blog name if it’s available. That makes it a lot easier for people to find you. And make sure your social media accounts are on your blog somewhere.

Whew, that was a lot of information! But I assume that if you read it all, you are here because you want to start a blog and are looking for tips that can help you be successful. Also, thanks if you read it all! Impressive! I wish you the best of luck, and come back next month when I share part two, Blogging 101: How to Grow Your Blog.

The post Blogging 101: How to Start a Blog appeared first on Life With My Littles.