A collaborative post by Joseph Peake. 

Creating a blog may seem daunting, particularly if you view it as a gateway to the blogosphere.

One way of overcoming this is to focus on your blog ownership – not in a material sense, but by claiming the blog as yours, and inserting your own personality into it.

This will familiarise yourself with the workings of your blog, and help you to easily converse with Readers who leave comments and questions on it.

Here are a few ways in which you can own your blog:

Naming your blog

Naming something gives it life. Choosing your blog’s name is one of the first things you do while setting it up. This naming exercise can be taken further by expanding this form of branding into your domain name.

Buying a personal domain prevents you giving credit to the platform where you created your blog. This action makes it your blog and no one else’s.

This naming concept also extends to the categories on your blog. This helps your readers to identify your interests and personality, and what you have written about.

For example, if your blog is about finances, some of your categories could be savings and investments. This helps to reveal yourself as an authority in those areas. If you write personally about these, your readers will get to understand more about you as a blogger.

Designing a logo

A logo is a statement image which acts as your blog’s recognisable feature. This is similar to recognising Twitter’s little blue bird, or Facebook’s white ‘f’ in a blue square. The aim of a well designed logo is to become universally known.

When you design a logo, keep in mind it needs to be versatile enough to be printed however and wherever it is necessary. It needs to be simple and unique to achieve this, especially if it is to succeed in helping towards blog ownership.

Remember your ‘About’ page

A lot of bloggers neglect the ‘about’ section of their blogs. However, if you do, you’re missing a trick. Regular readers will always want to know more about the blog’s author.

Include a description of why you started the blog, and include any hopes or plans for its future. Another tip is to remember the ‘about’ page isn’t necessarily about you, but also your readers and what you can do for them.

It’s worth being honest and use the same write style you use in your blog posts. This page should be welcoming enough to invite readers to comment, and help them to trust you and what you write about.

Creating your writing voice

Your voice, or your Writing style, should be the same as if you were speaking to your readers. This needs to be familiar, realistic and relatable. If you start with a particular tone, make sure this is consistent throughout your blog’s life.

Let’s hope your writing will improve over time. However, this shouldn’t affect the style you’ve chosen. Avoid confusing your readers by jumping about, both with the subject as well as your technique.

One tip is to focus on communicating with your readers rather than preaching to them. Dull, dry and academic prose is out of place in a blog. Fun, friendly and stimulating chatter will gain you many more readers, especially if they can relate to what you are saying.

And make sure you use the same kinds of words your readers are using. Analyse your ideal audience, so that you provide posts they will want to read, and encourage them to come back for more.

How have you focused on your blog ownership?

Share your experiences in the comments below about your blog ownership issues and successes.

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