3. http://bryonytaylor.com
Why blog?
You could have all sorts of reasons to blog: for
CPD, to have a resource to return to, to share what
you’re learning with others, for fun, to share
expertise, to keep in touch with friends & family, for
4. http://bryonytaylor.com
Create your blog – step 1
• Think of a name (this will be the url &
your username eg.
yourname.wordpress.com)
• Think of a title (you can change the title
later)
• Visit wordpress.com and sign up
• Click on confirmation email to complete
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Create your blog – step 4
Choose a theme – this is how your site will look.
Experiment with different looks. You can change
your theme at any time.
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Create your blog – step 6
Choose your ‘widgets’. ‘Drag’ which widgets you
want to appear in your sidebar. Keep checking your
site to see how they look until you’re happy.
Dashboard view
Looks like this on blog
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Create your blog – step 8
Add pages (you can add content to your pages later).
You may wish to edit the dummy ‘about’ page so
that your visitors know what they’re looking at.
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Create your blog – step 9
Choose whether you want your home page to be
‘static’ (ie. Stays the same) or for it to show your
latest blog post.
If you want to have a static home page
(rather than your most recent blog post
appearing on the home page) follow these
steps:
Create a new blank page and call it
‘Blog’, save it
Go to ‘Settings’ and ‘Reading’. Choose which
page you want as the ‘static’ page and
choose ‘blog’ for where your blog posts will
go – don’t forget to save!
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Create your blog – step 10
Connect your social media accounts.
Link your social media profiles to your blog –
this means whenever you publish a new blog
post it will automatically go to twitter,
facebook, linkedin etc.
Go to ‘Settings’ and ‘Sharing’.
Click on the relevant links on ‘Publicize’ to
link your accounts.
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Create your blog – step 11
Add sharing buttons so people can share your
content on social networks. Go to ‘Settings’ and
‘Sharing’ and drag and drop the services you want.
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Create your blog – step 12
Write your first blog post – edit the dummy post
created for you called ‘Hello World’.
Work out how to add a link, image and video and
edit the text. It works much like Word.
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• Always include an
image in your post
(ensure it is royalty
free - http://sxc.hu/ &
http://commons.wiki
media.org for free
images)
• Connect to Twitter
and Facebook to get
more hits
• Always reply to
comments (unless
obviously spam)
Some quick tips on blogging
• Split long posts up
into separate posts –
max length 500 words
• A blog post could just
be an image or video –
it needn’t be long!
• Read other blogs for
inspiration and
respond
• Post regularly
• Be topical
• Have fun!
18. http://bryonytaylor.com
My 3 golden rules:
Don’t be afraid!
Go for it, don’t be timid, you just
have to give it a try.
Don’t be stupid!
Don’t write anything you’d be
embarrassed for a loved one or your
boss to read!
Be yourself!
Be authentic, people can spot a fake.
19. http://bryonytaylor.com
Thanks. Keep in touch! http://bryonytaylor.com
I’m @vahva on Twitter bryony.taylor@gmail.com
http://bigbible.org.uk & http://seedresources.com
for extra help and resources