My very first blog posts were horrendous. I began writing at Blogger, and never did get the hang of it. The platform was difficult for me to understand, and then I heard about WordPress. I found it easier to write there, and it’s where my main blogs live. It didn’t mean I could write any better though! That is something I have been learning as I go.
Blabbing on about something on a blank page on a computer screen led me to believe that no one at all would ever even see what I wrote. I knew nothing about SEO or social media or tagging. I just wrote whatever came into my head, and it wasn’t very good, but it was honest and probably a bit unique (maybe not in a good way).
People I knew didn’t read my posts, but absolute strangers did, and they sometimes left comments. Those comments gave me the incentive to continue, and to give my readers something worthwhile to read. I wanted to become a better writer, and I had to learn how to do that. For many years I was too busy raising my kids to read a book much less practice any type of writing!
Then, out of the blue, I was asked to be a guest writer at a site connected to (the now defunct) Squidoo writing site. I had to write a review of a Squidoo page of my choice (not my own), and have it ready to post on a specific day of the week. We each had our own day to publish. It was stressful, because I was not a good writer. Over the course of the week eventually I got the short article (300 words minimum) ready to submit. Then I would sort of cringe on the day I knew it would go live.
Eventually I had to stop guest writing because my own online business needed more of my time. But, that stint as a guest writer was very good for me. It honed my writing skills a bit, as I had to try to live up to the expectations of the other writers. I wanted to write well. And I knew for a fact, at the very least, the other contributors would be reading it!
Writing with others also taught me what is expected for search engine optimization (SEO). Each post / article had to be a minimum of 300 words, well written, easy to read, and contain original text. This is what I think about when writing these days. That is not to say that I don’t slip out of that routine every now and then.
Everything I write contains at least one photo or picture to go with the story. Occasionally the photography is the story, but blogs won’t get far without some text as well. At first I used only my own photography when writing, but eventually I learned how to use public domain images to enhance my posts, like the awesome photos in this article (credit: Pixabay.com).
I have been overlooking the “featured image” option which shows on WP’s improved editor posting page. Now I am going back through my blog posts to add a featured image to the top of each one.
Thank you for sharing!
Hydrangeas Blue 
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