Instagram

Thursday 23 June 2016

The 10 best blogging platforms available for free

New to blogging but short of cash? These are the best blogging platforms to consider - and they're free.


It used to be said that everyone has a book in them. These days, it might be more appropriate to argue everyone has infinite tweets, snarky Facebook updates, and semi-random comments in them. But plenty of people retain a thirst for more thoughtful writing, and also a desire to share it as widely as possible – and these are the best blogging platforms to go about doing that.
Blogs might have fallen out of fashion a touch, due to the onslaught of social networks, but there's something about having a space that's properly yours, potentially free from the distractions of a billion adverts and countless competing status updates. And the best thing is, there are a load of free blogs out there to get you started.
In this round-up, we explore 10 of the best blogging platforms for newcomers who want to get a free blog up and running.

01. WordPress



WordPress is the most popular free blogging platform

If the folks over at WordPress are to be believed (and they seem suitably trustworthy sorts), it now 'powers' over a fifth of the internet.
It's easy to see why: on WordPress.com, you can rapidly create a new blog entirely for free, with a reasonable amount of customisation; alternatively, most web hosts provide WordPress as a free single-click install, and more info on what's possible there can be found at WordPress.org.
Newcomers might find WordPress a touch bewildering initially, but it's the best free option for anyone wanting a great mix of power, customisation and usability.

02. Tumblr


Tumblr is one of the easiest free blogging platforms to use

To some extent, Tumblr feels a bit like a half-way house between WordPress and Twitter. It offers more scope than the latter, but tends to favour rather more succinct output than the former.
Decent mobile apps make it easy to submit content to a Tumblr blog from anywhere, though, and it's reasonably easy to customise your theme to make it your own.
Tumblr also has a strong social undercurrent, via a following model combined with notes and favourites. Although be mindful that the service has quite a few porn bots lumbering about, which may give the faint-of-heart a bit of a shock should they check every favourite off of their posts.

03. Blogger


Blogger is one of the longest running free blogging platforms on the web

You'd hope with a name like 'Blogger' that Blogger would be a decent free service for blogging. Fortunately, it is. Sign in with your Google ID, and you can have a blog up and running in seconds, which can then be customised with new themes. It is, however, a Google service, and so be a touch wary, given how abruptly that company sometimes shuts things down that millions of people were happily using.


04. Medium





Medium is a free blogging platform set up by Twitter's founders
Medium is the brainchild of Twitter's founders, and appears to be their attempt to do for 'longreads' what they once did for microblogging. The result is a socially-oriented place that emphasises writing, although within an extremely locked-down set-up. It's a place to blog if you want your words to be taken seriously, and if you favour a polished, streamlined experience. But if you're big on customisation and control, look elsewhere.

05. Svbtle




Svbtle is a stripped-back free blogging platform for longform writing
Describing itself as a "blogging platform designed to help you think", Svbtle is fairly similar to Medium in approach. It again strips everything right back, resulting in a bold, stylish experience that pushes words to the fore. It could easily become your favourite blogging platform for the act of writing, but it again relies on you also wanting something extremely simple and not caring a jot about customisation.

06. LiveJournal



LiveJournal combines blog and social networking
One of the veterans of this list, LiveJournal (like Blogger) started life in 1999. Perhaps because of its age, it rather blurs the lines (the site says "wilfully") between blogging and social networking.
The result is more of a community that affords you your own space, but that also very much encourages communal interaction. It is possible to fashion something more private, but to get the most out of LiveJournal, you need to be prepared to delve into discussion as much as writing.

07. Weebly



Weebly is a website creation tool that includes free blogging templates
Weebly bills itself more as a website-creation system than something for solely creating a blog. It's based around drag-and-drop components, which enable you to quickly create new pages.
However, blogging is also part of the system, and you get access to customisable layouts, a bunch of free themes, and the usual sharing features you'd expect, to spread your words far and wide.

08. Postach.io



Postach.io is a free blogging platform from the creators of Evernote
Postach.io claims it's the "easiest way to blog". It's from the people behind Evernote, and, naturally, is deeply integrated into their system.
Essentially, you just connect a notebook to Postach.io and then tag notes as 'published' to make them public.
However, you get some customisation, too, including a bunch of themes, the means to embed content from other sites, Disqus commenting, and the option to instead use Dropbox for storing content.

09. Pen.io



Pen.io is one of the only free blogging platforms you don't need a login for
Pen.io's approach is also rather different from its contemporaries. Unusually, it doesn't require a login — instead, you define a URL for a post and set a password.
Images can be dragged into place, and you can create multi-page posts using a tag. And that's about it.
Really, it's a stretch to call Pen.io a blog in the traditional sense, but it's a decent option for banging out the odd sporadic post, especially if you don't want any personal info stored.

10. Ghost



Open source platform Ghost is free if you install it on your own system
Something slightly different for our final entry. Unlike the others on this list, Ghost is only free if you download and install it yourself; use the Ghost site and you pay on the basis of traffic.
However, this system differentiates itself in other important ways: it's entirely open source, and while writing you get a live preview of how your post will end up.
You need to be technically minded for this one, then, but it's a worthy alternative to WordPress if you're happy to get your hands dirty and have your own web space that's awaiting a blog.

What do you think is the best blogging platform? Let us know in the comments below!

8 Mistakes Most Beginner Bloggers Make (And How to Avoid Them)




Sometimes, when I tell people that I blog for a living, they roll their eyes. "That's so easy," they say. "You get a paycheck for sitting on the internet all day and writing. A monkey could do your job!"
That's when I roll my eyes. See, people are quick to deem blogging as a no-brainer job ... but when they actually sit down to write their first couple of posts, it hits them: This is way harder than I thought. Like any person starting a new job, they mess things up. 
It's okay -- it happens to pretty much every new blogger. Luckily, it's pretty easy to avoid these roadblocks if you know they're coming.
So for all of you beginner bloggers out there who are looking to get up-to-speed quickly, keep on reading. Below are the eight most common mistakes most beginners make and some tips on how to avoid them.


Mistake 1: You think of ideas in a vacuum. 

When you start blogging, ideas will come to you at random times -- in the shower, on a run, while on the phone with your mom. While the ideas may come at random moments, the ideas themselves should never be random. Just because it's a good idea in general doesn't mean it's a good idea for your company. 

Solution: Your blog posts should all serve larger company goals.

The reason you're blogging is to grow your business, so all of your blog post ideas should help serve those growth goals. They should have natural tie-ins to issues in your industry and address specific questions and concerns your prospects have. 
Need help figuring out what those goals are and how to address them? Chat with your manager about the larger company goals, then schedule a meeting with someone in Sales to hear what questions they get asked most often. After both meetings, you should know which goals you need to achieve and have some ideas on how to achieve them. 

Mistake 2: Your writing is too stiff. 

Writing a blog post is much different than writing a term paper -- but when bloggers first start out, they usually only have experience with the latter. But that's not the style of writing people enjoy reading.

Solution: Write like you talk.

It's okay to be more conversational in your writing -- in fact, we encourage it. The more approachable your writing is, the more people will enjoy reading it. People want to feel like they're doing business with real people, not robots.
So loosen up your writing. Throw in contractions. Get rid of the jargon. Make a pun or two. That's how real people talk -- and that's what real people like to read. 
Need help loosening up? Try literally talking out your blog posts using Evernote, and then cleaning it up a bit in the editing stage. Sounds kind of backwards, but it could help you get unstuck from boring business babble. 

Mistake 3: You think people care about you as a writer.

It sounds harsh, but it's true. When people first start out blogging, they think that their audience will be inherently interested in their stories and their interests ... but that's not the case. It's no knock against them as a person -- it's just that when you're new, no one is interested in you and your experiences. People care way more about what you can teach them.  

Solution: Show your personality, don't tell it. 

Even though people don't really care that it's you that's writing the post, you can infuse parts of your personality in your writing to make them feel more comfortable with you. How you do that is entirely up to you. Some people like to crack jokes, some like to make pop culture references, and others have a way with vivid descriptions. You could do any of those things, or something entirely different.

Mistake 4: Your topics are too broad.

When people start writing, they generally want to write on really big topics like:
  • "How to Do Social Media Marketing" 
  • "Business Best Practices"
  • "How to Make Money on the Internet"
Topics like these are far too broad. Because there are so many details and nuances in these topics, it's really hard to do a good job answering them. Instead, you've got to get really specific. 

Solution: Create very specific working titles.

Nailing really specific topics is crucial to knocking your first few posts out of the park. My colleague Corey Eridon wrote a fabulous post on how to do that: Go read it, now. Seriously. She'll tell you how to pick a topic that works for business blogs, and walk you through the process of narrowing it into a working title.
The working title isn't final -- it's just a concrete angle you can use to keep your writing on track. Once you nail those two things, it's much easier to write blog posts.

Mistake 5: Your writing is a brain dump. 

Sometimes when I get a great idea I'm excited about, it's really tempting to just sit down and let it flow out of me. But what I get is usually a sub-par blog post.
Why? The stream-of-consciousness style of writing isn't really a good style for blog posts. Most people are going to scan your blog posts, not read them, so it needs to be organized really well for that to happen. 

Solution: Use an outline.

Seriously, it makes all the difference. If you put in the time up front to organize your thoughts and create a logical flow in your post, the rest becomes easy -- you're basically just filling in the blanks. 

Mistake 6: Your content borders onplagiarism.

Plagiarism didn't work in school, and it certainly doesn't work on your company's blog ... but for some reason, lots of beginner bloggers think they can get away with the old copy-and-paste technique. 
But you can't. Editors and readers can usually tell when something's been copied from somewhere else. Your voice suddenly doesn't sound like you, or maybe there are a few words in there that are incorrectly used. It just sounds ... off. 
Plus, if you get caught stealing other people's content, you could get your site penalized by Google -- which could be a big blow to your company blog's organic growth.

Solution: Learn how to cite others.

Instead, take a few minutes to understand how to cite other people's content in your blog posts. It's not super complicated, but it's an essential thing to learn when you're first starting out. 

Mistake 7: You think you're done once the writing's done. 

Most people make the mistake of not editing their writing. It sounded so fluid in their head when they were writing that it must be great to read ... right?
Nope -- it still needs editing. And maybe a lot of it.

Solution: Take 30 minutes to edit your piece.

Everyone needs to edit their writing -- even the most experienced writers. Most times, our first drafts aren't all that great. 
So take the time you need to shape up your post. Fix typos, run-on sentences, and accidental its/it's mistakes. Make sure your story flows just as well as it did in your outline. 
If you need a checklist to help you remember all the crucial parts of editing, check this out. It's a godsend for those of us with shoddy memories. 

Mistake 8: You focus on getting it perfect. 

I hate to break it to you, but your blog post is never going to be perfect. Ever. 
There will always be more things you can do to make your posts better. More images. Better phrasing. Wittier jokes. The best writers I know know when to stop obsessing and just hit publish. 

Solution: At a certain point, you need to ship the post. 

There is a point at which there are diminishing returns for getting closer to "perfect" -- and you're really never going to reach "perfect" anyway. So while you don't want to publish a post filled with factual inaccuracies and grammatical errors, it's not the end of the world if a typo slips through. It most likely won't affect how many views and leads it brings in.
Plus, if you (or your readers) find the mistake, all of you have to do is update the post. No biggie. 
                                             
                                            $Want to earn Money online$