As someone who has been blogging for about six months, I am kind of in between being a “new blogger” and being “old” enough to give advice to new bloggers. So I am reading both sides on the Newbie Blogger Initiative.
I appreciate all those who support new bloggers. The NBI is a good way to kickstart a blog by giving some referrals and there is a also ton of good advice out there from veteran bloggers. I will keep mine short and sweet.
1. Be the blog you want to read. Write for yourself, whether it is newsy or conversation or rambling or full of pictures or speculative or provocative. I liked reading EVE exploration blogs, but there weren’t very many and most of them were inactive. So I decided to write one.
2. Blogspot vs. WordPress. Blogspot has 1 major advantage in that it has a dynamically updated blogroll. If you have a good blogroll on Blogpsot, you can get a lot of traffic just because of that. Personally, I think WordPress is better for just about everything else. The layouts are more varied and the mobile app is very nice for approving comments, checking stats, etc. I went with wordpress, but I envy that blogroll.
3. Have ideas for at least 10 blog posts before you start. Give them at least a title. If you don’t have an idea for at least 5 posts, you probably aren’t ready to start blogging. It helps to have a weekly rhythm or pattern as well, but that is easier said than done.
4. Getting traffic. Basically there are 2 main ways of getting traffic: web searches and referring blogs. To get traffic from web searches, you need to use good descriptive blog post titles. If you are writing about your experience in a dungeon or mission some such, put that in the title. Referrals are a bit harder. It helps to get some listing on the NBI. Sometimes you can just ask some of the bloggers you like if they will put you on their blogroll. For reasons stated above, it is better to be on a blogpost blogroll than a wordpress one. If you are a New EVE blogger, let me know I and I will link you as soon as you have 5 posts up.
Happy blogging.
Pilgrim in Exile 
Just write. Even if its bad. Even if its not perfect. Write it anyway. I’m always startled by what people like and how they respond to various things. I break most rules I’ve read, I post after writing, I do Nt do outline es, I ramble, and I write what I want to read. I experiment and I try to never take myself to seriously.
I agree with this so much. Also I dont know that its important to have a long queue of ideas already prepared before starting a blogging. So much of what we write comes from feedback after we publish.
Although I’m not new to blogging, I’m pretty new to the EVE blogosphere. (I used to have a writing-oriented blog under my real name.) We’ve had our alliance blog online for about a year and a half, but I just haven’t had time to post to it until recently.
I’m not familiar with the Blogspot blogroll or how it works, but I’ve got a plugin called “WP Social Blogroll” that sorts itself in order of last updated. I’m not sure if that’s the same functionality as the one on Blogspot, though.
I’m a big fan of exploration blogs, too!
Alas, plugins are not available on WordPress.com sites. If I decided to spring for a domain name for this blog, the that would be an option.
Added you to the blogroll mix if it also helps. A good tip I would say would be to get on Stabs blogroll over at stabbedup.blogspot.com. He’s a reader of mine as I’m of his, but Stabbs blog is on Blogspot and has a extensive link of MMO as well EVE Blogs. And you wouldn’t believe how much I uses his links when I’m out and about. He’ll find you if you ever comment on his blog.
I’ve used both Blogspot in the beginning when I first started my blog. Later in time I moved to WordPress to which my blog currently remain. Having used both I very much prefer WordPress for the more ease of use as well the layout and just have more options for customization of look, feel and message. The only thing missing is that Blogspot has the dynamic updated Blogroll links. Though I haven’t researched it in recent times I’m sure there is plugin or script that can be used to get the wordpress blogs when updated to show in some kind of way. I’m not certain but I’m sure i did read that something like that was around last time i researched it and it was a while ago. Otherwise I prefer WordPress very much.
Having been around long enough as a blog, i was never worried for traffic so not having a dynamic link blogroll never bothered me. I usually visit various blogs enough that I can see when they are updated vs just only ever using a feeder. I prefer to visit a blog and see what has changed, but that’s always been me though.
I don’t have any oracle wisdom as far as blogging or starting a blog. But i’ve been at it for 8 eight or so and i guess over that time i’ve probably learned a few things.
1. So It’s never too late to start a blog, but hopefully once you start you at least try and stick with it for the long haul. Persistence will carry’s you along way.
2. Write for yourself and don’t worry about finding readers!
3. If your apart of the community and just being apart of it mingling with others in the community of other blogs people will find you and put you on their blog roll in time if they so choose. You don’t have to ask, people will for their own reasons. Everyone that writes a blog is also a reader of someone else’s blog.
4. Always good to start a blog with a Neutral Name. Your blog can go on to other things or games if its not tied to any particular MMO game with a game centric name.
5. You don’t have to really know what your going to write about 3 steps down the road. You only have to decide to roll the ball and write and just try to keep pushing it slowly regularly. If you do it regularly enough you develop a pattern of regularly writing about something and in time it gets easier. As well in time you will find your voice where in the beginning you may not have known what it will be. But write for yourself.
6. Find a pace and try to stick with it. Whether you choose to in the beginning to write one Blog post a week or 2 post a week, try to stick with it and develop your own blogging rhythm. Because you don’t want to burn yourself out. You want to be in it for the long haul even if your not even aware of that yet.
7. Find your own style or writing and make your blog easy to read or spacious.
8. Most important thing regardless of anything i’ve said is once you start to blog, just keep at it. That will solve everything else in time.
Great tips. Thanks for sharing them!