Starting a Blog site?

[kristof (Kristof Van Kriekingen)]

Hiii!

So I’ve set myself a goal for 2023 to start my own blog site. Not just blogs but also write-ups and other stuff. It’s already May and it’s not there yet … So I started making it but I’m kind of “scared to start”?

What I’m wondering most is like how do you start out? Do you just post 1 blog or instantly 4 blogs to have a bit of content on your website? What would you bloggers advise, how did you start?

Any tips & tricks you guys could share would be epic

[fullsnacktester (Ben Dowen)]

Some tips:

1. Find a place to do your writing that feels comfortable to you, and makes it easy to save them to a safe shared location. This could be VS Code and GitHub, Google Docs, whatever works for you there is a low barrier to get you writing.
2. You can take what you’ve written and publish it in multiple ways, be that on your own platform or others, even cross posting.
3. Remember to promote your posts, you won’t natural just yet traffic by magic, at first no one knows where it is.
4. Find your reason for writing, and use to to tailor your work. Is it for a specific audience? Or primarily for yourself? Do you want to express yourself, start a conversation? Are you raising your profile to be more employable?
5. People and algorithms love consistency over huge drops in one go. Write when it works for you, but woke a cadence out for publishing. Any meaningful platform will allow scheduling of some kind, or at least drafts.
6. Once a week for year is huge! If you’re going for daily, give yourself a time box, like every day for a week. Then you can celebrate the win, instead of feeling bad when eventually you slow down.
7. Remember to link back to people who inspired you, give kudos and reference things. It’s good to celebrate the community, you might find opportunity for collaboration and the algorithms feed off cross linking, if it’s meaningful not a word list.
8. Pay attention to the title of your posts, it can make a huge difference how discoverable it is (search) and how likely people are to click and start reading. I’m not talking click bait, but you need a good hook if you want readers.
9. I’ve personally not taken up opportunities for writing paid blog posts for other sites, or reviewing products. If this interest you, do your research, and know your worth and any lines you don’t want to cross. This will make it easier if people approach you.
10. Finally, experiment and get feedback and carry out self reflection. Check it you are meeting the goals you see out to reach, or if you want to make course corrections.

Have fun, and take care of yourself.

On and bonus, 11. Make sure to drop your RSS feed to MoT so you can get your posts appear in the community blog feed!

[kristof (Kristof Van Kriekingen)]

Thanks for all the tips!

I would indeed mainly do it for myself, I don’t have an issue with topics. Mainly getting started
I was thinking of maybe doing 4 blogs a months for the first month and then on Monthly or when there is a specific event to write about.

Just to not have an “empty site”.

@fullsnacktester

On and bonus, 11. Make sure to drop your RSS feed to MoT so you can get your posts appear in the community blog feed!

Interesting, gotta read up on that!

[al8xr (Oleksandr Romanov)]

Hi there.

On platform

First, I used Github Pages and hosted here there blog based on the Jekyll engine. The address of the blog will be your_github_handle.github.io.
It’s free, but engine is a bit old and buggy.
Now, I purchased my own domain and I am hosting a blog here. I switched to Hugo engine together with papermod plugin.
It’s free, except for the domain name.
In both cases blog is stored as Github repository. Articles are in the Markdown format. Pretty nice and easy to add new ones.

On writing

• Stick to your schedule
• It’s ok to publish only one article at once
• Focus on the content and storytelling

On useful resources

• Writing Handbook by Julian Shapiro (great series with a lot of tips and tricks)
• Technical Writing: A Developer's Guide to Storytelling - Deepgram Blog ⚡️
• How to Use the Art of Storytelling in Your Blogging Strategy
• Storytelling in Technical Writing
• Technical Blogging as Storytelling
• Writing Tips for Non-Writers Who Don’t Want to Work at Writing | Whatever

P.S.

Unfortunately, I don’t have much time to write posts on the blog now - I need to learn new programming languages (Python and Rust) and continue to develop my own Telegram channel.
But as soon as I have free time - I will continue adding new posts.

[mirza (Mirza Sisic)]

Just check out several blogging platforms before deciding, a lot of them are free or very low cost.

As for topics, personally, I enjoy reading unique blog posts which come from people’s experiences. When you solve a problem at work or have some interesting thoughts it might be a good idea to turn that into a blog post, you don’t have to serious and well-planned content strategy.

You are a very knowledgeable tester, and I look forward to reading your future blog posts!

[melissafisher]

I posted my first blog back in 2018 on what i like about testing. I look back at some of my posts and cringe a little bit, however, that’s what I was thinking at the time and it’s all OK > What I like about testing. If you’re like most QA Engineers, you… | by Melissa Fisher | Medium

I would just say GO FOR IT. Don’t think too much. Hit that publish button!
Write for yourself as well as others to help digest content. Let us know your blog link … keen to have a read and support you in your writing journey.

[kristof (Kristof Van Kriekingen)]

@melissafisher

I would just say GO FOR IT. Don’t think too much. Hit that publish button!

Haha easier said then done! I’m a bit shy! XD

@mirza

As for topics, personally, I enjoy reading unique blog posts which come from people’s experiences. When you solve a problem at work or have some interesting thoughts it might be a good idea to turn that into a blog post, you don’t have to serious and well-planned content strategy.

You are a very knowledgeable tester, and I look forward to reading your future blog posts!

Thanks
I’m sure they will be ‘unique’ - I’m defo not planning to write a blog on how to do an API request with postman or something

@al8xr nice resources! Some good stuff!

[pwong (Philip)]

The main reason I did mine is mostly to demonstrate to potential employers I’m . I have trouble finding regular time to post, so my schedule is basically ‘whenever I feel like it’. Some are short (basically like tweets) and some are medium (no long blogs yet).

I would be interested to follow your blog though if you start.

[kristof (Kristof Van Kriekingen)]

@pwong

I would be interested to follow your blog though if you start.

<3

@pwong

The main reason I did mine is mostly to demonstrate to potential employers I’m

I’m not doing it for potential empoyers, I’m good where I’m at right now
I just love knowledge sharing and I believe there is so much knowledge to spread!

Also I just wanna do something new in the knowledge sharing area, besides Meetups.

[amratya]

Thanks for asking this question, and good luck with your blog.

May I piggyback your question with another one?

How do you folks find topics to write regularly about? I thought about having my own blog once, and I always have this feeling whenever I have an idea or topic: “There must be someone out there who wrote it before/better!”

I’d be happy to read your thoughts on this.
Have you ever experienced this feeling? is it valid?

[kristof (Kristof Van Kriekingen)]

@amratya

How do you folks find topics to write regularly about? I thought about having my own blog once, and I always have this feeling whenever I have an idea or topic: “There must be someone out there who wrote it before/better!”

I’m mainly going to write about exotic ways of testing, some weird test techniques and such

[alexschnapper (Alexander Schnapper)]

Hi @kristof - first of all - don’t be afraid of starting a blog or even creating a blogpost. Choose a platform you like and which is easy to handle. And the blogposts don’t have to be perfect or absolutely -science ready. They are for you, from you and for others. Go for it, blogging then becomes easier time by time.

I am into blogging since around 2000 (well, there it was just called a homepage), but did write a couple of blogs and postings since (nothing nearly business related, just mostly stuff I liked and I wanted to keep others informed). Then I connected (in earlier days on social media and on barcamps), got better and better and had a lot of fun.

Like @melissafisher stated above when looking back at old blogpost… cringy… But hey it is fun and you should stick to your fun and to what you love.
I’d be more than happy to subscribe to your RSS Feed and insert it into my feedly and read.

I also have got 20 blogposts in draft mode because i am “scared” of publishing… So much truth for experienced bloggers

[undevelopedbruce (Bruce Bruce)]

The Brucey two cents on being too shy to post is to silently have a blog and tell no one about it Don’t share your posts anywhere, and then in a year’s time be like “oh ya I guess I have this blog post for 10 months ago you could check out” and by that point it’ll be so old you won’t even care that no one likes it! That is my method, anyway.

Can’t imposter syndrome, performance anxiety or obsess over stats if you don’t tell anyone.

[flynnbops (Aaron Flynn)]

Already lots of great advice and support that I agree with %

I did a thing on this very topic at Testbash World if you have access.

Biggest block for me was “just publish something”, similar to other people. So if you already have ideas you’re nearly there! You’re not going to get thousands of people reading your post, and sending hate. You’re more likely to get a small number of lovely people you’ve shared it with read it. Also see bloggers-club

In terms of publishing schedule, I’d say if you have something you want to share, go ahead. There’ll be times you post more, or post less and thats totally OK. You don’t have to meet any targets. Be kind to yourself.

For what it’s worth. I personally am looking forward to reading your stuff.

PS. I’ve suggested something for October if anyone wants a writing prompt.

Bloggers Club / Share Your Blog Post - October 2023

Hello folks! Long time no see. Trying a Bloggers club topic - Share your post hybrid for October. So feel free to take the suggested topic as inspiration for a post. Or share what you’ve written in October. This month I’d love to hear about How do you approach continuous learning? With the topic, take it in whatever direction you like. I always see these topics as “guidelines” rather than rules. A bit like the pirate code. How to get involved Write a blog on the above topic or share …

[flynnbops (Aaron Flynn)]

@amratya

“There must be someone out there who wrote it before/better!”

Thats likely true to an extent, but only you have your unique perspective. Your experiences, context, style all make those stories different.

[cakehurstryan (Callum Akehurst-Ryan)]

I wrote a post about this The Awesome Power of Blogging where I talk about what worked for me.

I echo what many others have said, use your own voice and don’t over think things. For finding topics, I look online and see what conversations are happening around me (at work) from there I think about topics. Even if a topic is obvious to me… it might help others so I tend to write about those too.