The Huffington Post Complete Guide to Blogging

“The Huffington Post Complete Guide to Blogging” is an A-Z guide to all things blog-related that is as entertaining as it is informative. HuffPost editors break down to get a handle on this powerful new way of communicating. The potential blogger will learn everything about creating a blog and getting their blog noticed.

Some Background:

The Huffington Post -”The Internet Newspaper”-was founded by Arianna Huffington and Kenneth Lerer in May 2005, and quickly took the Internet by storm. The Huffington Post offers extensive coverage of politics, media, business, entertainment, living, style, and “green” [In violently liberal fashion]. It’s 24-hour news coverage regularly publishes scoops and is well-known for its high-profile contributors, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Larry David, Nora Ephron, Madeleine Albright, and other liberals…

What I found interesting about the book is that Huffington hardly contributes to it. Some would argue, “how could she contribute to it, anyways? I mean, the Huffington Post is a 24-7 content-aggregating beast.” Very true. And, I see this side clearly, but still, perhaps some more audio-based dictation would be nice? Clearly, she has some nice delegation skills.

My minor rant aside, I find that the book starts out nice, seems put together in a compact fashion and is worth a serious look.

Before going any further, though, I must make is crystal clear that this is the first book I’ve ever read on blogging. I tend to learn from trial and error. Yes, I’ve encountered errors (for reference, check out http://newportventuregroup.com — my first concoction).

So, what I’m getting at:

I was really hoping to find some valuable nuggets in her book. I did, and here are some of my favorite sections of the book:

Four Rules to Make a Blog Memorable:

1) The message must relate directly to the readers’ personal experience: “Memorable messages don’t just make you think about a subject–they make you feel, taste, smell, or hear the content.”

2) Make readers react emotionally: Whether you make your readers laugh, cry or mad, you’ll need to engage emotions to make them comment

3) Memorable messages often include an element of surprise: “They include the unexpected.”

4) Confusion leads to distraction: If your readers don’t understand the relevance or subject, they’ll move on. Quickly.

Three Characteristics of Generating Buzz Posts (popular posts):

1) Write about some breaking news

2) Offer noteworthy facts and data (not opinions)

3) Give something a new spin

- Your goal should be to get your reader to say, “Wow, I haven’t thought of it that way before.”

Become a good blogging neighbor:

- Update other blogging friends’ about topics related to their field

- Link to your blogging friends’ blogs, and their stories

The Huffington Post Rules For Great Blogging:

1) Blog Often

2) Perfect is the enemy of done (don’t try to have each post be perfect)

3) Write like you speak

4) Focus on specific details

5) Own your topic

6) Know your audience

7) Write short
Become part of the conversation with like-minded blogs

“A good post is a single thought or observation or anecdote, clearly expressed and directly conveyed. An essay may cover several topics; a post easily grows tiresome if it aims for more than one.”

The Art of E-Pitching

- Make sure your subject headline is short and snappy

- (No lengthy intros, stick with one or two lines, don’t be afraid to be bold and have an opinion)

- Move fast (respond instantaniously to current, hot news)

- Target your audience (do your research)

- Build relationships

- [I love this one]: If a blog picks you up, e-mail a note to say “thanks.”

Don’t forget mainstream media

- There’s no such thing as perfect PR

- Be polite

Best practices for building a community

- Create clear community guidelines

- Ask readers for input

- Read and respond to your comments

- Rate and reward good comments

- Keep the conversation going

- Admin when you are wrong

- Nix spam

- Keep people in line

If you liken this book to one of the books in the Bible, this one is Genesis. It tells you about the beginning, how blogging came into being and shares some deadly sins to avoid, which many people disregard. Furthermore, it ties into it some new testament blogging evangelism. And it also offers some quaint commandments that every blogger should embrace, whether born-again or a new believer in blogging.