Sports Blogging for Beginners
Published: 02/22/2010 by Craig Tacheny
So you’re looking to enter the blogosphere but you’re not sure where or how to start? Here are five tips that will help you get your blog off to a great start.
No. 1: Everyone needs an editor.
I don’t care how clever or snarky or original your sports blog is, if it reads as if it’s been written by a fourth grader, no one will care. Take time to edit for grammar and punctuation, and make sure you’ve got your facts straight. Wrongly state Albert Pujols’ 2009 OPS as 1.110 and not, 1.101, as it in fact was, and you’ll quickly lose any credibility you might have had. Also, make sure you let someone else read it before you click “post now.” A neutral pair of eyes will notice small mistakes better than your own.
No. 2: Start local.
Have aspirations of being the next Bill Simmons or Joe Posnanski? So do I, but remember before Simmons was the Sports Guy, he was the Boston Sports Guy. As a sports blogger you have better access to your local team(s), which you can follow more closely and blog in more detail about. I love baseball, and being a Minnesota boy, write about the Twins, not the Yankees or the Phillies.
No. 3: Stick with what you know (at least to start with).
When it comes to sports blogging, make sure you’re not punching above your weight. Some people think it’s a good idea to weigh in on a national story (Tiger Woods, anything the Yankees or Lakers do, etc.) to try and cash in on the high amount of search traffic related to those topics, but I disagree. Readers go to the big sites – Yahoo!, ESPN, SI.com – for the big stories. It’s more important to build your credibility and readership at the local level by being an informed expert on your team(s) than to throw your two cents in on every major headline.
No. 4: Get the word out.
I know you have a Facebook profile, a Twitter account and a bevy of other content sharing sites. Use them all to your advantage. Post your latest sports blog to all of them. It’s OK to be redundant. Your Facebook friends are not going to be mad at you for posting the same blog post in your News Feed and on Technorati. These sites are great for picking up readers. Use them. Now.
No. 5: Write, write and write. Then, write some more.
If your team’s right fielder just hit for the cycle, blog about it. If the center for your hockey club scored a natural hat trick, blog about it; the more you write the more likely it is that people will regularly visit your blog for your latest take on what’s happening in the sports universe.
I know I said I’d give you five tips but here are a few others, consider this overtime:
- Give your sports blog a relevant name (TwinsFan CT or Dolphins Dish or whatever) so readers instantly know what
to expect.
- Read lots of other blogs to get a feel for what works.
- And last but not least, stick with it, even if it’s not a great success at first. Even Rome wasn’t built in a day.
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