I have been writing a college football blog since sometime in 2006. It has been a lot of fun, and it was my first training ground for writing a blog. Several bloggers were very helpful to me when I started out, but some were not. A lot of the help depends on the person, but all-in-all, it has been a good experience.
As a sports blogger, I have learned a lot about how to run a blog. Many of the tips I learned in that area I have brought with me to my other areas of blogging and writing. Some have been confirmed by other bloggers such as Copyblogger, Problogger and Chris Brogan.
So, I am going to articulate five of the lessons I learned about blogging from my time blogging about college football.
1. Magnetic Headlines
This is where the sports bloggers often excel over many of the folks in today’s print media. It is unfortunate, but the sports bloggers know how to sell an article with a title. Compare these two titles form the weekend of October 2-3:
Washington’s Jake Locker leads way as USC loses for first time under Lane Kiffin (USA Today)
versus
Huskies put USC back in its place, which is anywhere but the top of the Pac-10 by Matt Hinton, otherwise known as Dr. Saturday.
2. Videos
Visit a top sports blog website, and you will find lots of videos. Videos serve different purposes, but mostly, people like to watch videos rather than read words. As a crafter of words, I don’t like that, but it’s reality. Therefore, videos need to be used regularly. They are what is known as “sticky” content. Youtube and Vimeo has made it easier, plus several other media websites offer the ability to embed their videos in your page. It’s really pretty easy to do.
Token Video
You watched it didn’t you?
To be continued. . . I leaned that from them too. . . . it’s called creating a “hook.” 🙂
photo credit: joelogon