10 Blogging Mistakes - MUFF Styleee!

Bansky - Graffiti Creative Brilliance

MUFF is writing this post about the respect and humility MUFF has for the challenge of writing a readable, engaging and hopefully entertaining blog. What makes a blog attractive? Is it funny, short, arty or just contain as much content as possible. What has MUFF done and considered to create this blog (the plan is at the end of the post) ? Importantly what MGBEB (MUFF Great Big Enormous Blunders) have been made so far. Will it \ does it meets the needs of the readership?
MUFF has been a scientist all his life and worked primarily in large corporations. MUFF had been turned into the proverbial robot happy in herds. MUFF wanted to write a blog which is a personal pursuit. The main problem was that MUFF has been a corporate employee trained to give up individuality and not to peruse risks. MUFF asked himself how in the hell does one write a blog? Never excelled in English whilst only having expertise at corporate memos and PowerPoint presentations...
How does MUFF write something readable in a sphere where professional writers can knock me out for the count????
To start the blog I needed a subject and a theme. The content was to be on financial and life planning - putting goals into a plan and making sure they happen. For a theme - boxing and the choice of the website url "www.GetInTheRingWithMe.blogspot.com". Life is a fight so the duel of boxing to win seemed to be a good fit.
Secondly an alias name was required. MUFF was borne to convey the message  "My Unconventional Freedom Fight" secondly the word MUFF is quite silly and can mean several different things and used in several ways.
Next was to get started. I had just stopped work in Feb 2012 to look after the kids. A couple of months were required to get accustomed to looking after the little ones full time. Exhausting to start with and my wife was just getting back into work mode. So I got started on this blog in June July and turned it on in August.........Is anyone going to read it?

Flop on my hands after all that work - time to change?

The first couple of months saw very modest traffic. This told me that there was a lot I was doing wrong (as usual) can MUFF learn from his mistakes?
Please read on for the MGBEB (MUFF Great Big Enormous Blunders) I have had to correct (so far):

1. How to make the posts more personal and readable. I have made mistakes in life some may be funny or a good example of what not to do and some are downright embarrassing - I must include them.
2. Fun fun fun - working for big business has made me too serious - can I shrug this off? Can I be Zac Efron and be 17 again?
3. Back up opinions with relevant, but short and sweet facts and links. It is easy to state something but it really needs to be liked to a source.
4. Know who is likely to read this blog and why they will read it. Wow a difficult one at best. Most information is browsable now (a shame) catchy headings, outlandish claims of shock horror. I want this blog to entertain at the same time as hopefully offering some practical solutions instead of just "fluff to get peoples attention.
5. A blog is personal and is about that persons goals and dreams - do they relate to other people or are they for entertainment etc. the MUFF tribe goal is to move to the French countryside so MUFF should provide a running commentary on it!
6. Don't forget your roots: MUFF is British, this is a blog by a Brit that reads around quite a few US sites. It was not British enough from the outset. This should be a British take on life, it is what I know. 
7. I have traveled extensively but have no hope in hell on commenting on other cultures without getting it completely wrong or winding someone up. Opinions should be kept to national subjects MUFF can back up with experience - Come on you dragons (Welsh Rugby Team)!
8. I did not know (and probably still do not) how to set up a blog
   1. Structure posts
   2. Link setup
   3. Easy to find related articles
   4. Email accounts
   5. Automatic email of posts (feeds)
   6. Forum's
   7. The list can go on and on (I will post this blog plan when I have a good readership to prove if the site works.....)
9. English grammar - short and sweet sentences - spellling corretly! Check check check - Some of my first posts have been revisited and corrected - not a good MUFF.
10. Read the post out loud and get a proof read - do not be afraid to drop it if the feedback is bad.

MUFF will update and add to the learning's and screw ups over time.

We all have a story to tell. MUFF hopes his life learning's will provide an informative interesting read that people can relate to and hopefully find of use. Blogging in my opinion is a great freedom of speech tool. An opportunity to provide alternative views and MUFF even dare to say an education. MUFF has definitely learnt amazing insights into life through several blogs that would never have been on the radar from school or day to day life and friends.
So if you want to start a blog yourself what are the main steps to do this? MUFF has documented all the steps to create this BLOG in a simple project plan. It is a high level overview of all of the steps that have been made so far and how it will be run going forward. It may be a good starting resource.
We all have it in us to create a blog on whatever subject we life or just use it in private as a personal journal. Personally MUFF is learning lots of new skills, clarifying what the MUFF Tribe is up to and hopefully making some new friend on the way. Why not get onto Google blog spot or Wordpress today - setup an account - write a post today. It may be the start of a great new adventure.
  
Why not have a go at writing a blog? - its easy, free and liberating ;)
MUFF
Click here for the MUFF Blog Project Plan (Open Office Spreadsheet)
Welcome New MUFF Readers! Take a look around. Start at the first article, browse the all posts or just go for a Random Post. Please feel free to play with the FREE planning tools and checklists.