It's taken me a while, but I'm getting into the habit of writing blog posts with subheadings. It doesn't come easy to me, though! This is because I started out blogging about politics and still spend a lot of time writing in this niche. And if you look at blogs focused on this subject and related ones they very rarely use subheadings.

Basically, in blogs like these you tend to elaborate on a point, investigating its nuances at length. It's like writing a newspaper column. You'll tend to include lots of text with long paragraphs that are not separated by subheadings. 

They save time 

But marketing and business blogs have a different requirement. Readers are often time poor, and are looking for useful key points and insights that they can implement immediately. So they want to be able to scan content easily. Therefore a chunky, punchy style is much more suitable.

They aid selling

And it has real benefits if you're using your blog to sell products and services. In that case you'll want to make your posts not just verbally compelling but visually so as well. Subheadings, along with bolded and italicized sections, bullet points and the like can give a blog a much more striking, lively appearance.

They improve clarity

Just as this style is appreciated by readers, it also has advantages from a writing perspective. If you use subheadings, they make you think about what each part of your post is really getting at. So they help you improve post clarity. 

They suggest other ideas

Subheadings can also help generate other ideas. If you look at several subheadings, the list will often suggest related concepts. You can include those in the post. So subheadings can help you expand a short basic post into something longer and more substantial, without any fluff.

If you have a blog it's very easy to get obsessed with the mechanical, technical aspects of traffic generation. You find yourself constantly thinking about backlinks, keywords, anchor text, and Alexa ratings etc. Odds are you'll also be checking your stats regularly, wondering how to lift those visitor numbers. These activities can take up a lot of time and make blogging seem like hard work!

It's important not to fall into this trap. It is putting the cart before the horse.

If you focus on what you enjoy, then follow that, it's a much more pleasant approach. And you end up with better results in the long term. (Well, perhaps that's not entirely true. You do have to promote your blog to some degree, particularly on social media. But you should try to keep that enjoyable too. Ease up if it's becoming a chore!)

You can find enjoyment in writing your posts, of course. You can also do this when reading other blogs, and commenting on them. 

As any blogger knows, comment backlinks have long been a ranking factor. Even though most of these are set to "nofollow" by default, having a lot of them linking back to your domain still seems to help with SEO. So a lot of bloggers continue to spam the crap out of squillions of blogs, or pay others to do this. This doesn't work nearly as well as before, and can result in the linked to site being penalized. Yet it still happens a lot. That constantly amazes me!

Really, it's so much better to forget about the link you're getting when leaving a comment. Do it because you like the content and have something interesting to add to it. 

Rather than think "I should do some commenting" go looking for blogs in your niche that you'll enjoy reading. If you find ones that are stimulating, informative and interesting then commenting will just come naturally.

You'll write much better comments because you've got the right attitude. And the odds that you'll strike up a friendship with the blogger go way up. If they develop these relationships can be enduring and keep delivering benefits indefinitely, particularly if the blogger is influential. 

They'll link to your blog in the body of posts from time to time. Or they'll share your content on social networks. SEO benefits aside, their endorsement of you will be seen by others, and add credibility and authority to your name. 

Blog commenting remains one of the best ways to forge meaningful connections with influencers. But this will never happen if you're just doing it for the backlinks. Do it because you genuinely like to read them. If you have this intention it will be much more pleasant, as well as beneficial over the long term. 

Having images in blog posts is not absolutely vital. But it certainly helps make them more appealing, and therefore shareable ... But you can't use just any old image. It's gotta be appropriate. And you don't want to be spending ages looking for the right photo to go with a blog post you've already written.

I've long found this process of finding just the right image a bit of a chore to be honest. That's because I do a lot of blogging in the political and news commentary niche.

Since much of that is topical and involves a lot of rhetoric, ideology and quotes, text is all important. While it's nice to include images, not having them in posts seems not to negatively impact them. If they're good and timely, they still get shared a lot. That being my main blogging niche, I've found it a bit of a challenge to get into the habit of including pictures in posts on this blog and others. 

Reverse the process

Still, I'm well aware of how powerful paintings, photos and infographics in blog posts can be. So I've been thinking about how to include them without spending so much time finding them. And I suggest this more streamlined method:

Instead of writing posts then looking for images, why not do it the other way around? A picture paints a thousand words, after all. (And that length is actually a good one for a blog post. If it's fairly long it is more likely to rank well in the search engines, remember.)

So, get into the habit of collecting free images that you like and that inspire thoughts and observations. Then write comprehensive posts elaborating on these themes.

Obviously this will save time. It will also make the posts themselves more relevant to the images.

Use photos you've taken yourself

This approach is also a good motivation for taking your own photos. If you have a locally oriented blog (as I do) then it's ideal. You can take photos of local landmarks and write detailed and interesting posts about them. Put the geo-specific keywords in the titles and your posts are sure to rank highly for them.

But you can take photos of objects that can be used metaphorically as well. For example, an apple can symbolize health, nature, or even sin! You can include a photo of a stairwell to communicate the concept of progress, ambition, or raised consciousness. Pretty much everything you see around you can be used metaphorically. When associated with clear and well written content it will be absolutely clear what it symbolizes. And it will thereby complement that content nicely. 

So it's a good idea to keep your camera on you. Whenever you see something that can be used in a symbolic way to inspire a blog post, take a snap of it. It doesn't have to be artistically stunning -- just clear and crisp. Doing this will save lots of time. You'll also avoid copyright issues that sometimes eventuate if you use free images from sites like Flickr. 

Clearly, the internet has had a huge impact on the way information is disseminated -- not to mention absorbed by readers, listeners and viewers. It's been a hugely liberating medium for anyone who has something to say about a subject they know and love.

In the past you, if you wanted to convey your thoughts and opinions to even a small number of people you had only a few options:

You could take the time to write a book and submit it for publication. Or you paid to have it published yourself.

You could also become a regular columnist with a newspaper or magazine. That was a difficult thing to achieve. Media organizations didn't give such roles to anyone. To be in the running you either had to be on their payroll as a journalist already, or earn sufficient credibility over a long period of time working as a freelancer. Occasionally, people who were highly successful already in their profession or business niche could score a regular column in some publication or other.

All these avenues required years of work, and ultimately a bit of luck. They were all so involved and time consuming that they were simply beyond the reach of most people.

While all of these paths are still available, and many who work in the media pursue them, there's another one that's open to pretty much everybody: blogging.

You can immediately start publishing thoughts about your field of interest. If you keep at it, and make sure you share your posts on social media, you can slowly but surely garner a decent following.

Sure, it's likely that your readership will never rival that of a typical columnist for a daily newspaper
Still, you can certainly end up with respectable numbers of regular readers -- and even make some money as a result. This is enormously satisfying.

Actually, it can be so rewarding that I suspect many who dreamed of having their own syndicated column have settled for the niche market domination that a blog affords.

And what bloggers lack in readership they can make up for in engagement. As well as being an online column, a blog is a kind of community. It's very much a two way process.

Of course today's high profile columnists are expected to engage with their audience online. But the vast majority of their readers don't actually converse with them in comments. They just read their weekly offerings in the printed edition.

In the blogosphere, however, everyone who reads your work can comment, and many do. This gives you a more accurate picture of how your views are perceived, I believe.

There's another advantage to blogging: You can say pretty much whatever you want, however you want (as long as you are not defaming someone, of course). This is not the case if you are working for a big media company. And as well as legal issues there are political considerations to take into account -- not to mention the sensitivities of major sponsors. This could really wear at your soul, particularly if you are a bit of a free spirit.

Last but not least, with a blog you can just take a break whenever you feel like it. That's certainly not the case if you're contracted to crank out a certain number of words every week. Having to do so could end up being a burden after a while, even if you're being well compensated for your work.

There are countless blog posts about the advantages of blogging. But there are negative aspects too. Ironically, a big downside stems from one of the best things about it, namely the freedom it affords. This is because too much freedom can actually spoil you. 

The immediacy of blogging means you can satisfy your desire for self expression very easily. If you're passionate and creative this is reason enough to throw yourself into it.

Liberating and exciting

You don't have to be making any money from it. You don't even have to have many readers. Just getting your thoughts out onto the web for others to read is immensely liberating and exciting. Best of all, you can do it in your own way without having anyone demand any changes.

But the obvious freedom this medium affords contains within it a kind of trap: The longer you write whatever you want, whenever you want, the less able you are to take criticism. You can even become inflexible when it comes to writing style.

Becoming selfish is a risk

This can have an effect on your earning potential if you do make money from freelance writing. Being so used to doing things entirely on your own terms, you can become not only less adept, but also less motivated to write in the way that your prospective clients require.

Even if you don't write for money, it can be deleterious to the blog itself. This is because you can end up blogging for yourself entirely, and eventually end up figuratively disappearing into your own mind! You can alienate many readers this way and ultimately lose them.

Your readers should come first

The way to counter this tendency is to constantly remind yourself to keep your readers in mind. Before posting, ask yourself: Am I only doing this for myself, or is there value for readers? Would they enjoy this content and want to share it?

Do this and you'll retain the buzz of writing on your own terms, while still offering value to readers and thereby growing your audience. And if you write for money you'll remain open to outside opportunities and flexible enough to complete them in an accomplished manner.