Last Monday, Apples & Snakes held a training day. As part of the itinary I held a session exploring the glories of web 2.0 in particular blogging, Skype, information management tools (such as Google Docs and MyYahoo) and RSS. The main aim was to get everyone comfortable with using these tools. One of the exercises involved splitting up into four groups and analysing some blogs (ranging from great examples to award winningly awful) before writing a paragraph based on one of four questions about blogging and posting it onto here! To make life easier, I’ve collated the posts and compiled them below…

Training Group 1

The Purpose of Writing blogs…

Blogs are a very useful tool to get feedback on work if you are in a development stage. They are also useful in getting more exposure for a particular event or project. They foster audience interaction and investment in particular projects, and are a good source of dialogue for people who are far away from each other.  In less interesting cases, people seem to use blogs to publicise their own neuroses.

Do you have any thoughts on the purpose of blogs? How have they been helpful to you in the past? Leave a comment…

Training Group 2

Blog It Write!!!!!!!!

Keep it short.

Be aware of self-indulgence. There is a difference between expressing yourself and witless drivel.

People will connect to you if they feel you are talking to them personally.

Be aware of your audience – it is a dialogue not a monologue.

Before you write, think: is this for the public domain?!

If you use keywords people will be able to search for posts they have a personal interest in.

Blogs that work best often have a clear personality, differentiating them from more corporate or traditional website.

Leaving questions open so people can respond and enter into conversation is a good way to get people interacting rather than just reading – surveys & voting, videos, photos/visuals to comment on are other ways of engaging.

Linking (to other people’s blogs) is a good way to create a community, and good blog etiquette.  if you refer to something your audience might not know about using hyperlinks makes it accessible and stops people feeling alienated.

Training Group 3

Well, this picture says it all, doesn’t it?  Or does it?…

Pictures and videos as visual aids are a way for viewers to burrow into your experiences, new items and countless other happenings all over the world.

Here’s Chikodi, Russell and George from the Apples & Snakes team at a training day pondering the possibilities of the visual.  We all agreed that if you’re gonna post pictures make it relevant!  (Like, ahem, this one)…

Training Group 4

How to choose a blog topic

Here are a few things for you to bear in mind when tackling your first obstacle for posting a blog…

1. It needs to be relevant to the blog you’re adding to

2. Ideally interesting to others and to you yourself [something you're passionate about]

3. Write about what you know or what you wish to know about

4. Enjoy it!