Pet Blogging 101: Writing that First Post

By: Pam Hoerauf

Your first post sets the tone for your blog. Too many bloggers don’t plan ahead and end up with a “Here’s my blog, now what?” post. Your first post should do three things: Introduce you to your audience, introduce your pet to your audience, and give your audience a feel for the tone your blog will have.

What Should You Focus On?

The main focus should be on the person or pet who will be doing the ‘talking’ on the blog. If the blog is written from your pet’s point of view, have them introduce themselves, and talk about where they come from and what their personality is like. Describe their favorite activities, favorite places, favorite foods, etc. Introduce other pets in the house and the role they play in relation to the main author.

If you are going to be the protagonist, then introduce yourself and the pets you’ll be blogging about, and describe your background with animals. Tell the reader what you hope to do with your blog. Is it mainly to amuse them? Will you have a strong focus on rescue?  Is it to educate the reader in some way? Will you be focusing on product reviews? Maybe it’s all of these things! Give your readers a general idea of who you are and what they can expect to find on your website.

Talk about where you live. You don’t have to be super specific, but if you live in the mountains and will have lots of posts about hiking, let the reader know. Are you a big city family? Tell people that you’ll be sharing pet-friendly venues with them.

Of course, let the reader know if you have a Twitter account they can follow, or a Facebook page they can like. Get them connected to you in as many ways as you can.

Things To Avoid

Don’t tell your whole story in the first post. Instead, tell just enough to touch on all of the major players—you want to leave your readers wanting more.

In addition, it’s important to always remember that unless you actually are an expert on a topic, you shouldn’t make yourself out to be more of an authority than you are. Coming off as too close-minded will not bring readers back to your blog.

The last thing you may want to avoid is the breeder/rescue debate. It’s one of the most volatile issues around today, and your blog doesn’t need to turn into ground zero because of your opinion. Of course, talk about the things you are passionate about, but try not to alienate readers by being too opinionated.

Don’t stress about it too much! The first post is not the end-all-be-all of your blog—just write in a way you enjoy, and share things you think others will find interesting. Your first post sets the tone for your blog, so make it fun, upbeat, and happy, and people will want to come back.

Pam Hoerauf created and maintains The Daily Oskar and Pet Blogs United. She is owned by Oskar, an excessively handsome Miniature Schnauzer and 2 cats, Chloe & Moe. She’ll be here every other week sharing with TAILS readers everything there is to know about pets and social media!

Tagged pet blogging