 Hi everyone and welcome back to another vlog. My name is Claire Carmichael and I'm a newly qualified general practiceness. So the next part of this vlog is all about blogging. I know I'm doing a vlog about blogging, weird. So yeah if you're thinking about blogging, if you're getting into blogging, you don't know where to start, you don't know what to do, oh my god, this is the video for you. This is the second half of the video for you, amazing. Thank you so much for staying to the second half. Well thank you for skipping to the second half, amazing. Just thank you for joining. First things first, just get on Google and Google literally. Google, blogging, free blog insights, there's so many freebies out there, do not pay for it, you don't need to pay for it. Honestly if you're just starting out, I just used the basic WordPress and that was it and I didn't pay for it, I didn't have anything and then when I got my scholarship I did use the money to sort of pay for a WordPress so I could have my own URL and things like that but that was just a little privilege that I had and the sort of goals that I had and what I wanted to do with my blogging site so that was just my personal things but there are free stuff out there, please don't go out and pay ridiculous money for a blogging site, like it's a site, it's fine as long as you're getting your message out there and people are reading them, it doesn't matter if you have your own URL or not honestly. Now I personally use WordPress because I found it just really easy to navigate around, really easy to set up, it's got free themes so you can have your own theme on your blogs and I just found it really simple to use and then sit down and have a think about what you want to write so if you're a nursing related person a lot of things that people put as their first blog is their journey so why they went into nursing and why they want to become a nurse and I think that's quite a common theme for a lot of people they want to show that journey and say a little bit about themselves, keep it open and honest as well really really helps so yeah so if you're thinking about a first blog to write write about why you want to become a nurse or your journey or something to give the readers a little bit of your life and what sort of a person you are that makes them think do you know what I'm going to come back to this person and read their blogs again. I always write my blogs on Word document first I type it all out correct any spelling get it proofread do all of that and then I think okay this is ready so then I'll copy and paste it onto WordPress and then I will schedule it publish it whatever and put it out there but a good tip is just to maybe do it on Word document first save it as you go don't lose any of your stuff but if you want to do it straight onto WordPress that's okay as well because I have done that as well especially as a student when I was doing these two hour journeys to placements I would see it and I would just type out a blog on my WordPress on my phone just it makes that journey go so much faster I've got so many blogs back then I used to blog all the time on my phone however when I was at home on my laptop I did use Word document just to correct everything and just so I could see it better and things like that it really did help so yeah so don't be afraid to just type it out on WordPress first or whatever blog site you use first yeah just be careful of spelling mistakes that's the only thing it's in grammar because there is the grammar police out there that will correct you for it sometimes don't worry about it too much as long as you've got your message out there and you're writing from the heart it doesn't matter so a lot of the tips I gave for my vlogs also work in blogs as well so things like the title using keywords for your title so putting the word nurse in there or nursing things that you know people are going to be searching on google to find your blog and what your blog is about put that keep it simple also apparently on WordPress I don't know if this is for other blog sites I'm assuming it is but you can tick what categories your blog sits in and you can do the hashtags as well so a tip that I discovered was put less categories so only put two to three max categories but then hashtag quite a lot I don't know if that works or not but that's what I've always done since reading that tip and I get a few views so I'm assuming it kind of does something I don't know but yeah that was just something that I read upon and yeah I've been using that ever since so I usually put my categories as student nurse nursing or newly qualified nurse sometimes it depends what the blog's actually about and then I will hashtag everything to do with nursing student university work live GP whatever I will put all the hashtags as well my next tip is write about what you love don't think oh I really need to write this blog because it'll be really good and I should write it write about what you're interested in write about even if you're not a nurse and you want to write about books like book reviews that's quite a good one actually writing about book reviews if you really love reading books if you like going to the movies and reviewing movies like just write what you're passionate about what sets your soul on fire because that is going to come across in the right in the way you type it and everything and just another point to make actually about the way you type things it doesn't matter how you write a blog this is your blog this is like your diary in a way this is your journal this is your documentation it's not somebody else's this isn't masters this isn't a phd at university this is very much real it's yours so the way you write it is the way you write it you don't have to structure it in a way or anything like that just again like I said right from the heart right from the soul and just get it out there just whatever you your passion is do it and Dylan has decided to join us here hi Dylan one thing I will say about structuring your blogs is if you're talking about something and there's a link or a website for that put it in there link it because people like to see like go through links on blogs and it just looks a little bit more professional as well sometimes like if you want to write something in particular that you're passionate about so for example I wrote something about continuing healthcare and package of care but because I knew there was a lot of government links and nhs links and stuff like that that people could read on I included them as it was almost like a reference in a way but I wrote it but then I added the link so then people could go and actually have a look a bit of the research around it as well I think that's a really good way to get people interested and intrigued and gives people useful information as well if you're doing that sort of a blog next tip is don't be too scared to add pictures into your blog to use videos do different colors like this is your blog like I said make it your own make it unique don't copy other people this is yours and this is yours to create anything you want from it everybody is individual everyone is a unique in their own way and everyone will have different writing styles so you have to find what works for you and just again you do you forget about comparing yourself to other people because it's it's not the way forward you don't need to do that because you are an amazing person on your own and you will write amazing blogs when they come from the heart so word count for blogs I tend to stick to about five to six hundred words I try not to make it too long-winded because I don't want people to get bored and just of reading reading reading a lot of people are very busy you've got assignment you've got exams you've got work to do you're a full-time parent you've got family to look after all these different things so people might not have the time to read a full-on blog that's like pages long so I do try to keep mine to five to six hundred words maximum sometimes I go up to 800 and that's okay but yeah I try and edit mine cut it down I always ask myself why am I writing this do I need it no okay delete it and that sort of keeps me on track and in target of that sort of word count but that's what I do I stick to a word count just to make it less boring for people and to save me waffling too much as well about things that really aren't relevant a little bit like this video and my last tip is share share share if you're vlogging blogging whatever you're doing share it across all social media platforms get it out there don't be afraid to tag people so if you're writing stuff on the nhs for example and you want people to see it tag trusts in it tag the cno in it tag nhs england in it don't be afraid to tag people in your in your stuff to get it seen and they will also read it and retweet it if they they find it really useful for other people so it's a really good way to get it out there and get people to read your blogs and stuff and on my last and final note if you're thinking well why should I blog and vlog and why is the reason that people vlog and blog should it is it for me um again it's up to you but I know that from my vlogging and my blogging I've had some amazing opportunities so I've put my vlogs out there I've put my blogs out there and I've done stuff like talking at a conference for example I've gone to the nursing times career events and did like a big Q&A with people and I've just had all these amazing opportunities from my vlogging and blogging and it's just a really really good way to get yourself out there get your get some positive following behind you and not only that but it makes you stand out a bit when you're going for a job for example you can put it into your cv or your application that you do blogging and you've been published for example and that's just going to make you really stand out from the crowd when you go for your interview as well they're going to remember you for these little things that are different from other people so yeah so hopefully that persuades you a little bit to vlog and blog but also it's just really nice to look back at your journey I love looking back at my journey and seeing how far I've come and how resilient I've been come and how I've improved and grown as a person as well throughout these vlogs and blogs that I've written it's just really nice to reflect on and that's a really nice thing to do anyway I'm going to shut up because I'm waffling so yeah that is it from me everybody massive good luck to you all if you're going to pick up that camera if you're going to pick up that metaphoric pen get vlogging get vlogging and if you need any more further advice or any tips or anything I haven't covered in this vlog if I've missed anything out if there's things that I haven't covered that you want to know please ask me comment below and I will cover it no problem at all and yeah so thank you so much again as always for tuning in thank you so much for following my journey and I hope you all have an amazing week