How to blog a poem: 8 tips to get you started

Is there a proper way to blog a poem? No. I don’t believe so. Simply, poetry as an art form is very subjective to poet and reader in different ways. It promotes freedom of speech, freedom of written word and expression, so trying to foster any rules is actually diminishing its essential function as an art piece. But I also believe it is important for us to acknowledge we are living in a digital world and available technological tools we can use in our own advantage to reach more like-minded readers, spread our message and have desired impact in the world.

Technology paired with different art forms, such as poetry is birthing other artistic, somehow hybrid, multimedia forms and that’s the moment where all the fun begins.

Becoming creative on how you present your poems, how you enhance the written word can have a great influence on your reader. Especially this could be of interest for newly established poetry blogs. Words should always be your focus, but how you access your audience across diverse social media platforms is also important.

Almost any blog platform, just as wordpress allow authors to post different types of content like photos and videos. You can pair your poem with suitable photo to accentuate the atmosphere and experience you want to convey, but even more important it can be using feature to record yourself reading your poem. Your voice and your emotions have a great power to move your readers, and you sharing your deepest intimacy in such way is making any feeling, image and interpretation even more believable and true.

To get your reader more acquainted with your poetry pieces, you can share your opinion on different poetry styles, your writing and creative process, how poetry impacts your life, your favorite poems and poets. This is a great opportunity for someone who is new to poetry and your blog to get acquainted with your background, style formats, different poets. You can form a page like ‘start here’ to present such information.

If you have attention of becoming more professional writer, than your blog becomes your portfolio, where you showcase pieces of your work.

So what are the actual steps you can do to improve your blogging process?

1. My experience has shown that it is the best to blog at least few times a week. You are getting your readers accustomed to reading regular content and it is also good routine to get you in a writing mode. To make it easier, you can draft a lose editorial schedule to keep you focused and on track.
2. Pick 2 -3 social media platforms you are most comfortable and connect with your wordpress account. Do your research and see where your writing style fits best – like Instagram and Tumblr are very popular for short and visual poetry. Use Publicize feature which allows you to directly publish your post to your social media accounts. Make sure in the title to use adequate hashtags as it will make your post more prominent and easier to find.
3. To consolidate your audience, you can start building you email list of subscribers by installing a prominent signup or MailChimp account offering something like ‘next week’s poem in your inbox’.
4. Other cool thing I liked and some writers have been doing is collecting their most popular pieces and offering them as a bundle in pdf booklet or ebook that readers could download for free. It’s a great promotional tool for you to show to prospective publishers and media agencies.
5. Use small snippets and excerpts of your poems to engage your followers on twitter and drive that traffic back to your site.
6. Consider submitting your poetry to different literary journals. You can treat your blog as a writer’s resume and update your blog regularly with your published work. In such way you are building your writer’s reputation.
7. Repost. You can ‘recycle’ your old content/poem by refreshing or publishing it in the same form which allows newcomers to your blog to get acquainted with your older poems/articles.
8. And maybe best advice one can give you is, to follow your instinct and publish your poems in a way you think best represents what you want to say. Reading poetry is unique experience, just as your writing. Be open to learn and experiment and with time you will develop your recognizable style.

As long as you keep your readers engaged and keep conversation going, they will frequently return to read new content. And more importantly share your beautiful poems 🙂

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