Getting started with blogging:a guide for Liberal Democrats
Edited by Mark Pack,
co-editor, Lib Dem Voice(www.LibDemVoice.org)
bloggers? by Mat Bowles(matgb.dreamwidth.org) .................................................................... 4
2
Introduction
by Mark Pack
In the run-
up to Christmas 2009, Liberal Democrat Voice ran a series of “how to”
posts about political blogging written by a range of different Liberal Democratbloggers. As befits a diverse range of liberals, not all of the authors agree fully onall the issues touched on in the series, but that diversity was a strength
–
because
there isn‟t only one way to blog or only one way to blog „correctly‟.We‟ve now gathered slightly updated versions of the posts together in this e
-book.Whether you are thinking of starting your own blog, a novice blogger or an oldhand I hope you find this guide useful.I am very grateful to all the authors of the pieces for providing them so promptlyfor the original publication and for helping with the creation of this compilation.All of this of course assumes blogging might be a worthwhile way to spend some ofyour time. So what might the point of blogging be?
Blogging can be fun:
I‟ve recently started doing a post each Monday morning over
on my own blog highlighting anodd quote from Hansard
.There‟s only one reason
for doing this: I like hunting out the quotes and I hope a few other people will findthem amusing too. But even if no-one else reads them, I still get fun out of thequote hunting.
Blogging gives you a voice
: Just because you have a blog that doesn‟t mean the
world will immediately start reading it, though future posts in this series will helpyou on the way to an audience at least the size of Lichtenstein. But if you wantother people to hear your views, making a success of a blog is one of the bestroutes to take.Many people in the party
–
from the passive supporter who gives a donation once ayear through to Nick Clegg himself
–
read blogs, as do journalists of both nationaland local variety, people in other parties and so on. Make a success of your blogand all of those and more could be reading your words.Some of the more successful bloggers even often have their stories picked up bythe national media. That may be a little way off when you write your first post
–
but remember many of those people have not been blogging for that long. It
doesn‟t take years to join their ranks.
Blogging can help you win elections:
If you decide to have a blog aimedprimarily at the public (rather than at fellow Liberal Democrats), it can build up alocal audience in your ward or constituency that is a major boost to our othercampaigning in the area.
3Blogging may not win elections on its own but when done well it does help
–
andLynne Featherstonegives her blogging and other online campaigning a key rolein explaining why she is now an MP.
Blogging can be a good way of learning a skill:
One style of blogging is to takenews from other places and then write up a story about that news. Being able toquickly but accurately grasp a story, find something interesting to say about it andwrite it up in a clear and compelling way is a skill that is useful in many othercontexts, such as writing news releases, stories for political leaflets or evenproducing a staff newsletter at work. There are tips and tricks unique to each ofthese areas, but there is a common skill across them all.
The above list isn‟t comprehensive and with
the other pieces in this book you willpick up a flavour of the diversity of motivations and methods there are. One factor
is common amongst all the authors: for all its moments of frustration and writer‟s
block, blogging is also a great source of knowledge, interest and above all fun.
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Blogging Guide
How to be a Liberal Democrat blogger: the collected set of articles from Liberal Democrat Voice (www.LibDemVoice.org)
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