Blogging 31 days straight is hard. If you’re not used to writing every day it gets more grueling as the month wears on.

Some people who signed up for the 2011 WordCount Blogathon didn’t make it past the first week. Others got to the second or third week before succumbing to a busy day at work, illness, lack of an idea for a post. Some just plain ran out of gas.

Then there was Blogger.com. A maintenance issue shut it down on May 12, taking posts and comments from dozens of blogathoners with it (most everything was restored a few days later).

But for the bloggers who gutted it out, the annual challenge to post every day in May was a rewarding experience in more ways than one.

On many levels, this year’s blogathon was the most successful ever. More than 200 people signed up, close to double the number who participated last year, though as I said before, not everybody made it to the finish line. Of the people who registered, 83 percent took the challenge for the first time, 13 percent for a second time, 2 percent for a third and only 1 percent had taken part all four years.

A healthy portion used the annual community blogging challenge to launch their first blog, or their second or third. Others turned a blog that had been all over the place into something focused on a specific subject. Some used the time to experiment with widgets, self hosted platforms, RSS feeds, adding links or images to posts and other technical aspects of blogging. They hung out on the blogathon Google Group to talk about how to get more comments and drive more traffic to their sites.

Some bloggers hit the jackpot.

• More.com picked up a post called The Middle Place that Rachael Vidori wrote for her East Coast Musings blog during the blogathon.
• Laura, who blogs at In My Little Town, had a post she originally intended to publish on her own blog accepted by McSweeney’s, the literary magazine and website.
• Pavithra K., a Indian software coder who wants to be a freelance writer landed her first paid gig.
• No less than three professional storytellers noticed and recommended short stories that Florida writer and storyteller Billie Oakes posted on her blog, The Billie Gram, during the month.
• Joan Lambert Bailey’s posts on her Tokyo urban farm blog Popcorn Homestead got her an invitation to blog at a new urban farming website.
• My editor at SecondAct.com asked me to write about people using the blogathon for a life transformation; you can see that post here: Blogging Their Way to a Mid-Life Makeover.

Many others reported huge increases in readership and comments during the month

During the month, bloggers shared their favorite books and places to write. They wrote haiku, exchanged guest posts and experimented with data visualization.

Yesterday, several dozen of them attended a Twitter chat to discuss about what they loved, hated and learned.

Here’s a recap of what they shared. Generally I write chat recaps in article form. But I thought people who missed being there would appreciate seeing replies in their raw state so it’d feel like they were there. To find out more about any of these bloggers, copy and paste their username into Twitter’s search window.

Favorite Parts of This Year’s Blogathon

@Tia_Bach_Author Finding a community of resources to continue to grow my blog (but shockingly also haiku day)

@teachwhatisgood Google Groups, without a doubt. Helpful and very supportive.

@bikelady The opportunity to meet a whole new set of bloggers. So many topics.

@lauranewmanny Sharing tips on better blogging and exchanging guest posts. Expanding audience for Patient POV.

@ClaudineMJ The community was great and I loved reading new blogs. Loved all the tips/tricks too. And the pressure to get it done.

@HarryCMarks Realizing my blog found a voice & actually fell out of the realm of the blogathon’s theme days. I’m different!

@radiatinggnome I appreciated having goal – the drive to write every day forced a lot of creativity.

@pegc Learning from the other blogs and reading how everyone handles issues that come up in blogging.

@jwalkerwrites The guest post exchange, meeting new people & just having a goal, which gave me a new enthusiasm for blogging.

@LaraSalahiABC There were so many times I thought that it wouldn’t hurt to skip a day… but I thought of the blog as a story I had to tell!

Hardest Part of Blogging Every Day

@reellifejane Posting every day was a challenge, but getting in a groove helps. Also seeing the boost in traffic numbers. And I must confess I actually back-posted a few times! So I’m not in the running for any prizes.

@MenaGrazie Finding time to read and comment on all the great content was the hardest thing. I’m sure I missed a ton of stuff.

@intralingo The time it took… loved it but sometimes it distracted me from paying work.

@billienoakes Not being able to read as many of the blogs as I wanted, then seeing comments about those I missed.

@babyhellfire Blogger failure. Posting daily proved tricky some days, goes without saying.

@Gardening4Life The hardest part for me was it took a lot of discipline to think about what to post about daily.

@BooksYALove Getting a blogging routine going during first week for brand new blog.

@Liz_Sheffield Time management with family, full-time job, blog management, deadlines.

@alisonlaw I didn’t realize how much time it took to visit other blogs and comment. Wanted to cast a wider net, but it was impossible.

@teachwhatisgood Keeping my mind focused for blogging besides my normal life…and keeping up with my normal life.

@LaraSalahiABC Hardest part was not having enough hours in the day!

@pegc The hardest part was feeling as though my blog niche was so narrow that it did not relate to many of the other blogs.

@mamahhhjenni Still learning how to use the RSS reader more effectively.

@klgr360degrees Most difficult was not having a robust blog. Our webmaster is doing an overhaul on it so I can add pics, links, etc.

Blogging Lessons Learned

@mamahhhjenni It takes time to build blogging muscle, just like any kind of workout.

@jenwillis I re-learned how important it is to read and comment on other people’s blogs.

@MenaGrazie I’m trying to do the whole news site thing and wow, talk about a learning curve.

@Tia_Bach_Author I learned how very little I knew before 5/1.

@teachwhatisgood That I’m better than I thought. That was very encouraging.

@Liz_Sheffield It’s all about the blogging calendar.

@mamahhhjenni WordPress Editorial Calendar: http://bit.ly/aJMcZ6

@babyhellfire I didn’t know there were so many different kinds of bloggers, and so many different preferences of blogs among them.

@BooksYALove Feeling OK that I had few followers, as I’m building up collection of great YA book reviews. Being able to schedule posts for later release is WONDERFUL.

@billienoakes I didn’t expect to have as much fun with this as I did. The BillieGram is now something I look forward to, no longer work.

@pegc The importance of community and commenting. It really helped get people to visit my blog, even if it was once.

@AnneWainscott I learned that content curation is a survival skill if you write often, especially daily.

@HarryCMarks Curation. It’s all about writing and finding the content you want your readers to come back to each day.

@reellifejane Like the ‘War of Art’ guy says, just get up and do it every day. Never a shortage of ideas in the entertainment world.

@Gardening4Life That blogging under pressure helped me to see what needed to be fixed or added to my blog.

@bikelady Oh, wait! I learned that I should have a “Best of” page, like @MichelleRafter’s 101 list. Looking forward to creating that.

@AnnetteGendler I was also amazed how loyal, generous and steadfast some of my commenters are.

Blogging Apps to Learn More About

@mamahhhjenni Totally need to learn more about Google Analytics. I have a video to watch from Appsumo, but no time yet. And photo editing. That’s a steep learning curve for me. Trying to learn my camera. And mobile blogging. I’m clueless about that! I’d also like to learn more about keywords.

@teachwhatisgood Video blogging. And I’d love video tutorials for some of the basics we discussed this year.

@MenaGrazie It’s not exactly an app but blog directories and affiliate programs (not sales but social networks like SheWrites).

@radiatinggnome Maybe some on deeper and better on social media use.

@JanUdlock I’d like to learn more about growing traffic.

@reellifejane Maybe something on time management, how to fit everything in without going crazy.

@Tia_Bach_Author Me, too (re: learning about growing traffic). I don’t want to go back to my lonely blog world.

@milesaustin Would like to learn more about tools that help conversion into relationships, how to get reader to take action to further the relationship. Landing pages, appointment setting, contact forms. Also mobile-optimized blogs: best practices, plug-ins, tools and strategies to reach the mobile reader.

@chezsven Emphasize importance of comments. Blog need comments. How to get them?

1. Focus on yourself. Unless you’re Lady Gaga, nobody wants to hear about you, you, you all the time. Pick a blog topic you’re passionate about, but make it something other people are interested in too.

2. Write about anything. Write about parenting one day, gardening the next, trips, relationships, books and that wild weekend in Vegas with your college girlfriends and readers won’t have a clue what your blog’s about. Stick to your stated subject. If it helps, keep a notepad – or iPad – in your pocket, purse, messenger bag or car so you can jot down ideas related to your theme when you think of them.

3. Pick a generic name. My Daily Musings doesn’t tell readers what your blog’s about – other than you (see No. 1). Pick a name that fits the topic. The only exception: if you’re using as blog as a business platform, in which case, name it after some version of your own name. Add a tag line – catchy, straightforward, serious or humorous – to give readers more information. Use GoDaddy or another domain name registry to find out what blog names are available.

4. Post whenever you feel like it. Letting days, weeks or months roll by without a post is a great way to kill interest – and page views. Readers like consistency. Pick a posting frequency you can live with and keep to it, whether that’s twice a day, week or month. Use Google Analytics to find out when your site gets the most traffic and publish posts on those days. Use an editorial calendar to map out what posts you’ll publish when. If it helps, write posts in advance and use your blogging software’s pre-publish feature to schedule when they go live.

5. Write when you can squeeze in a few minutes. Writing posts whenever you can fit it in doesn’t work because you’ll get busy and put it off – I know,  I’ve done it. Pick a schedule that works for you and stay with it. If you’re an early bird, write before work starts. If you’re a night owl, write the next day’s post before you go to bed.

6. Write really long posts. When it comes to blog posts, less really is more. 250 to 300 words is fine. Break ideas into paragraphs. Use bold face subheads to break posts up into section. Include numbered or bulleted lists. According to recent research on online readability, making text easy to read will keep readers hang out on your site longer.

7. Focus on style over substance. I just got back from the American Society of Journalists and Authors annual writer’s conference, where expert after expert stressed creating blogs with original content, including good old fashioned reported news. So use make sure your blog posts are optimized for search engines, but concentrate more on providing new information.

8. Never include links. Links are the way of the web. If you’re making an argument, link out to related material from a news site or more well-established bloggers to show you’re part of the conversation. Link inside to your own blog posts too – it’ll help readers discover material that might be new to them.

9. Run the same types of posts all the time. Variety is the spice of blog posts. Use Q&As, lists, trends, guest posts, roundups and collections of links to stories on a related topic. Record a podcast or video. Share a photo. Surprise your readers – people like surprises.

10. Assume you know what readers want. You might think people come to your blog for your witty repartee when they’re actually there because of your cool photos or daily pie recipe. Why wonder: ask what they want. Invite comments. Use polls and “Open Threads” to draw people in.

You could be blogging for a client, to support a new book or to write more about a favorite subject.

Regardless of the content, the steps to getting started are the same.

But if you haven’t ever done it before, how do you figure out what to do first?

That’s where I come in.

I’m happy to announce that I will be moderating a hands-on workshop called Ready…Set…Build Your Blog on Sunday, May 1, from 9 a.m. to noon at the American Society of Journalists and Authors 2011 conference in New York City.

This three-hour intensive workshop will give you the tools you need to jump start a new blog or redesign an existing one.

The workshop will be run by a hand-picked group with expertise on particular aspects of blogging, including:

• Ron S. Doyle, a Denver freelance writer and website designer whose created blogs for dozens of successful writers, who will discuss WordPress and other blogging software platforms.
• Trish Lawrence, a Seattle-based social media strategist and agent intern for Erin Murphy Literary, who’ll talk about how writers and authors can use Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to promote their blogs and themselves.
• Michelle Rafter – that’s me – a long-time freelance journalist who blogs for Entrepreneur Media’s SecondAct.com and runs the WordCount blogathon, an annual month-long blogging challenge for writers.

We’ll kick things off with a few words of wisdom from the panel, then get down to business. Writers will spend the bulk of their time in the workshop working on their blogs – including finding a hosting service (if they don’t already have one), choosing a theme, creating a handful of blog posts and more.

During the workshop, panelists will spend one-on-one time with every attendee, answering questions, making suggestions, providing any required hand-holding and generally helping get their blogs off and running.

The ASJA conference room where we’ll hold the workshop will have an Internet connection. All you need is:

• A laptop or netbook
• If you’re starting a blog – ideas for how and where you’d like to host a blog (on a free hosting platform like Blogger or WordPress.com or self-hosted service from a provider like GoDaddy or Bluehost), blog topics, names and posts
• If you’re building on an existing blog – ideas for blog posts, design changes or additions

That’s not all – the Ready…Set…Build Your Blog workshop coincides with the first day of the 2011 WordCount Blogathon. ASJA attendees who sign up for the blogathon during the workshop will be entered into a special drawing for a writing-related prize that I’ll announce at the end of the session.

Sound fun? Sign up for the ASJA conference if you haven’t already. The conference is open to the public on Saturday and Sunday. Registration for non-members is $385 for the weekend, or $150 for Sunday only. Registration for ASJA members is $425 for the weekend (including the members-only program on Friday) or $50 for Sunday only. Register here.

Read more about the 2011 ASJA conference here.

But getting started can be intimidating. What to write about? What software to use? And how to get anybody to visit once it’s there?

I addressed all of these issues in a post that’s making a guest appearance today on the national blog of the American Society of Business Publication Editors, a professional organization for business magazine editors and writers. You can read the post here.

If you’ve started blogging to support your freelancing business, how is it helping? What’s it taught you? How are you making it work for you?

That’s just one lesson I learned since starting this blog a year ago. I still consider myself an advanced beginner, but I’ve picked up enough over the past 12 months to want to share. Here’s what I’ve learned:

Sex sells. Good headlines attract attention, whether they’re in a newspaper or a blog post.  That’s one of the biggest things I’ve learned from Twitter, which limits users to messages of 140 characters, forcing them to be catchy and concise. Recently I’ve been channeling Cosmo to come up with blog post titles like Work smarter, not harder, Write like a pro and Beat the recession. Big caveat: once you’ve got people’s attention, though, you gotta give them something worth reading.

Mix it up. The best blogs offer a variety of types of posts, a blend of news, how to’s, first-person experiences, round ups based on other people’s opinions or experiences, Q & As, pointers to great material on other blogs, lists, “best of’s” and just enough off topic material to keep things interesting. Offering a variety of material keeps things from feeling stale – and gives a blog a personality.

When writing a new post, include links to old ones. A couple weeks back I wrote about my picks for top 10 digital media trends for 2008 and included a bunch of links to older posts.  Not surprising, many of the older posts I linked to got a nice a bump in page views. What was surprising, though, was the overall number of old posts were getting click throughs at the same time. So I counted – 104 of the 226 posts I wrote in 2008 had been viewed that week. That’s almost 50 percent. There is something to the long tail theory after all. One of the reasons is…

Evergreen topics have an incredibly long shelf life. My no. 1 most popular post of 2008 was a list of best blogs for writers I did last February. It still gets a couple click throughs a day. That’s something to remember when thinking of subjects for new posts. There’s no need to re-invent the wheel, just revise posts that worked well the first time. Especially if you’re committing to posting every day of the week. Which brings me to the next lesson learned.

More is better. I was contemplating cutting back to three times week from five times a week in 2009, following the advice of 4-Hour-Work Week author Tim Ferris to let posts percolate through the blogosphere to build momentum and readership. Now I don’t think I will. The guys at ProBlogger advocate posting multiple times a day on the theory that the more you write, the more traffic you get to your site. That’s holding true for me.

Need a break? Recycle. Twice this year when I’ve gone on vacation I’ve run “Best of” compilations of three to six posts related to a common theme. This post, Work smarter, not harder is a compilation of seven posts I did earlier in the year on some aspect of being more productive. It works: click throughs for that and other “Nest of” posts I did was exceptional. In fact, the weeks my “Best of” compilations ran my blog had some of its biggest traffic days ever.

It’s all about community. If you’re using a blog to build a brand, platform or business, you want people to know about it and the best way to do that is to circulate in your virtual community. Befriend bloggers writing about the same thing you do and leave comments on their blogs or write guests posts. Join blog rings. Use Twitter. Make it easy for people to interact with your blog by adding all of the RSS and subscription bells and whistles. Caution: there’s nothing worse a blogger whose only aim is self promotion. Be real, and give back.

The past year has served as something of a learning curve for me. Now it’s time to get serious. That hit home after I started using Twitter a couple weeks ago and have seen traffic to my blog increase as a result. I’m kicking myself for not putting some kind of income-generating mechanism in place before now – especially with the publishing industry going down the tubes and taking freelance writing opportunities with it. So I’m moving that to the top of my 09 to-do list, which means buying a domain name, porting the blog to a hosted service, finding a designer, figuring out what to sell, etc. Hmm, sounds like fodder for a bunch of new blog posts.

But enough about me. For any fellow bloggers, what have you learned over the past year?

There are all kinds of reasons for blogging: building a brand, practicing different types of writing, promoting a book, putting your resume and clips online, or just getting stuff out there that you couldn’t or wouldn’t put in a paid assignment.

Though the reasons may vary, the mechanics of getting a blog started don’t. Here are six simple steps to starting your freelance writing blog:

1. Pick a niche that you’re in love with. If you’re not passionate about something, your enthusiasm for writing about it will fade. So pick something that speaks to you. Entertainment writer Jane Boursaw blogs about movies at Film Gecko. Sandra Hume, a freelance writer in Kansas, blogs about Laura Ingalls Wilder. Another freelancer, Roxanne Hawn, blogs about her dog Lily. I blog here about how digital media is changing the freelance writing business, a topic that combines my experience covering the tech business with my personal interest in keeping up with the times as a freelancer.

2. Deal with the mechanics. Once you’ve got an idea, you need to give it a home. You can set up a blog on any number of free blog sites including WordPress, Blogger or TypePad. Or you can download free software from Moveable Type or WordPress.org and pay a service like GoDaddy to host your blog. Most of these services have extensive FAQ sections and user forums where you can get answers to your blogging-related questions.

3. Present interesting and well-written material. There’s no right way to write blog posts. But there are some good rules of thumb. Short is good. Write like you’re talking to a friend. Vary post styles: lists, Q&As, and anything with bullet points seem to be particularly popular with readers. Blog posts that spell out your reaction to new events practically write themselves. Others that offer your original reporting or commentary take more time and effort. I included a bunch of other ideas in this post on writing great freelance blog posts and in this one on whether to plot out posts ahead of time or write on the fly.

4. Commit to posting regularly. How often you post is up to you, but doing it consistently is a sure way to increase traffic. That’s one of the main lessons I learned from my May blogathon, where I posted every day for a month. Now I blog Monday through Friday. Other freelancers I know post a couple days a week. Boursaw, the entertainment writer, writes multiple posts a day, sometimes as many as 10. Maybe it’s why traffic to her blog is through the roof.

5. Build traffic. There are all types of tips and tricks to get people to find out about your blog, including using search engine optimization or SEO to tag your blog posts so Google, Yahoo and other search engines will pick them up, and putting links into your posts. Other traffic builders: maintaining a blogroll, leaving comments on other blogs, and joining blogging networks. Here’s a list of other tips for improving traffic to your freelance blog. You can find more information on these and other techniques on sites such as Copyblogger and ProBlogger and Blogging Basics 101.

6. Have fun! Don’t freak out if your blog’s not popular right out of the gate. Unless you’re lucky or are using a blog to promote a book that’s already bestseller, it takes time for people to find you.

If you’re still not comfortable getting started, you can always take a class online or sign up for a new media seminar.

Got your own suggestions for how to start a writing blog?

Mediabistro.com is offering three new, short classes on starting a writing-related blog as part of its Crash Course series of mini-seminars. Classes are online and on demand, so you sign up and watch when you can. “How to Start a Blog” features blogger and Mediabistro writer David White, who covers getting started, creating content, domain names and tools for bloggers. The class is 14 minutes long and costs $15, or $12 if you’re a Mediabistro AvantGuild preferred member.

A two-part series, “How to be a Blog Star” Part I and Part II, feature prominent writers including Brian Williams, with NBC Nightly News, and Brian Stelter, who writes the The New York Times TV Decoder blog, discussing topics such as why they started blogging, how they established their niches and how blogging can lead to other work.

Once you sign up for an on-demand class you have access to it for 30 days. Each comes with an area for taking notes, plus a class outline and links to resources. Free previews are available too. If you’re interested in learning more about blogging, online video and other Web tools, Mediabistro has a variety of other on-demand classes you can check out here.

If you’d rather not shell out $15 to watch a video, there are plenty of free resources online. Here’s a collection of posts I’ve written about blogging for freelance writers:

10 reasons freelance writers should have a blog
Best blogs for writers
How to write great blog posts
Writing blog posts: plotted out or on the fly?
What freelance writers should know about SEO
Tips for improving traffic to your blog
10 basic Web tools for writers