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What the heck is a Blog?
A blog is like a website, but in more of a journal format with chronological posts. It should be used in addition to a website.
One of the best places to get a free blog is on the WordPress website. And the links you build here from your blog to your website will assist you in having your website ranked higher in the Google search engine.
It's fairly easy to set up a WordPress account. Just log into WordPress and provide a username and password. WordPress will send you an email confirmation and you reply to it. Now you are in.
You will want to create a name for your WordPress Blog that uses your Salon or Spa name. For instance, we'll call this MySalonandSpa and the blog name. Consequently, to see your blog, you go to MySalonandSpa and then add WordPress to the end of that with a period between spa and WordPress and then add the standard period and com after that like you would on a regular website (sorry, these articles are now allowed to put in domain names whether or not they exist:)
You will set up these 3 things:
Select a Theme & Insert your Custom Header
About Me Page
Your First Post
First, you'll want to select a theme.
A theme is your blog format. They come with the ability to create your own custom header. I prefer the Cutline theme by Chris Pearson. After selecting this theme by click on Appearances, it will prompt you for a custom header.
Don't use of the canned, generic ones. You want to be unique. Show your creativity. The dimensions are 770 x 143. It's now time to really get out of your comfort zone. Under you Windows start menu, click on Paint. Paint is a very, very basic graphics program, but it will do just fine here.
Once in Paint, click on Image, then on Attributes. Select pixels, then put in 770 as the width and 143 as the height. This is your canvas. Start by inserting your picture on the left and a company logo on the right to begin. Now put some text in the middle like the name of your salon or spa and a smaller byline like "The Pampering Experts". Now save this file as a JPG (a picture file). Select the new image file you just created. Now look at your new profile by entering your WordPress blog name in a different browser window. Don't like how it turned out? No worries. Go back into paint and adjust it and re-upload the JPG file again. Repeat as many times as you like.
Second, let's add an About me page. By default, WordPress already creates an About page. So click on Pages, then edit that. I like to use a title of About Me, or About MySalonandSpa. Then edit the body of that page using the WordPress interface. It's just like using MSWord. When you are finished, click on the upper right side that says update. Your changes are immediately transferred to the internet so you can go to the second browser window you have opened with your live blog and click on refresh or press the F5 button.
Lastly, let's add a new post. Again by default, WordPress creates a default post called "Hello World". Just select that post and delete it. After you delete it, let's select "Add New Post". Give your post a name like "Welcome to MySalonandSpa". In here, just enter your location, a quick note about yourself and insert a copy of the directions from a map as a image. It's also very easy to insert a video from YouTube. You can even insert that video we created in that other article in these series called "How to Market Your Salon & Spa on Youtube".
And always end each post with a link back to your website by inserting a hyperlink (there is a icon that looks like a chain).
As a Salon and Spa marketing on WordPress, you'll want to post weekly specials. Document events and posts videos and pictures. Write articles on each of your staff members. Tell your story. Personally brand yourself and your Salon and Spa and people will connect with you. And always end each post with a link back to your website by inserting a hyperlink (there is a icon that looks like a chain).
And that's how you market your Salon and Spa on WordPress using a Blog.
