Blogging: Purpose and Strategy

In my opinion, the decision to start a blog boils down to one of two reasons:

To increase the visibility of an issue, product, or idea. [professional reasons]
To journal about issues that are important to you. [personal reasons]

Your reason completely changes the blogging strategy you take. If you're blogging for personal reasons, then you should write about things that are important to you, because you aren't accountable to anyone else. You will benefit from some simple strategies:

Choose titles with good SEO value
Include an image or video in every blog post
Link back to older posts where appropriate

If you're blogging for professional reasons, then the above still apply, but now you have to pay much more attention to issues like:

How easy is it to share your post?
How well does your blog "show" on different mobile devices and browsers?
Which posts get the highest traffic? Can you identify and leverage the reason in future posts?
Who is actually reading the blog?
Do readers stay and read other posts or are they one-post readers?
Is the blog serving its professional purpose?

Keep these two different motivations in mind while reading the following.

Why I Blog, by Andrew Sullivan, The Atlantic, November 2008.

10 Benefits of Having Images in Blogs, by Mike Allton, Social Media Today, Feb 3, 2013.

5 Ways to Make Your Blog Posts more Sharable, by Mike Alton, Social Media Today, Feb 7, 2013.

The Real Benefits of Guest Blogging, by moosahemani, SEOMoz, October 26, 2012.