Every day, people from across the globe start their own websites on WordPress.com to share everything from their latest thoughts on current events to family recipes passed down through several generations. Among this group are Grace and Georgie, who started their blog Attempting Vogue a few weeks ago to share their thoughts on a variety of topics, including fashion, beauty, and social politics. We wanted to know more about how Attempting Vogue got started on WordPress.com and what Grace and Georgie hope their blog will become. They were kind enough to provide us with some answers.
Can you start by introducing yourselves?
Grace: We’re both students in our second year of university. Georgie is studying theatre and performance at Warwick University, and I’m studying sociology at Newcastle University. We met in secondary school, and have stayed friends ever since. We don’t see each other as much as before, but we still keep in contact and catch up when we can. We both have a keen interest in fashion and beauty, as well as social issues such as gender, inequality, and racism.
How did you two come up with the idea for your blog, and when did you decide it was something you wanted to create?
Georgie: I’d been sitting on the idea for quite a while. I knew that I wanted to create some kind of blog, but I struggled to pin down a certain genre or “target readership.” Originally, I had planned on running a blog by myself, but Grace offered to help me out with the proofreading process so I suggested that we co-edit. This was when I became completely certain that this was something I really wanted to do — two heads are better than one after all! Together, we decided to keep the genre relatively broad and write about things that we find useful or interesting. With this approach, I believe we are likely to be continuously engaged with the blogging process, and this is a main priority for us.
The bloggers, Grace, on the left, and Georgie.
How did you decide on WordPress.com as the platform for your blog? Have you used it before for anything else?
Grace: Well, we had a look around and tried a few different blogging websites. However, none of the websites we tested gave us the professional finish we wanted; a lot of the blog layouts were too simplistic, or slightly tacky. However, when we had a look at WordPress.com, all of the themes and layouts that were available looked really professional and easy to use. As this was our first time blogging, we wanted to make sure whatever site we picked was simple to use, but delivered the best quality finish. Compared to other websites, WordPress.com definitely delivered this.
WordPress.com has lots of themes to choose from. How did you to decide on the theme you’re using now, the Cubic theme?
Georgie: Attempting Vogue is largely focused on fashion and beauty, so aesthetics is important to us. The Cubic theme caught our eye as a sleek and professional layout that can be easily personalized with our own choice of featured images. It is also incredibly simple for visitors to navigate, another great bonus to this choice of theme.
Usually a blog is written by a single person, but the two of you are running Attempting Vogue together. Have you decided on how you want to run your site? Will you be trading off on posts, or writing them all together?
Grace: We’ve known each other for quite a while and share similar tastes and views, so we thought writing together would be fun. We co-wrote our initial introduction post, but agreed to individually write at least one post a week to deliver consistent and equal posts. Although we individually write posts, we are constantly helping each other create new ideas. We also proofread and add suggestions for improvements on each other’s work. I think this is probably the best way to approach our blog, as it ensures it is kept to the highest quality, and that every post — no matter who it is written by — has shared input from both of us, whilst maintaining our individuality.
In your intro post, you wrote that the two of you are “diving into the giant pool of the blogosphere.” How are you going out to let people know that your blog exists and to share your tips and opinions?
Georgie: Our current strategy is primarily through the use of our existing social media accounts such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. So far we’ve had a tremendous amount of support from our family and friends — they’ve really helped out with sharing our posts! We are planning on creating social media accounts specifically for Attempting Vogue so we can focus the content on the blog, become more involved with blogging communities, and hopefully develop our online presence.
Have you set some goals for your blog? What is your hope for it?
Grace: We haven’t set any goals in particular. Our initial concern is just to get in the habit of writing and creating new content. We aren’t expecting lots of people to read our blog; we just want to write about things we find interesting. Our main hope is just to keep consistent and in a few months’ time to still be enjoying writing posts.
Has WordPress.com allowed you to do everything you wanted to do with your blog so far? If WordPress.com could help you with one thing, what would you like that to be?
Georgie: WordPress.com has been great. We chose it carefully for its rookie-proof functionality and impressive aesthetics. My favorite aspect of the site builder is the breadth of viewer statistics that are available to us. I love knowing what countries Attempting Vogue is being viewed in and which social media websites are leading audiences to our posts. Although Grace and I are working through the form of WordPress.com with trial and error, it would have perhaps been useful to have been provided with an initial tutorial. That being said, so far we have had a fantastic experience with WordPress.com!
Editor’s Note: If you want to learn more about getting started on WordPress.com, check out our “Blogging: Fundamentals” course from Blogging University.
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It’s your turn! We’d like to hear from you: How did you get started on WordPress.com?
