4 tips on how to create a student science blog

Hi everybody!

Its Karima & Danielle from kadani.net, a health science blog we started last year in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic. 

Writing our own science blog has be an invaluable adventure so far with a plethora of learning experiences and growth opportunities. It is an adventure we would absolutely recommend to any scientist looking for a way to share their passion. So, here are our 4 tips for creating your own science blog.

Up until June 2020 we had never discussed starting a blog together, let alone any kind of project. The idea literally popped up in a Zoom call one day, and we both sat there for a minute asking ourselves – why not?

2020 has been – among many things – a year of sharing. We’ve all spent nearly 12 months studying and working from home, desperate for an entertaining piece of other people’s lives but also desperate to share a piece of our own (especially on Tik Tok…). 

So, we thought it would be a really great time to start sharing a part of our life, specifically the part of our life that is health and science. Together, we’ve amassed a vast sea of scientific knowledge. It’s a privilege to have this knowledge, but we felt like we were about to burst if we couldn’t do more with it – like writing a blog.

And so we did.

We created a website and an Instagram account, both of which are super easy to do. 

Neither of us had created a website before but luckily, we live in the era of technology and today it’s easier than ever to do so. This leads us to our very first tip:

Tip #1. Get help from web development services. We decided to use Wix.com, partly because they provide a simple, easy-to-use (even for the most technologically challenged) web development service and partly because they often have fantastic offers. (“Squarespace” is another great option)

Web development services will allow you to create spectacular websites with no coding experience for free, but if you want to publish your website on your own “domain” – meaning make the website your own and give it your own website name – you’ll have to pay for the premium plans. These premium plans are really not too expensive, and it is an expenditure we recommend. Therefore, our second tip is:

Tip #2. Buy a domain. No one’s going to remember your website with a title like “yourwebsitename.wixsite.com” or “yoursitename.squarespace.com”. They are far more likely to remember a simple name, specifically your blog name, like ours “kadani.net”, short and sweet.

Soon after creating our website and investing in our own domain, we started writing some articles. We chose a topic we felt passionate talking about, and just started writing. 

The most difficult part of writing a science blog won’t be setting up the blog, it’s the content. 

Tip #3 practice before posting. It may take some time for you to find your groove with writing, and our advice is just to keep writing and writing, ask friends or family for feedback and then keep writing and writing. We eventually got comfortable with our writing and started posting about 2 articles per week. 

However, the ultimate challenge remains, namely exposure.

We very quickly had to adapt our expectations with our blog. We couldn’t expect our baby blog to get hits through Google or Yahoo, because there’s no way we could compete with well-established, successful science blogs out there like sciencedaily.com or nature.com. We had to be realistic about how people would find our blog, and Instagram is that place.

Instagram is a brilliant platform to gain an audience. With over 1 billion active users it’s the best place to share and promote your product or service. Its young, dynamic and filled with individuals hungry for entertainment. So, our last tip is…

Tip #4 get on social media. Be it twitter, Instagram or Facebook, you need to have social media platforms to reach people and promote your blog. While you're there, be sure to follow @sherpaonline_ on Instagram, for fun facts, riddles and more!

To conclude our article, we absolutely recommend starting your own blog, especially with a friend or partner. It’s fun, it keeps your creativity active and you learn A LOT. 

Good luck! 

All the best,

Karima & Danielle from kadani.net