5 Tips for Investigative Blogging

December 2, 2015 by: 10

img_5471

Blogging and journalism are definitely not the same, but they are cut from similar cloth, and there are tips, techniques, and tricks that can be shared between them, especially for sets of writing that can be considered ‘investigative’.

So, let’s consider for a minute some of the categorical tips that you can follow in order to have successful investigative blog posts, coming from the basic groups of using science to your advantage, being sure to leave your opinions out, following basic journalistic rules of engagement, showing and telling, and deciding on the level of entertainment your posts are producing.

Use Science To Your Advantage

When it comes to investigative blogging, you always want to use science when possible. So, when you’re on the trail of chemtrails, being in contact with scientists and aviation engineers to back up your story is going to be a great idea. In fact, any time you do any investigating, the bulk of your information should come out as cold hard facts; the point of you being the writing conduit, in this case, is that you figured out how to put the pieces together.

Leave Your Opinion Out

And since you have the bulk of that data from experts and professional sources, one of the things that you want to leave out of investigative blogging is your opinion. You can lead readers to believe what you believe, but the trick is to not spell it out – to make them come to their own conclusion, and it just happens to be the same as yours. Great journalism works much the same way. Which leads us to the next tip.

Follow Basic Journalistic Rules

If you do choose the investigative blogging path, even for a short series, you should be sure to follow basic journalistic rules. These often cover matters like protecting your sources, double checking names and facts, and being sure you’re not infringing on certain rights of people you talk to or about either.

Show and Tell

It’s particularly important in investigative blogging that you show and tell. And that means not only do you have to have great copy, you have to take great pictures as well. For every major point in your story, you should have good visual data to back it up, whether it’s in typical photo form, or even better these days if you have streaming video to add.

Decide the Level Of Entertainment You’re Providing

Eventually you have to make the decision of which proportion of your blogging is going to be about presenting information, and how much of it is about entertainment. Certain topics are going to go better in either of those direction, so just make sure that it’s an intentional choice.

Share this Story
Categories
Tags

    10 Comments on "5 Tips for Investigative Blogging"

  1. Thanks for sharing the post as it help me a lot!

  2. Ripu says:

    Dear Jennifer Gretson,
    Your compression is so much informative for every man to understand different between blogging and journalism. Thanks for the important post

  3. CRM Expert says:

    I have come to know the different between blogging and journalism.It helps me to enrich my knowledge.

  4. Marie says:

    This is very helpful site for me because i am new in SEO work…

  5. Technic says:

    Thanks Fro This Great Post And I Think Its Really Helpful For Beginners. Keep it UP!

  6. Jimmy says:

    Interesting and informative article. Thanks

  7. Nice and informative post to increase conversion rate optimization., Thank you for sharing.

  8. shuvo pk says:

    It’s particularly important in investigative blogging that you show and tell. And that means not only do you have to have great copy………….

  9. Colleen Bell says:

    This is very helpful site for me because i am new in SEO work…

Leave a Reply

Follow us