Dear Bloggers (new & old):
I have not done a blogging tip post in a while, I figured I should do one this month before the year comes to end. This post is about you and it includes personal blogging advice that I find helpful and that may help you down the blogging road.
As a blogger that has been blogging since 2008, I have seen and come across many blogging experiences. Some of these blogging experiences aren’t as pleasant as others are, but everything in life is a lesson or learning experience; and I want to share my life’s lessons with you all.
New bloggers ask yourselves the following question:
why do I want to start blogging? Or why am I blogging?
1) To make money from blogging should never be your number one reason to start a blog.
In order to make money you need to have a passion for what you do, in this case, blogging/writing. If you don’t love it you won’t make money, plain and simple.
Also, keep in mind that in order to start seeing some income you will have to blog almost everyday or several times in a day. Which means blogging will be sort of like your full time job. But if blogging is your passion and you have the time, then this is all a piece of cake. The more you blog the quicker you’ll start to earn income.
There are several ways you can earn income by blogging, check out a post I wrote earlier this year where John Chow and others talked about ways to monetize your blog.
I wanted to touch on another important blogging lesson that will help you along your blogging journey.
2) Not everyone is your friend.
This one is kind of a given, but you will come across some very competitive bloggers that will try and will want to bring you down, while kindly smiling in your face, giving you candy and acting like bffs. I learned that business is first, friendship is later, but for the most part it remains business.
3) Never trust another blogger with your numbers.
Some “well established” bloggers will befriend you and try to “help” you out by suggesting they will “hook you up” with PR/marketing agencies they work with so you can stuff to review. What these bloggers tend to do is ask you to email them your “numbers” so that they can “forward” the info to the PR agencies themselves. They will NEVER give you the PR/Marketing contact’s information for you to contact them directly. To these blogger this is like letting you steal their clients/contacts, sharing is not caring in their world.
Please note: NEVER EVER give another blogger your site stats, this is a no-no. If a blogger asks you for your site stats to pass along to a PR contact of theirs, this blogger is most likely intimidated by your success and wants to know for sure how successful your blog really is. Let them worry on their own, they don’t need to know what your following is like. If they keep pestering, just give them some ridiculous number to get them off your sight.
Know the difference: Any blogger that is really trying to help you will give you a contact person’s email so you can email them your numbers and introduce yourself. A blogger that isn’t trying to help you will do some shady business like the one stated above.
On that note, have a happy blogging.
If any of you need helpful advice with your blogging, please do not hesitate to email me, I would be more than happy to help.
Image Source: http://nuclearextroversion.blogspot.com/2009/12/awkward-moments-partying-amongst.html