You know what I think is so cool? That you come across a blog post about the blogging world from a while back AND that the message is still relevant and then inspires me to write a new blog.
Last year I wrote“Is Blogging Dead?“, a blog with a somewhat exaggerated title but in which I thought back nostalgically to the blogging world of yesteryear. That the way of blogging has changed we have all noticed that. That social media has become an important factor in getting your blog noticed, everyone knows that too. That YouTube is becoming increasingly popular and therefore many bloggers are making the switch to daily vlogging I get that too. More and more bloggers as well as vloggers are emerging every day, resulting in a market that is incredibly saturated. A market that actually wants to see results from his or her efforts as soon as possible. However, you must realize – if this is your goal – that this is not accomplished overnight. Rome wasn’t built in a day.
Don’t get discouraged when you don’t get the results you want
I came across this great article via via: The insanely slow road to building a blog (and why most people give up). This article encourages potential and current bloggers not to become disappointed and discouraged when their blog does not achieve the desired results. The reality is that blogging is really not as easy as people make it seem. It sounds easy, technically speaking, to set up a blog and it is not something that requires an amount of skill, but it does require a lot of patience. With technologies like WordPress, getting a simple blog that is up and running is pretty easy. Besides, writing your first article is a breeze if your motivation is high and creativity is still bubbling. The real “problems” come later.
I blog to share my learning moments
I’ve been blogging off and on for about 15 years now. With the emphasis on off and on, because everyone has periods when blogging is on the back burner and normal life takes precedence for a while. Although I strive to be consistent, it is quite difficult for me to combine it with my full-time job and freelance work for Deliciae Design (and if I look at my hours, that can be considered full-time as well). The will is there but chilling with Netflix once in a while is nice too. I certainly won’t deny that. My goal with blogging is not so much to grow quickly, although additional followers are very welcome! I know how it feels when you get a comment that looks like a compliment (although, it was, wasn’t it?) and then find out it’s a spam comment (stupid bots!) Or that amazing feeling of satisfaction when a real person tells you they love your blog AND your work. Of course I think that’s totally super and gives me a boost – it’s not THE reason I blog.
I’ve touched on it before, I started blogging on Deliciae Design for one reason: to share things I’ve learned while working with WordPress and Blogger. Things I have come across in the blogging world over the past 15 years; SEO, Google Analytics, social media. But also a piece of graphic design, fonts, use of color, etc. I knew that writing about new discoveries would help me learn more but also teach others the same things. Money was not the goal and still isn’t. I earn 0.0 cents from my blog. I do hope through blogging to bring in potential new clients for a beautiful WordPress design *hint*. Bottom line is, I write because it encourages me to learn new things and by sharing them, I (hopefully) retain the knowledge.
My blog is a reflection of what I have learned over the past few years as a blogger but also as a WordPress user and developer. I still have so much to share but as mentioned, I’m a little stumped with time. However, I try to do my best and hope that with that small audience I have built, I have still been able to help some people. That said, blogging is a win-win situation for me. I hope to reach people with it but it is also a source of information that I can look back on myself when I don’t remember something 100%.
Why am I writing this?
I actually want to echo a bit of what Belle brings up in her blog. Blogging is not something that generates you tons of money and fame. Not after a day’s work. Fair? Probably not in the next few years. Looking very realistically, you probably won’t achieve either of them. Sounds harsh, but that is the reality. I say this because many new bloggers start before they know how much time it actually takes. Time you need to invest. Blogging can be a great outlet for a lot of things. Whether you love food and like to share recipes. Or of traveling and want to share your beautiful travel photos with hot spots so others can discover them too. Anything is possible, but if you start with unrealistic expectations, it will lead to the loss of motivation. And you know what comes after you lose all motivation.
Sign up.
My advice to all new bloggers is to ask yourself this question: “If I post a blog of about 1000 words every day, 1-2 times a week, for a whole year AND don’t make a penny from it, is it a waste of my time?” If you answer yes to this then I recommend you choose something else.
The same goes for bloggers who have great business ideas but give up after a few months because sales are disappointing. Like customers, visitors don’t just show up and still need time to think in an investment. That can take a while, and sometimes they are interested in a product but their wallet won’t let them. This does not mean that your product is not catching on and that there is no market for it, it could be due to so many other things: perhaps the way of communication, the look of the product, the promotion, your findability in Google, and so on…. Don’t give up right away but first try to figure out why it’s not catching on and then go promote it again. Chances are it will work then.
Don’t put too much pressure
Articles with “Are you also curious about how I made (money amount) within 1 year?”, “Get 100,000 visitors per day” or “Income report – (money amount) earned!” are flying around your ears. This puts enormous pressure and expectations on a (beginning) blogger. People think that these amounts are normal but if you are realistic, you know that these are either exaggerated (bait) amounts or bloggers touting their products while they have been struggling for years to do so. They have struggled for years to build a mailing list you could say hello to.
It is naive to think that you can accomplish the same thing within a month or a year. These bloggers have already put so much time and energy into building a customer base, time for which they also got nothing in return before, only they often leave that part out. The sales pitch “learn in 3 hours what I learned in 3 years” sounds nice and appealing, of course, but in practice it is often different. And even if you did get the knowledge by taking a course, you will still have to get to work to get results. Unfortunately, it doesn’t come easy.
[Tweet “Het boeken van resultaten kost veel tijd, geduld en toewijding. Een beetje geluk helpt ook. “]The advice that you should start blogging for fun is what you should pursue, because that will also be the only way to keep it up. As Belle also points out in the article, even if you hope to one day profit from your blog, having fun writing will help you persevere without even having an audience or being profitable.
Don’t discourage yourself. Enjoy the process of building your blog, writing blogs and growing your audience. Learn from the process, delve into different methods of getting your blog to people, but most of all have fun. And who knows what things will come your way. I discovered through blogging on Livejournal 15 years ago that I did like design a lot. Now look. Now it’s my job and sure, that did take a really long period of time before I was able to accomplish that. However, I don’t think about that. I did it anyway and I can be proud of that result.
