Why I Blog
My reasons for blogging have changed since I started a year ago (Spring 2009).
At first, I thought it would be a way to show examples of my work in an easily updatable fashion.
In June 2009, I had an epiphany at an Arts Summit when I heard Kris Krug speak. I then started to ramp it up a little by posting about once per week on things that were on my mind. My topics were somewhat scattered and I’d not really figured out what I should be writing about.
Then, in late December 2009, I decided to give myself a challenge: blog weekdays for one month. I started on the last week of December and have now successfully gone for two months on this schedule.
To give myself some parameters, I broke my topics into general themes for each day of the week (this post fits into “Work Wednesday) which, has really helped me focus.
But why do I do it?
- I enjoy it.
- It’s a way to show more of myself (good and bad) to clients and potential clients. It’s a way to make myself more human in the digital world.
- Most importantly, it helps me organize my thoughts and allows me to focus on what I do and why I do it regarding work (and play). I look at it very selfishly in that I do it, not to garner a huge readership or make money directly from my blog, but because I get better, personally and professionally, because of it.I’m not a professional writer and my grammar and sentence structure is not perfect, but that’s not the point for me. I want to focus on what goes on inside. If what I have to say sparks some interest for others, great. If not, that’s fine too.
There are times when I wonder if the time investment is worth it so I suppose, I could decide to stop this routine, but for now, it’s making sense for me.
Kris Krug is a smarty-pants, hey? He’s really savvy about this stuff.
You are so on the money, John. Blogging allows people to see “the real you,” and that can be very powerful. My own experience with blogging has taught me that a regular blogging schedule will pay off in subscriptions and hits (it’s the topic of Monday’s blog post, in fact!)–although I only blog 3x wk as opposed to your 5. I think you will find after a while that it will become more automatic. You start to look a the world through different eyes, and think, “wow, that would make a great blog post!”