What is the point of blogging?

by | Mar 5, 2013 | Browse and chat, That Creative blog | 1 comment

I have been typing my fingers off for 3 months now, on average 2-3 blogs per week. Where has it got me to date .. 18 subscribers (half are family and friends), about 5 new viewers per day (that is cool), over 240 unique visitors so far and a whole $1.84 in advertising revenue lol

I did a lot of research before deciding to do a blog, how to go about it, what is easy, what is hard and importantly what is the purpose and what makes me unique amongst the trillions of online information. Recently, I have had a few people ask me how I went about setting it all up.

So here is my summary for setting up your blog:

1. What you need

There are a couple of affordable options – cheapest and basic. I decided on a small basic investment. My set-up included:

You can do the whole lot far cheaper and not pay for a dedicated domain name and use one of many free themes. It all depends on why you want the blog. For myself, I wanted to establish my artist brand-name again and believe I have good content and IP to sell one day.

 

2. What’s your purpose

What is the purpose of your blog? Purely to blog, or to sell products or to showcase your portfolio or a combination? Each of these determines what type of theme design, navigation layout and marketing plan you will require for your blog. In my design I have four goals:

  1. Showcase my art.
  2. Attract my previous students and customers.
  3. Develop a customer base.
  4. Eventually in 5 years: begin to earn some income through product sales and advertising.
  5. For the next 10 years: grow my own corporate career path. Blogging is my evening hobby instead of TV.

 

Dina blogging

Me blogging away ..

I gave myself a 12 month goal to set up and find a path that creates followers, then a 5 year goal to begin to gain some income and finally a 10-15 year goal to retire from corporate life and be a full-time artist again. I read somewhere that 100,000 unique visitors / month to your blog = $75,000 advertising / year.

I also read this advice:

“Start by picking a crowded topic and then, instead of being a big fish in a small pond … be a small, ridiculously evolved, very rare and weird fish in a great big pond.”

 

3. What makes me unique

There are so many blogs, wikis, YouTube about every artistic subject out there. So what was going to make me different? There is one thing I have learnt about me as I matured (well got old), stay myself, even though it is odd to others and outside the square. I think someone once said: I beat my own drum.

My art is outside of the norm. Its not pure craft, its not pure art, and I’m definitely not a cool person when it comes to interior design. I’m eclectic, I’m decorative and I’m non-conventional and that’s OK. In fact more middle age women are just like me rather than being stuffy about their art or fanatical about their craft. They just want to create or sew or home-make!

What makes my blog unique:

  1. Me – a non-stuffy lover of artistic quality creative things.
  2. My blend – a cross-over of art, craft and home design.
  3. I teach – I show others how to use the artist eye to create, design and decorate.
  4. My style – keep it simple can still equal make it beautiful.
  5. My ethos – “By sharing we grow.” 

I learnt many women intrinsically have a creative gift, they just haven’t had the chance to be confident to experience yet. Hence my motto:

Dina Goebel - DIY creativity & success

 

 

4. So what is easy …

Getting this far, I had an idea, I researched, I set it up. That was all fun. Short paragraph isn’t it!

 

5. What is hard …

Getting subscribers – publicly I am an introvert, with few friends and not socially outwards. I now need to create online friends and this will need to come via social networking and using tools.

Keep on writing – writers block and ongoing motivation. I have noticed that writing can sometimes experience writers block, so right now I am filling writers block with writers gab.When you write an article and it looks like no-one is reading it, finding that personal motivation and persistence is the hardest.

 

6. Social Networking

There are hundreds of options so it depends on what is relative to you and potential audience. Not only are there the well known network sites but you can also become involved in smaller forums about your chosen topic. The networking sites I have chosen are listed here. You can find out more about me simply by visiting these:

 

7. Learn about tools

There is a whole heap of tools techniques and tricks which will help grow your blogging success. I don’t plan to learn them all overnight but I do intend to learn them over the next 12 months and continue to refine my approach. So far I am working on:

 

8. Read blogs about blogging

There is hundreds of blogs about blogging, simply Google and research the best tips and advice from the experts. Also visit ‘star’ sites that the experts showcase, they have blogging down to fine art and by looking at what they are doing will help refine your approach.

 

9. Some of my favourite tips

I can’t recall where I collected these various tips from but as I researched I copy and pasted a whole list and I am gradually working my way through the list as I learn to use the tools.

1. Intimacy – Its about be a real person, offering real advise for real folk. Here’s an example of some feedback about a successful blogger: “Because when I go there he chats with us, he tells us what’s happening in his shop, his life and the village. He doesn’t push products or sell to us. He just makes us feel welcome and keeps us in touch.”

  • Remember to blog on a regular and even reliable basis
  • Understand what are your consumers interested in? What needs do they have and how can you meet them? What questions do they really need answered?

2. Building Community – When you share content you not only define your areas of expertise, you also create good will.

3. Credibility – There’s nothing like a blog to truly help people understand what it is that you do, what your area of expertise is, and that you are, in fact, an expert or highly knowledgeable.

4. Differentiation – How can you differentiate yourself from all those competitors out there?

Broadcast your differentiators once you know what they are. Because the point of blogging is to blog regularly, one of the best things a blog can do for you is brand you. Branding has many benefits and getting the point across about what makes you different is one of them. Choose carefully what you decide to cover in your blog and/or how you decide to cover it — it can be a great way to help you separate yourself from the crowd which again will help both your business and your blog grow.

 

10. Can you make money?

I would like to retire at 60-65ish as a full-time artist again so if I can spend the next ten years building my online brand and earn a meagre wage by then .. then hell yes, pick me! I love this diagram from Problogger.net, there is so many sources of income available on-line if you are willing to work for it.

Ways-to-Make-Money-Blogging1

I hope you enjoyed my learners approach to blogging.

ALWAYS THE ARTIST

Dina

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