People ask me all the time what it takes to become a successful blogger. For years I struggled with that question, because there were so many different things that made one successful in blogging. But over the years, I have found one aspect of blogging that every successful blogger I know from Seth Godin to Linda Ikeji possessed early on when they started. It is an aspect that has made them as successful as they are now and it is one that every upcoming blogger needs to adhere to. It is it to me the best blogging advise of all time and it is this:
If you write a blog post and nobody comments on it, keep writing…
If you pour your heart and soul into a blog entry and nobody retweets it, keep writing…
If you craft the perfect blog post and nobody facebook likes it, keep writing…
If you write the best blog article ever and people tell you it is whack [Including your Mum], keep on writing…
Because success in blogging is not determined by the amount of comments, retweets or likes that you get, but rather by the passion you have for blogging. And provided you keep on writing…your passion will pull you through to success!
Beware!
When I started out as a blogger all I wanted to do was write about the crazy and stupid things I had done in life and the many lessons I learned while doing them. That was it! But somewhere along the line I stumbled upon a thing called google analytics and google adsense. The former was a detailed measure of visits to a website and the latter was a money machine that rewarded bloggers financially for those site visits. I became instantly fascinated with the two tools and started reading and studying extensively on the both of them. My goal was to improve my site visits so that I could increase the number of people clicking my google adsense links. That was my primary focus! So I would write my blogs posts laced with the right type of keywords as prescribed in the numerous adsense manuals and laced with just the right amount of links that would optimize my blog clickability (not a real word…but me thinks it should be real!). After about 2 months of keywording my blogs I had made a grand total of less than $5! For the effort I had put in my reward was somewhat <insert your own word>. But I am glad it happened, because that period of adsense madness produced one of my most inauthentic writings. It was as if I had sold my writing soul to the devil google.
So one day I pulled off all the google adsense, keyword click searches and ridiculous apparatus I had rigged my site with and started blogging from my heart again. Over the years (but not overnight) my writing improved, my viewership increased and my listserv grew…today I see a lot of bloggers blogging. But their only reason for blogging is to make money or become the most googled blog in the world. So they write not in their own voice but in the voice of google.
If you are a blogger and you are fidgeting with the idea of google adsense and all that other stuff, there is nothing wrong with that, but if it detracts from the purity of your content…stop! Readers can smell fakeness and moreover it waters down your brand. Write from your heart on topics you truly care for, don’t write an entertainment blog post because that is what is popular. Instead, write on entertainment because you truly care about who Kanye West slapped yesterday night entertainment and your readers will feed off your passion.
Keep writing and stay awesome
Truth and makes more sense than Adsense
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