Blogging: Probably the greatest thing since sliced bread; and other clichéd musings.
I’m headed to Vegas today for a wild weekend with my husband, brother-in-law, and sister-in-law-to-be, so here for your reading pleasure is a little something I wrote as a pie-in-the-sky attempt at getting something published on a super-professional blog. Since, not unexpectedly, it didn’t quite fit the bill, I figured I’d share it here.
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Let me begin by saying that I don’t make a cent from my blog. I’ve been reading ProBlogger for over a year, but no matter how loudly I shout, “Show me the money!”, I’m just not seeing the cash flow. I don’t know what it is…
I absolutely love to blog. I’ve loved it since before I even knew it was called “a blog.” I love blogging for all the typical reasons people tend to love it, like…
- The ability to have your own “space” on the web where you can say and do just about anything you please…
- The social aspect; being able to receive feedback on your thoughts and ideas, and finding people with common interests — people you might never have encountered otherwise…
- That giddy feeling you get when something utterly hilarious happens to or around you and your first thought is, “I am so blogging this!” (Or is that one just me?)
- The potential for fame, riches and popularity — however slim a potential it may be…
And for me, blogging is something that relieves tension, clears my mind, and gives me something to look back on when I start to forget things (and boy do I ever forget things).
But blogging is also, in some ways, my nemesis. See, because of the fact that I blog about everything that happens in my life, I tend to get flustered in face-to-face interactions. I’ll meet up with a friend who asks, “What’s new?” and my first inclination is to roll my eyes and say, “Haven’t you been reading my blog?” Or, when someone asks me what I like to do in my spare time, I struggle a bit: How do you tell a non-blogger that you like to generously overshare about the ins and outs of your daily life in a place as public and unprotected as THE INTERNET? The few times I’ve tried to talk to people about my blog, the general reaction is, “Uhh? That’s…nice…” or, “Aren’t you afraid someone is going to find you and, like, stalk you or something?”
So how do you reconcile your blogging world and your “real” world? How do you prioritize the amount of time spent corresponding with your cyberfriends, blog associates and E-BFFs versus time spent having “real-life” interactions? I’ve pondered this before, and you can probably sense that I haven’t quite figured it all out yet.
The funny thing is, I’m always thinking about how to take my blog to the “next level” — improving my content, my layout, my readership — but rarely do I put the same amount of thought into enhancing my actual career. (It may have something to do with the fact that I have lofty dreams of quitting my “real job” and making my millions by being a fabulous web presence. But I’ll never get there because I spend too much time just reading all the ProBlogger tips and thinking, “There’s got to be an easier way to start raking in the dough!” Yes…I’m THAT blogger.)
I suppose the thing I love most about blogging is also the thing that keeps me from “going anywhere” with it: I’m all about just being me and enjoying the connections I get to make with so many other people who are just being them. I can’t be bothered with all the strategies and “Ten Simple Steps” that are chillin’ just outside my line of sight, waiting for me to take notice of them so they can start making me my millions. And yet I read them all the time, and I imagine myself poring over them, obsessing over them until my blog really does become a huge hit. But what keeps me from ever taking action is the thought that I would miss out on the connections by trying to force myself to become more connectible. Does that even make sense?
So, what’s the point of even reading all of Darren’s insight and “Tips to Help You Make Money Blogging” if I’m not even going to implement them?
I don’t know if it’s just a matter of needing to learn how to prioritize my time, or if I just like knowing how other people do it, or if it’s even as simple as the fact that I cannot get enough of reading and discovering new bloggers every day. But I keep reading it, and money or no money, I feel enriched with each new bit of advice I may or may not actually take to help me make money from my blog. Maybe I just read it for the tips that are more geared toward improving my writing or my relationships with other bloggers.
Of course, it’s probably up for debate whether I’ve made any progress in those realms, either. I’m pretty sure I will never be cured of my tendency toward tangents (or alliteration, apparently), and as much as I’d like to pretend to regret that fact, I’ve actually grown to embrace it. Every blogger’s supposed to establish a voice, right? So maybe I’ve kinda, sorta got that going for me?
Maybe?
…Bueller?
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(Pssst…Only a few days left! Don’t forget to enter my fabulous giveaway by midnight on February 1st! And tell all your friends.)
I’ve been a reader of ProBlogger, too, and to be honest, I don’t think it really applies to our kind of blogging. When I read it, I get the sense that it’s geared towards small businesses that don’t know much about blogging. Or even towards individuals with ideas. Big ideas. You and me? We have life blogs and most life blogs aren’t money-making material.
It’s funny, you get annoyed that people in your life aren’t reading your blog and ask you seemingly repetitive questions. I’m exactly the opposite. I assume no one is reading my blog, so when I’m talking to friends I haven’t seen before and they already know stuff from reading my blog, I’m actually disappointed and a little sad that there’s nothing “new” to tell them. hahaha.
I know exactly what you mean with this! I struggled for a long time with just wanting to be an ‘internet presence’, and I don’t think my writing was very good at those times. I think I prefer just being a part of a little blogging community… it seems more natural. But then, I don’t think I’d complain if someone offered to pay me a million dollars to write in my blog!!
I think that Pro Blogger is interesting, but I’m with Nilsa- it’s talking to topical bloggers, not to personal bloggers. Blog about technology or celebrities or books or any topic exclusively and then it will help, but we’re not selling a product, we’re asking people to invest emotionally in our lives. The reader investment is way bigger and the demands on the reader to respond are much larger.
I think there are ways you can make a little money, and there are ways to grow your community, but I have way more luck watching what bigger bloggers do and figuring out how to take that sentiment and scale it down to my blog’s level than I do trying to monetize.
Re: “didn’t you read my blog?”: I’ve kinda got the opposite… “issue”, if you will. People read my blog (via email subscription or on Facebook) but nobody ever comments. So I have no idea who’s actually reading. At least you always get a bevy of comments from regular readers, so you know who they are. Anyway, I’ll be chatting with either an online-only friend or an offline friend, and they’ll mention something that I haven’t told them about, and that catches me off guard for a sec ’til I realize they got that info… from my blog, of course!
Re: “I am so blogging this” — it’s not just you. It’s me, too. I remember one time when Allan did something silly/funny. He looked at me and then promptly said “You’re going to blog about this, aren’t you!?” And yes, I blogged exactly what he just asked
I guess I’ve gotten predictable about that sort of thing, at least to Allan 
Re: focusing your efforts on your blog instead of your job. Been there, done that, too
So I feel ya. Don’t lose heart. Maybe one day the twain shall meet 
Haha, most of my IRL friends don’t know I blog or if I do they say “what’s the appeal of sharing your life on the internet?” and when I try to explain what an awesome community this is, no one gets it. I told them about how everyone rallied around me when we had to put down the family dog, or during my break-up, but still, they don’t seem to care. It’s frustrating. And I find that I can’t talk to some of my IRL friends as honestly (how sad is that!?) as I can to people I’ve met through here? Or maybe I just think that because I’ve shared it online then I don’t have to share it again. Who knows.
I also confess to knowing NOTHING about Problogger.
yeah. blogging rules. one of my bridesmaids asked me a few days ago why i blog. and it took me a moment to answer because i wasn’t entirely sure how to answer her question. part of me was thinking ‘because it’s awesome’ and ‘because i love to write and so it lets me write without the pressure of trying to novel it up and have a coherent flowing storyline for hundreds of pages’ and ‘because other people can keep up with what’s going on’ and ‘so i can process stuff’. it’s all those reasons, all those things. do i aspire to have a lot of readers? yeah, that would be cool, but i just don’t have time to do that connecting right now. heck… i don’t even have time to do my homework. that’ what i’ll be trying to squeeze in between the craziness that is going to be this weekend. someday, i hope to have effective time management skills (be able to say no to my boss, either way) and then i know i can devote more time to my writing and all that.
I think if I started to make money on my one blog I’d be OK with that, but the other one…it’s completely insanity and needs to be free. Although if I did make money blogging, I’m not sure it would be so much fun anymore.
Agree with most of your sentiments (found you through randomizer on nablopomo) i often wonder why i blog its not about the money or the attention but the latter is a real feel good thing. I now catergorise it under my positive mental health plan because it keeps the brain ticking over in a different way. Ill try and visit again.
Yeah, I am kind of the same way – I’ve made a few cents from my blog (quite literally), but I don’t really put the effort in finding and developing readership because I have a hard enough time delivering content that I feel screams Me Me Me!
I think you’re doing a great job blogging – and if you want monetary compensation, you’ll get it…somehow!
I’d never heard of Problogger until now! I think I’d get way too stressed if there were ever a tie between monetary reimbursement and blogging – it’d take away the whole reason I did it. Stay a personal blogger – and even if you don’t get paid for it, there’s tonnes of people who love and adore everything you do here