Lessons Learned from Two Years of Blogging

“Today is my second anniversary of being a blogger,” he said, as the neon applause sign over his head lights up.

October 13, 2007 was the first day I set-up this WordPress blog. Social Media was growing fast and I wanted to learn more about it for business as well as personal reasons. I have always liked to write so it didn’t seem like that much of a stretch. Biggest challenge was what to write about. I felt it was important to have a theme, and so after dozens of tries I came up with “Tracking the convergence of society, media and technology.” A friend who now resides in California made her way back to my blog a couple of weeks ago. She tagged me and my writing with a label; postmodern. I feel it’s a fitting description that I want to spend more time pondering. Hey another idea for a post!

Looking back over these two years I’ve learned some things, I think. Here’s the short list of lessons learned.

Blogging is hard. You get out of the blocks fast, but the longer you do it the tougher it becomes to maintain momentum. Don’t stop. You started for a reason.
You become obsessed over the stats. I found myself clicking back to see if I gained any more readers in the last 10 seconds. This goes away over time with therapy sessions.
There is a temptation to find a new theme or redesign every six months. Evolution is normal. Have at it as it’s your time. But people come for the content not for the design.
Cadence is only mildly important. Believe it or not, no one is waiting for your every Monday, Wednesday and Friday 7:15 am post.
Don’t manufacture posts to stay on a schedule. If you have nothing meaningful to say, you won’t say it and no one will read it. Save everyone the trouble. People can be harmed by careless posts.
Read other bloggers you admire and learn from them. Style, topics, use of images and stats, etc. But don’t develop Blogger Envy.
For the most part stick with your theme, but it’s not taboo to veer off-road once in a while.
Challenge yourself to write better. If you put in the time you will improve, and it will show. Ask an editor to review your work occasionally.
Stop obsessing about the stats. You’re not doing this for the fame or fortune. Really, you’re not.
Above all, be passionate. Boring is boring. Don’t be boring.