About Blogging - One Year of B-Side Blog
America is celebrating Independence, I’m celebrating the first anniversary of my blog.
A lot happened in one year. I became a blogger, a youth worker and a writer. I moved to the UK and started writing daily for the Adventures of the Muddy Shoes (for exactly 301 days). I started studying English Literature & Creative Writing, experimenting with books, scripts and short stories. Then there was (and still kind of is) a pandemic. My world and the whole world are going through changes and I am here, in front of my laptop, writing about the realities of day to day life.
I’m proud of the way B-Side Blog grew in one year. One of my articles has been read by more than 1700 people, and most of them are read by 40 to 300 people, depending on what I write about. When I was inviting people to write for me (during exams period), most of them were actually excited to take part in this. Also, there are always shares and people talking about the things I write. I would be a liar not to say that I’m experiencing a high level of Impostor Syndrome. I’ll get over it at some point (hopefully).
It took me 3 years of just posting on Facebook and wishing I’d start my own blog to finally do it. I spent 6 months with my page ready to go, but I wasn’t ready to commit to it. I kept finding excuses - I don’t have enough time, I don’t know how to promote it, my articles are not worthy, and the list can go on forever. I didn’t have a plan at first. Instead, I set a date when I wanted to start then took everything step by step. Looking back, I think I made good decisions and I didn’t make any huge mistakes so far. For those of you who are going through the same negotiation period as I did, here is a plan that might work for you.
1. Stop making excuses
This one is self-explanatory. For me, setting deadlines was an excuse to stop making excuses. For you, it might be having a full plan pinned to your wall or talking to people about it or I don’t know. Explore what suits you, there is definitely something that will.
2. Create the blog
I’d recommend WIX if you don’t have too much experience with websites. It’s easy to use and it has lots of cool features. However, don’t bother too much with that. You don’t need everything to be perfect from the very beginning and you can make changes whenever you feel like it.
3. Ask for feedback
Feedback is always important. I don’t know what else I should say about this.
4. Shameless promoting
Talk about your blog as much as you can, share your own articles, send them to friends. If you don’t feel comfortable doing it from your personal accounts, create Social Media accounts for your blog and invite your friends to just like them. It’s less personal and you might feel safer to share your thoughts (and so will your readers).
5. Write and write and write
Really, just write about whatever is on your mind. Experiment with articles, prose, poetry, reviews - whatever. If you feel like writing about it, just do it. No one will truly judge you. I mean people will judge you regardless, so why not give them something interesting to talk about?
I’m not sure if there is anything to add to this list right now. I’ll definitely discover more as B-Side Blog keeps on growing. It seems easy? It’s really not that hard to start a blog and keep it going. We’re surrounded by inspiration, we just need to look around. I know I mostly talked about writing here, but really you can have a photography blog or a cooking blog or a video blog (vlog), things don’t change too much. The first rule is to stop making excuses, everything else will fall in place after that. And if you make mistakes, learn from them and keep growing. Nothing should stay between you and your passions and you sharing your passions with the world.
Also, if you have a blog or need some help or you have any questions, drop me a message. I’d be more than happy to talk to you and offer you some support. Write me an email at bside.blog.bk@gmail.com or just message me on any of my social media accounts.
Last but not least, going back to the part about shameless promoting. Jeanine is again a guest on the Adventures of the Muddy Shoes talking about rebranding sky.s.stories to HWLNG. Check out her thoughts and her Instagram page @hwlng.j!
Adventures of the Muddy Shoes 04.07.2020 - HWLNG
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