Today I want to share what I have learned along my blogging journey entering my fifth year. A piece of cake, it is not.
To start let me just say that I no longer want to polish up my posts for the sake of SEO. Yeah sure, Google would rather I did. The truth is, deciding what I want to write and share has been difficult enough as it is. And putting in the effort to hit all of the SEO pain points feels like a chore.
Also, I feel like polishing up blog posts in general can sometimes take away authenticity from the writing style.
I have circled around many blogging “to do” and “not to do” posts about blogging. And while SEO has helped a few of my post, I noticed it is only the views that increase, not the engagement.
My post about How to Give WordPress Permissions on MacOS is my highest viewed blog post. And while I am sure it has been helpful to some, there have been no comments or feedback to let me know one way or the other.
That blog post took a bit of time to piece together authentically, but SEO suggestions for “Transition Words” and smaller paragraphs I feel took away some of my authentic voice.
When I first began blogging, I came across a blog post on how to get started. I wanted a website, a place away from social media, a small corner of the web. I jumped into it without ever taking the time to decide on a niche.
In the past 4 years, I still haven’t selected a niche to stay focused on. Which is why I am now on day 2 of writing unfiltered, raw content.
Everything I have created up to this point took a lot of overthinking and time. It is because of that I chose this new path of writing freely with no overthinking and only having some of the SEO boxes checked.
I chose to pay for a self hosted WordPress blog rather than sticking to a free WordPress.com account. Self hosted meaning that I pay for web space, own my content, and unrestricted features.
Blogging is not as easy as others make it seem. If you are looking to monetize your blog, you need to niche down and build a following and community.
If you are beginning a blog as a hobby only and not looking to monetize, then you may not need a niche. At least not right away.
Content you create on WordPress.com you still own, but WordPress.com places their own ads within your live content. And they restrict users from installing plugins and even some of the more popular themes.
The last thing I want to share tonight that I learned is that many bloggers give up. I have followed several bloggers, and most of their sites, while still running, have been inactive for a year or longer. I thought about giving up at one point but told myself “to hell with it”, and decided to keep going.