I read a quote the other day after I published a post and it said “the first thing to do to become a blogger is to read other blogs.” I’m sure when you wanted to learn how to blog you have read and been told something similar. Everyone says to read blogs that get a lot of attention and that are in your niche of writing so you can get accustomed to the way your future viewers want to read.
But,
what is problematic is that they suggest doing it BEFORE writing your own posts.
There are two points to this. The first is that if you want to write a blog on a specific topic of your interest, you better already be reading blogs, books, articles, blurbs, press releases, references, magazines and any other material related to your field of interest.
The second problematic point is that when you follow other people’s blogs, when you interact with the authors of the books, when you connect with the writers of the articles you read, they are going to want to see what you have created. For example, every time you follow a blog or “like” someones post on WordPress, they get notified that you are following them or liked their post. The writer gets a message like this sent to them: ” They thought article title was pretty awesome. You should go see what they’re up to. Maybe you’ll like their blog as much as they liked yours!” You don’t even have to tell the person who wrote the blog you liked to check yours out, it’s done for you, it’s common curtosy, it’s expected to read some material in return. Given, maybe the big blogs that are actually making an income will ignore the suggestion WordPress makes for you, but when you are starting up a blog you better try and connect with everyone possible. More so the blogs that don’t make a lot of income. That’s how you get to become a blog that makes an income.
More to the point, while you better be reading up on the information on your niche that other people are also writing on, it would be beneficial to start writing posts before really connecting with anyone else. Get your information out there, if you are starting a blog, you obviously have something powerful enough to say to everyone.
Don’t waste valuable time searching and following other blogs, seeing how they write and interacting with them. When you sit down at the computer, get to work on creating content that the writers of the blogs and articles you read, will want to read back and provide feedback. Blogging is a two-way street, you can’t expect to grow if you have nothing to show. You can’t expect to improve if you have nothing to present to the specialists you take a fancy to.
Stay Positive & Write First, Talk Later
Garth E. Beyer
