When you sit down to write a blog post, how does your thought process flow?
Think about it for a moment.
I can tell you that 3-4 months ago, I did not really have a thought process. I would get an idea for a blog post, and by idea I mean absolutely anything that came into my head that was remotely marketing or Social Media related. I’d sit down and type, look for a picture, hit publish, and tweet it out. Then I would wait and see who would pop by and comment.
At the time, my thinking was that this was working pretty well. I was thinking, I thought to myself. Aren’t ideas thoughts? Wasn’t I writing my thoughts down? I thought so.
What I was missing
If you are blogging in a way remotely similar to the way I was blogging a few months ago, you may find that you are missing a lot of things that are really important to think about, as it turns out.
For example:
• Who are you writing for?
• What is your objective?
• What kind of narrative are you hoping your blog will tell?
• If someone new happens upon your blog will they “get” what you’re trying to do?
Three or four months ago, these questions were not even residing in the general orbital space around my brain. A month or two ago, I thought about some of these questions but didn’t have any answers. Or at least the answers weren’t very good. “Who are you writing for?” I’d ask myself. “Um…people…who read…blogs.”
Your slip is showing
If you’re a person who has worn skirts and dresses with slips, you know that one of the primary concerns, all day long, is whether your slip will show. It’s not that it’s the most tragic thing in the world, but it’s something that’s nice to avoid. Realizing that your fly is undone could also be used as an analogy here.
Well, approaching blogging without a thought process results in the same kind of feeling, or at least it did for me. As I realized that I hadn’t even been thinking about thinking, my ability to grasp my own narrative and my own, well, point, drifted further and further away. What was I doing? Why was I doing it? It all became a great muddle, and I felt certain that everybody noticed. My confidence drifted away. My blog was revamped and then further revamped and then resuscitated. It was not good. And I knew it.
Let’s get to thinking
About a month ago, I decided to do something revolutionary.
I actually decided to think about what I was doing. And you know what? It’s made a pretty positive difference, at least in my outlook. I’ll leave it to you to evaluate my blog posts.
Since we’re early in the year, this is a great opportunity to think about what you think when you sit down to blog. Let me know if you have answers in your head to the questions I raised above:
• Who are you writing for?
• What is your objective?
• What kind of narrative are you hoping your blog will tell?
• If someone new happens upon your blog will they “get” what you’re trying to do?
If you don’t have answers to these questions yet, that’s okay. We can still work on that. If you have answers but aren’t happy with them, we can talk about that in the comments section. And of course, if you have answers and you’re willing to share your example for others, that would also be great.
Make sense?