We all have them.
Bad habits, mindsets, learned helplessness that we may not be aware of. We’ve gotten quite accustomed to them that they feel a part of us. Developing good blogging habits should allow you to confront some of these habits and make decisions about them that will be beneficial.
If you’re new to blogging welcome to the club! This is your new baby and you can look forward to a few sleepless nights (to make that deadline), staring at a blank screen and a controversial topic or two.
On the other hand, if you’ve been doing this for some time then you’ll see a pattern in some of the things listed here below.
But I’ll be honest and real with you: building a blogging audience will take commitment and dedication. It’s been estimated that there are 7 million dead blogs in the blogosphere.
Yours won’t be one of them.
With that said, blogging is not for those who want an easy buck or internet stardom.
It’s for those willing to build a community.
So the question is, how can blogging help you in your personal development? It’ll teach you to focus on a few things if you want to see your reach grow and your influence increase.
5 Blogging Tactics That Can Help You To Grow
1. Build Discipline.
Mark Sanborn in his book: Up, Down, or Sideways talks about the art of discipline; an underappreciated, but necessary tool for success and he looks at the mindsets and methods that enable us to succeed come what may. Self-discipline or self-control is a sign of inner strength and control of yourself, your actions, and your reactions.
You’ll have to employ self-control to focus and get the job done when a deadline hits or when crafting a proposal for a client or even when you just don’t feel like it. Blogging pushes you to develop that art. Every popular blogger must work via discipline, or they won’t get much done at all.
You’ll find that if you lack discipline, then you’ll struggle to grow your business but once you implement strategies to build self –discipline it will reverberate in every area of your life.
Tip #1 – List the 5 things you need to get done over the next seven days in order to get your blog moving forward. (This may include following up on a guest post query or as simple as researching content for the remainder of the year). As you complete them tick them off and give yourself a sweet reward.
2. Improve Organizational Skills.
There are days if you take a look at my desk at home you’ll see an abundance of pens, must-have print outs of the latest blog post, and things that have nothing to do with blogging.
But if at the end of the day your to-do list looks the same as when the day started or you have to scramble to find the number you just wrote down then you need to improve your organizational skills.
To get results from blogging calls for consistency; whether it is twice per month or twice per week. This will definitely require you to put checks in place to facilitate the smooth running of your business.
Some of us have full-time jobs, families, and extended families that all need to be taken care of. But the blog is also important, so you’ll have to be creative in putting things in place.
Practice writing things down regularly (I use Google Docs and my handy notebook for everything!)
Structure your work days in ways that incorporates the aspects needed to get your to-do list completed. For example if your children are home you may need to employ a part-time nanny to assist with them while you spend the first four hours of the morning responding to emails and writing proposals.
Tip#2 – Develop routines for the everyday events in your business and personal life: filing, posting, writing, you time, etc. Create a calendar or day timer (or use the latest app on your smartphone) to keep track of what needs to be done daily.
3. The Ability to Adapt.
The online landscape changes almost every single day: there are trends to keep up with; people you need to follow, apps that you may need to get rid of.
The way to keep up is through adaptation. No – not survival of the fittest, but just being aware of what is happening in your industry and how it affects you and your clients.
Being conscious that changes WILL happen should give you direction, an incentive to always be prepared for eventualities. This ability to adapt will prove helpful as you continue to grow as a person as well.
You’ll also find that as situations will happen in life, you’ll have to make choices but the key will be flexibility when called for.
Tip#3 – If the plans you’ve made don’t work out 100% of the time, don’t panic but practice putting Plan B’s in place for those just in case moments.
For example in keep a running list of blog post ideas in your Google Docs arsenal, so that if that article you’ve been waiting on falls through you have something to fall back on immediately.
4. Develop Empathy.
It’s amazing how many people start blogs with underlying motives that benefits them only.
Of course, as a work-at-home woman, no one expects that you’ll spend all that time blogging and not create a career from it, but making money from your blog should not be your ultimate goal: helpings others is.
Once you grasp that deep within, you’ll always be looking for ways to help others whether online or off. For instance, you may find yourself recognizing needs in places you never saw them before and building a desire to reach out to help.
And because you appreciate it’s not all about you, but about others who need your help, you’ll be more understanding in difficult situations.
Tip#4 – Look around at your target audience and those in your personal circle. What are they struggling with? Look for two ways you can help them without looking for anything from them in return.
5. Make a Difference.
As a blogger reaching out to others should be a part of your program. Follow them on Twitter, connect with them on Facebook, Pinterest and the list goes on.
As you do, you’ll read their stories, their challenges, their passions and their hobbies. You’ll laugh; you’ll cry and maybe even get mad.
But.
These stories will resonate with you, touch you and ignite a fire within you to help make a difference.
You can make a difference by sharing their story or sharing your own. It is through the act of helping others that you can impact and create change.
Tip #5 – It’s easy to get bogged down in creating the life that we crave that we take for granted others around us who crave our attention, who may be in need of our gifts and talents and sometimes our presence.
Over the next few days, identify one person to reach out to be it online or off; get involved in their back story, passion or hobby and help make a change by sharing with the world. You never know what movement you’ll help create.
As you go forth on this journey, know you are not alone, but also be aware that your success as a Work-At-Home-Woman won’t reside in a vacuum, it’ll affect every area of your life especially in the area of personal growth.
Let these five views become part of you and what you do and be sure to document this thrilling ride in your life.
Now it’s your turn. How has blogging been beneficial to you (apart from financial)?
Looking forward to your comments.
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Tasia Gonsalves-Barriero is the author of the forthcoming book: All In – Creating The Best Of You. She’s a small island girl from the Caribbean who also writes about Social Media, Content Marketing, and Copywriting on the Web. Say hi over on Twitter. And share your thoughts on this post.
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