Patience and Perseverance
Post By Billie
Patience and persistence is key when you first start blogging. Why you want to write publicly is totally your idea, how you do is WordPress’s and its many users intelligence.
Almost 2 years into my blogging adventure, I still find it an amazing tool to get your voice heard. When I first started blogging, I simultaneously wrote on Blogger as well as on WordPress, just to find out what was the perfect tool for what I wanted out of my blog. After blogging on both for a while, I became very dissatisfied with the lack of settings Blogger had in comparison to WordPress. The choice to cancel and delete my Blogger profile was an easy one to make, and to this day, I am still amazed at what WordPress offers its bloggers.
When starting a blog, it’s easy to find fantastic themes and widgets to go with your blog. Match your content to your style of background, for example if you want to blog about history, it would make sense not to use a background of people partying, or if you want to blog about something serious, don’t use one that is perpendicular to the content of your posts. Play around with themes, upgrade to have Custom Design added to your themes and/or buy a Premium Theme and if you can afford it, have WordPress give you a designated domain name (web link name).
WordPress offers so many themes and layouts that in my case, I’ve changed themes so many times I fear I am playing with my readers and followers patience and understanding a wee bit. Why I say ‘understanding’ is because of one of the main topics of my own blog: living with multiple sclerosis and its many very and utterly annoying symptoms like eye trouble. My eyes seem to dislike the rest of me and often have me wearing sunglasses indoors or when I am writing on my laptop because of the brightness of black letters on a white background. It is causing the often-heard “Aaaaargh…” when I realize I have been writing, researching, reading newspapers or Facebooking too long. However, that cannot be a reason to annoy my blog followers because they are my backbone and because of them I want to keep improving my writing, my blog and my online presence. We live in an online symbiosis and like any other company, the owner has to respect the rights of its clients. This means that no matter how much I love playing around with WordPress themes, I have to respect the needs my users expect of me.
That aside, what I also want new bloggers to know is to be patient. We all secretly want to be the next Dan Brown, Shakespeare or other literary marvel, but unless you come forward with answers to why Egypt’s sphinx really has such a small head, or know the answer to the true identity of God or if you have content so revealing, interesting and ready to be published by the biggest names in the business… you… need… to… be… patient…
Don’t be alarmed when you have few readers and followers at first. Keep writing, check other people’s blogs to see what works for them and don’t be discouraged if it takes you a while to get your mojo. Like I always say: Rome wasn’t built in a day either. Or in two.
Another thing is not to be afraid to write what you believe in because after all, freedom of speech is what we all strive for, and if it’s important to you, it just might be important to someone else.
Also, don’t be afraid to ask questions in the weekly Community Pool, which is sent to WP users every Sunday where you can ask others what they think of your blog, and if they have any tips to improve your blog. If you want to find out where your strength as a writer lies, participate in the Daily Post and Weekly Post challenges, it is a fantastic manner to finding out if you prefer one or another writing style, what you like writing about and whether you can write ‘on command’.
Lastly, don’t forget to Publicize your posts by going to your Sharing Settings so you can link your blog to your Facebook profile, Twitter, LinkedIn, Tumblr and other social media websites. This will impact greatly on the amount of people visiting your blog, and otherwise, just be annoying for a while and tell all your friends and family that you are now a blogger on WordPress (been there, done that… I fear my family and friends are still suffering Billie-phobia).
Good luck with your new blog and please feel free to ask any questions or post other comments, and do come back regularly to see what I am up to on WordPress. I always check back in on your blog to do the same!
Write your thoughts. Express your emotions. Share your joy, as well as your pain. Stand tall. Say it all.
Thanks for your feed back.
Cyril