Blogging

I Wouldn’t Quit Blogging Because Huffington Post Said So

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A recent article from The Huffington Post lists reasons one should quit blogging.

How do you know it’s time to quit blogging? Well, The Huffington Post has five suggestions for you to ponder.

Some offer the typical doomsday blogging advice. For instance, being too broad in your target market is a negative because other blogs have been around longer than yours and the broader your audience, the smaller the chance your modest little blog will get noticed.

Another suggestion involves your anonymity: no one knows who you are or that you’re even there, so why blog, it seems to say. I’m sure there was a time when no one had ever heard of The Huffington Post, ProBlogger or countless other blogs that have since made it big.

No, I don’t delude myself into thinking this little blog will ever reach that status.

But the thing about blogging is that it’s a personal thing: you have to ask yourself an important question at some point in the blogging journey:

If your blog never becomes famous, will you still enjoy blogging?

Really, that’s the crux of the issue.

The article seems more targeted to people who blog for their business or people who will see blogging as a business for extra income.

I’ll go ahead and fess up: I’d love to make money on this blog. I haven’t. In more than eleven years, I haven’t made one cent at this little endeavor. At least, not directly. But indirectly, this blog helped me demonstrate skills of writing for the web and communicating with an audience that may have led to my current job in TV. It wasn’t the primary selling point, of course, but it was something I could show immediately.

There are different types of value, after all.

For those of you thinking about starting a blog or who have been at it for six months and are already starting to feel the frustration of not earning that extra income you were hoping for, allow me to rephrase my question:

If your blog never becomes a moneymaker, will you still enjoy blogging?

If your answer is no, then I’d say it’s time to think about looking for a different hobby.

As the article so indelicately puts it, the odds are certainly against new blogs taking off and building an audience because there are just so many other blogs already out there and already established.

I think most of us already know that, even though some of us may be just stubborn enough when it comes to our own abilities and our own little “digital darling”&nbsp that we may be hesitant to acknowledge the obvious.

Making money with a blog can be very, very difficult. It can truly seem impossible.

Can you remove the pressure from your shoulders to make money and commit yourself to blogging for the sake of enjoying blogging? If you can’t, that’s a red flag.

But if you can, if you’re in it because you like the craft that is blogging, I think you have a better chance of building an audience, albeit perhaps a bit slower than the “money-focused” bloggers out there.

I also think you’ll have a hell of a lot more fun even when the cash doesn’t start raining down into your living room.

the authorPatrick
Patrick is a Christian with more than 30 years experience in professional writing, producing and marketing. His professional background also includes social media, reporting for broadcast television and the web, directing, videography and photography. He enjoys getting to know people over coffee and spending time with his dog.