Brand, Ideas, Story, Style, My Life: How to Stand Out as a Blogger in a Crowded Space

Friday, May 25, 2018

How to Stand Out as a Blogger in a Crowded Space

Every year it gets easier to start a blog, and as this ease brings more blogs into the picture it becomes more important to set yourself apart. But with so many blogs already out there, and so many ideas already being put in to action, aren’t all the good ideas taken? The answer is no. Each one of us has a unique experience, and angle to come at different problems, and each one of us have a different strength set. You have a message. You may even have multiple messages, the trick is to figure out what they are.

No matter why you are starting your blog if you want to bring people to it, and if you want it to be the best quality that you can produce you are going to need a message. So what is your message? Your message is the story that you tell people about your own life and theirs. It is a consistent message and it is your brand, and without a strong message your blog is going to just end up being a raindrop lost in the ocean.

The first thing you need to know is what you expect to get out of your writing.

Are you doing this for fun? Would you like to turn it into a business? How much do you want your blog to grow? Is there a certain audience would like to connect with? These are the questions you need to ask yourself before your going to have a clear idea of what direction to even start moving in.

So pull out a piece of paper or open a text document because we are going to find your message by answering a few questions. While answering these write down as many things as you can think of. The more things you can put on this list the better, and feel free to add to it as you come up with more ideas.

What excites you most to think and talk about? You are going to need passion to write consistently and you are going to need something that excites you before you can get someone else excited about it. The best part is that if you are excited about something excitement and passion are very contagious.

What type of people do you want to build a connection with? Is there an age group? What do these people have in common? Why do you want to connect with them? Be as detailed as possible, the more specific the better. Try to think from their perspective. This is going to be your target audience, so it needs to be somebody that you can relate to, and think like. It is okay to have more than one type of audience to aim at, but you are going to want to try to aim at one type at a time, unless you can find a broad connection between the different groups.

What type of problems does your target audience have? There is no problem too big or small. Even just relieving boredom is a problem that some groups of people need solved, and changing the world can only be done if somebody tries.

Make a list of what you are good at. What major and minor accomplishments have you completed in your life? If you have troubles coming up with answers than go ask friends and family, what they say you are good at.

How did you achieve each accomplishment?

What type of things do you like to read?

What have been the most important things you have been told in your life?

What have been your favorite things to write about in the past?

Once you have all that down its time to start going over the data. What you are looking for is a common theme. Pay particular attention to the problems that your audience needs solved. What out of the things that you enjoy reading, and writing makes you unique? Is there a need for your audience that is not being addressed, or at least not completely addressed? Is there a particular approach that has helped you that is not talked about often enough? How many things can you apply this information to? This is where you are going to find your message so write out a few sentences, they don’t have to be perfect, just put down as many as you need to. How many relationships can you find between the ideas that you are writing down?

Summarize. Try to put these relationships into a short sentence. Sum it up in as few words as possible. Keep going over this again and again until you find something that makes you pause. If you get more than one idea that’s great you can save extra ideas for later on down the road, but for now pick out the idea that has the most meaning to you.

How few words can you sum up your point of focus in to. What you want to do is come up with a URL idea out of that idea. The next step is to do a search and see if that name is available to be bought. If its not available don’t worry, you can still rephrase it, and you have other ideas written down. If your site name is taken see if you can take a look to see if they are leaving anything off that you would want to do. You can focus on that difference, and rather than see them as an opponent look at this person as someone who could help you spread your message. After all something from your message will probably resonate with them too.

You can check back to your list any time you want, and add to it as you come up with new ideas, and accomplish new things. So now not only do you have a message to focus on and grow with but you have options to switch to if your first idea goes bust. Just make sure that you give it your fullest try before you move on to something else. The minimum amount of time you should work on an idea is one year. Knowing your message is the step that will set you apart. Now you need to do something about it.

What ideas did you come up with? More importantly what are you going to do with your message? You have an idea to share, but its not going to share itself. There is an audience to connect with but you are going to have to do the work to make it as easy as you can for them to find you. You are going to have to put the things together to make them want to come to your blog. So don’t let it go to waste, and have fun.

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