Personal development is crucial to everybody, and was the purpose behind my first blog. Healthy Lifestyles Living Blog purpose has always been to share my feelings and thoughts on my subject and to help my readers grow personally and discover ways to live consciously.
I am still, just as I was at the beginning, thrilled and excited how I am able to help others take new daily actions and develop more positive thinking, and making a huge beneficial difference in their lives. It does give me a real buzz … it’s great!
I didn’t think blogging and personal development would interlink so much. But it has, and the two have gelled so perfectly. Blogging has enabled me to truly affect so many more lives, than I could as a life coach, and even as a speaker.
Because of my blog, I was able to build a very strong personal development coaching practice. Once people had read what I had to say for a while, as I earned their trust, and demonstrated both my knowledge and my skills, they began enquiring about one-to-one coaching. Unwittingly blogging had become by far and away my greatest marketing tool for this. I suppose the saying, what you put in, you get out, definitely holds true to the blogging world.
Once I also started getting people contacting me, asking for my advice about how to improve their blog etc, I realised I had now established my personal brand, and demonstrated that I had built a strong, well respected blog, and this was a strong reason for me to then start up this still relatively new blog. Larry Lewis Online has become my stage for talking about blogging. Helping others avoid some of the pit falls and mistakes waiting for us out there in the blogosphere.
On the 29th August, 2011 I launched this blog. So it is not yet 2 months old. I’ve reached the position of 167,889 on the Alexa daily chart. I’ve got to say I’m happy with that, particularly as I still don’t look at it as my number one blog. I don’t think I’ll ever fall out of love with the other one, to ever think of another blog in exactly the same way.
It is on the other blog that I have learnt so much. It is the reason I was able to launch my new product where I could teach others how to not just build a blog, but a complete online business. Through this I know without any uncertainty my knowledge will help others achieve this. I don’t want them to make the same mistakes I did. For example, only a few months ago, Healthy Lifestyles Living blog was in the 90,000’s on Alexa, and at about 6000 with an authority of 500 on Technorati. By one very silly mistake, I then plummeted on both. I dropped to the 190,000’s on Alexa, and to about 30,000 with a pitiful authority on Technorati. Having worked out what I did, I’m pleased to say things are going back in the right direction, and will be back on top within a month or two. Thank god I can teach others how to avoid this.
There are lots of very good reasons why so many people are attracted to blogging – it costs them virtually nothing, it’s simple to set up and get started, and it’s a great way of getting your name out there and building your authority. Blogging also brings with it a sense of community.
True networking has got to be the most rewarding benefits of blogging. I’ve met some remarkable people who I’m honoured to say make up my blog’s community – many of which I call friends. I would never have crossed their path if it wasn’t for blogging
Blogging has undoubtedly helped me build my personal brand. When I| first started out blogging I had no big intentions. Then as I gradually wrote more articles, got involved in the social media sites, particularly facebook and twitter, I started to realise that blogging offered me far more than just a past time. It showed me the potential of building a successful, money making internet business. Which is what I now have.
What I did come to realise, and my community taught me this vital piece of the jigsaw, was that Blogs are just as much about the person behind the words as they are the words themselves. The blogger, in my case, me, and my voice are a big part of why my blog is successful.
Blogging can be a therapeutic experience particularly when you start to see yourself building a healthy and popular blog that’s begins to prosper. When you suddenly find that you have established a large reader base who check your site every morning, it becomes such a amazing inspiration to you. You become very proud of what you are doing.
The success you enjoy online can slowly start to pour into other areas of your “real” life. Yes even a blogger has a real life. We do retain our offline life and in my case it is still a very active one at that. You will find on my other blog that I will frequently talk about the importance of creating a healthy, balanced lifestyle.
Returning to what I said before, that there are lots of very good reasons why so many people are attracted to blogging I would say primarily blogging is a means of communicating and putting forth ones thoughts and ideas. It’s all about sharing and sharing especially what works for you. I will always say first and foremost it’s not about making money. But yes if you do stick with blogging, put your passions in, build your community, money will come to you from all sorts of different areas.
To anybody reading this that is on the verge of entering the blogosphere, you really have to ask yourself, why do you want to do it? After all, it’s a very busy place right now with blogs on every topic, every niche, and we are told there are over 100,000 new blogs started daily. That’s right 100,000, and that’s from Technorati.
You know when you first think about building a blog, it is essential that you ask yourself lots of questions. Here are some more questions that you as a wannabee blogger needs to ask yourself:
Why would anybody want to read my blog?
What would they hope to find?
Will I be able to succeed as a blogger?
Will I attract enough readers to make it feel worthwhile?
What is my voice?
Are there blogs with similar voices?
How will I make mine unique?
Do I really want to express myself in this way?
Are you willing to commit the time?
To some of you existing bloggers, from many of the chats I’ve had recently, I want to give you time for reflection, and get yourself to ask a really important question:
Do you really know what you are blogging about, or blogging because you think you have to?
Now you’ve answered that, here is another question for you:
Does your blog make a difference in the world around you, are you helping others?
And finally, here is a question I’d like you to answer in my comment section:
What benefits have you enjoyed and what rewards have you seen so because of your blog?
Thank you for visiting Larry-lewis.com today!
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