Controlling You

Part One in the Series. Dot Mom Blogs™

Whether you’re a newbie or an old pro, becoming successful as a blogger can be a daunting task. It’s not going to happen over night. (No matter what you’ve been told or sold) But it can and will happen, if you have patience and a little insight into some basic marketing principles. No, its not just about making money here, but I’m going to let you in on some “secrets” that will help you along the route.

Chances are, nobody will ever care about your blog more than you do- except for , well maybe your parents or your spouse. This means you must take responsibility for managing it on your own. Don’t even think about leaving that responsibility to anyone else. I’m not saying here that those around you aren’t interested in helping you succeed. But their focus is primarily on themselves-their own projects, blogs, families and careers. Quite simply, your focus should remain squarely on you. Start thinking like the CEO, marketing manager, sales team, HR director, chief design engineer and talent coordinator of your own company. A company of one. YOU.

I talked about branding yourself in a guest post last week. We all know that product branding is designed to create an emotional response in consumers. Turns out, that many of those same strategies apply equally as well to branding yourself.  In today’s competitive environment, self branding is an essential element of establishing your reputation in the blogging world and distinguishing yourself from the pack. Simply put, its how you convey your core values, highlight your talents, and present your passions to your readers, peers and advertisers. You can be sure that each and every reader of your blog is forming an opinion about your brand, each and every page load. So, think very carefully about what it is you want them to be feeling and thinking about Brand YOU.

Next week, we’ll talk about  knowing yourself versus technical skills.

Below are the topics we’ll cover in this mini-seminar. I hope you’ll join me for the next few weeks and participate in the discussion.

• Knowing yourself = twice the importance of knowing the technical ins and outs.
• No such thing as work/life/blog balance, only trade-offs.
• Listen to your heart, then your gut.
• No pain, No gain.
• Get out of your own way
• Learn the truth about integrity
• You have to be good to be lucky.

What’s your brand?

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