“Don’t focus on having a great blog. Focus on producing a blog that’s great for your readers” Brian Clark

Blogging 201: Day One: Set Three Goals

Welcome to Blogging 201: Branding and Growth!
Today we want you to do a bit of thinking about your blog, so you can focus the next two weeks effectively.

Today’s assignment: Consider what you want to accomplish with your blog. Write down three concrete goals.

* Why are we doing this? Why do you blog? For notoriety? To get a book contract? To self-publish? To establish yourself as a leader in your field? To gain followers? To connect with others? To clarify your own thoughts?

I would have to answer, all of the above and then some. I would think every writer thrives on getting acknowledgement for their work and others liking the work put out there and actually coming back for more. Getting published: From my point of view, step one is already achieved. Putting out your work for the world to see on the world wide web is publishing. Now getting a book deal out of it could be the next goal for any writer, certainly it is for me. First step for me in the near future is self publishing. Last but not least, networking is important in what ever you do in today’s world. Writing may be a solitary job, but the support gained through the blogging community overwhelmed me. There is no better kudos than those coming from your peers.

* If your blog exceeded your wildest dreams, what would that look like? Would you have a different design? How many followers would you have? How much traffic? What sort of community would participate? How often would you post?

Keep it simple stupid would be a great guideline to follow. That being said, I am interested in too many things to just concentrate on one specific thing, be that in my life or in my blog. Sooner than later the structure of the blog needs to be revised, now that the content is growing fast. Also the upgrade is necessary. As for the numbers, well, your guess is as good as mine! Unfortunately my crystal ball is not showing me exact figures, so at this point, any followers are a great number.

I prefer the audience to be as wide as possible, not concentrating on specific subjects nor agendas, rather paint the images as open as possible and give the audience a chance to play with their imagination and fill in the gaps.

Daily posting has been my goal since May, when I first participated in Writing101. Currently the format is more on photography and poetry. I hope to include more stories and serials in the future as well.

• Three specific goals.

⁃ Self publish first book with assortment of poetry and photography
⁃ Widen scope to include travel log: August 2015
⁃ Widen scope to include video: Project start in September, concept and scripting in progress currently