Does the thought of writing blog posts scare you?

Just before the recession hit the UK I decided I’d had enough of the 9 to 5 rutt and I was desperate to escape and get out.  All I wanted was to find something that earned me enough income so I can work from home.  While working I spend every bit of spare time I could find to work on one day being able to work from home.  I explored and exhausted many options and then one day I found what I was looking for.

When the time came and I started working for myself I did not have a big marketing budget and I also knew that traditional marketing was costly.  However,  I understood the importance of dedicated marketing because it is the ingredient one needs to let people know you exist so you can generate business.  I decided to see if there was a way I could market my business using the internet.

There is quite a bit one can do to market your business online but it does come at a price if you want results.  However, it is not as expensive as advertising in the newspaper or using other traditional mediums and the biggest advantages the internet has over traditional marketing is that it is forever, it levels the playing field and you are not restricted by location.

One of the ways you can market your business online is to use a blog.  Blogging gives you the opportunity to demonstrate your skills and expertise.  It gives strangers the opportunity to get to know who you are and decide whether one day to use your services or not.

I decided I was going to blog and I went on a mission to learn how to write blogs.  I spent hours and hours researching articles on writing and copywriting.  I spent hours researching top bloggers websites to establish what works and doesn’t work.  I also spent hours reading other people’s blogs to get ideas on how to write and what I could write about and before I wrote that first blog post I had spent time just commenting on other people’s posts to help me become better at writing.

Truth be told, I had a big stumbling block when it came to writing stuff in general.  As a child my first language was mainly Afrikaans and the first years of my schooling was all in Afrikaans.  At the age of 9 I switched over to an all English school which presented numerous challenges having to learn everything now in English.  I struggled with English and when it came to writing essays,  I hated it so much that I got my brother to write my essays for me.

I remember when I published my first blog post like it was yesterday.  It was nerve wrecking especially when self-limiting belief thoughts starts to flood your mind, giving you all the reasons why you cannot write a blog post.  I spent hours and hours trying to write my first blog post and it took me 30 minutes to hit the publish button.  It is really quite overwhelming writing and publishing your first post because you feel like you’ve just exposed yourself to the world and you can’t take it back.

So I know where you are coming from when the fear hits you and you think you can’t do it because you don’t have the skills, the knowledge or the education. That’s how I felt.  I was so consumed with the fear of not having the education or the degree to write that I would write the blog post but not promote it as effectively as I should have.

I think we can over complicate things and I think a large part of the problem is how we’ve been pre-conditioned to behave and think in a certain way that suits the “status quo”. Sadly the result of this is that many of us have unrealised gifts and talents all stored up inside of us just waiting for an opportunity to come out.

reading-blog-postI’m not the best writer in the world and I’m certainly no expert at it but what I learnt is that you can learn to do anything if you put your mind to it.  You can do anything if you put in the time and energy but you have to put in the time and energy, it is not just going to magically happen.  It takes patients and practice and lots of practice.

What I am saying to you is that you won’t know until you try. I am saying we have spent too much of our valuable time thinking that we cannot do things therefore limiting ourselves and getting nowhere.

It really isn’t the end of the world if your blog post is not perfect,   mine certainly wasn’t but I’m learning and I’m practising to be better at it.  Willing to try it out has shown me that I can actually write something and surprised myself.  The result of my first blog wasn’t so bad.  I got lots of comments and met 3 people who I’m still in contact with today because of that  first blog post.   7 years later I am still in business and I generate all my business from the marketing I do on the internet using blogs and other mediums.

I hope this has inspired those of you who have been putting it off all this time out of fear of what people will think.

What was your first experience like writing a blog post?

If you are new to the idea of using blog posts and using it to market your business and would like someone to help you through this process and help you overcome those fears, come and join in one of our online group training workshops Paint-by-Numbers training program it may be just the confidence you need to get started.

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