Blog Challenge Review - Week 1

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Last week I announced that I would be subjecting myself to somewhat of a blog challenge by committing to write 5 times a week leading up to a speaking engagement in March. Let's see how I did my first week!

Weekly Debrief

Posts

My talk will cover equal parts content strategy (what to write about) and creative inspiration (how to write it).

Where Did I Find Inspiration?

I found inspiration in a few places. One article was written from an old draft. I have about 50 concepts that I'm always adding to or pulling from. The Never Forgive And Forget post was one such draft that came from a fragment of an email I wrote to a friend a few years ago.

Two of my articles were inspired by photos. I like to dig through photos to remind myself of stories, strong opinions, and life lessons. One was from a visit to the planetarium with my kids, the other came straight from my wife's facebook page.

I totally cheated and posted a link to an 8BIT article on project management one day, instead of writing a new article on my personal blog, but I think this is still a legitimate move. The article was freshly written by me and describes a communication technique that is useful beyond the stated application.

Finally, the article about body language was a current event and came directly from the trenches of parenting.

How Did I Put Inspiration To Action?

Announcing on my blog, twitter, and Facebook that I would be writing (almost) daily was a big help to me following through. Public accountability can me quite effective!

A number of people commented (and tweeted, and facebooked) to encourage me and say nice things about my writing, and this really gave me a boost!

The post about body language practically wrote itself because I wrote it while the event was still fresh, right after my kids went to bed that night. I should I do this more often.

Further Thoughts

I found myself thinking more about writing. Getting into the groove has made a difference in how I think throughout the day. I found myself contemplating post concepts, titles, etc. more than I have in a long time. This felt good!

I had so many good ideas throughout the week but I didn't write most of them down and now they are lost. I need to do better at this. It's more than a little ironic considering I helped invent (and write the marketing copy) for this product here called #notes.

I found myself struggling with the blog being too "me focused," and not adding enough value to others. I've always wanted the blog to be about me and my family, and to be for me and my family, but I may change the focus and intent if it broadens my writing horizons and helps me get better at writing.

Knowing your audience is an important step in the right direction! I'm not sure I know mine yet.

That's all for now, on to Week 2!