This week is a particularly important week for me. Not only am I traveling to Boston for work, but I am celebrating my first full year of blogging seriously.
After being promoted to a Team Lead at work, I am traveling to meet my team, face-to-face, for the first time. I’ve also never been to Massachusetts so I’m excited to get a glimpse of what life is like up there. I would love to move to Boston someday. Did I just say that? Whoa.
When I look back on my posts from a year ago, I can’t help but cringe and also smile. My writing style was so ‘journalistic,’ as that was my focus in college, and my photography was not great. I know I am not perfect now, but I do love looking back and seeing how much I’ve improved.
1/5 Pick Your Platform
I started out on blogger. Back in the day, I was on WordPress via GoDaddy but all three of my past blogging attempts were thwarted by college, entering the job market and overall confusion about what I wanted my blog to be about. WordPress proved to be too big of an investment for me at the time.
After three months of consistent content creation and nailing out a solid post schedule, I decided to go back to WordPress but through BlueHost. Unlike Blogger, WordPress gives you more creative freedom over your templates and your post formatting. I have not looked back since making the switch.
2/5 It’s All About The Hustle & Dedication
Like I mentioned above, I have published at least one piece of content every single week of the last year. I was lucky enough to define a schedule where I could publish twice a week for the last four months. I can’t promise that will stay the same in the coming months, as I have a few potential projects coming up that will eat up a lot of my free time, but I will continue to publish quality content for you guys. This is not the end, but a new beginning.
3/5 Have Personality
In order to gain followers and readers, you have to have personality. What makes you worthy of having readers? Why should people care about you? In the last year, you guys have had a lot of opportunities to get to know me better. I will never stop sharing things like that with you, as I value transparency and honesty.
You guys know I am not camera shy, and I am not afraid to speak in public, but believe me when say I have my fair share of anxiety about it all. It’s important to me that you guys see that side of things as well as the finished results. After all, I am human and I get my bouts of self-doubt and nervousness too. Feel free to follow me on Instagram and Snapchat and look out for my stories!
4/5 Be Strategic – It’s Not All Creative
I have always been more creative than analytical. These days, I think I am a good mix of the two, but I still have a bit to learn on the strategy side. One of the most important lessons I learned is to find what works best on your blog. I’ve tested a variety of blog posts, to see what performs best, so I know what to focus on in the future. That doesn’t mean that I won’t stop trying new things. I know as time goes on, my tastes will change along with the tastes of my audience, and it’s important that the content I create be relevant to every person who enjoys reading what I write, or the photos I shoot.
When I first started blogging I had a little over a hundred page views per month. Now, it has more than quadrupled. Still, it’s probably nothing compared to other bloggers out there, but this is still important to me because it shows that my hard work is paying off.
5/5 Never Stop Learning
There is always room for improvement. With how fast-paced social media and blogging is, there is no time to stop learning. Never stop asking questions and pick your mentor’s brain when you can. I am always trying to learn new things, develop new skills and mold my craft.
My focus has been mainly on photography. I’m still learning to shoot in manual but I am getting more and more confident every time I get behind the camera. For the most part, I am still shooting all my own fashion posts with the help of my beloved boyfriend. I test shoot him, adjust the exposure triangle, and give him as much direction as I can, so I can walk away with images worthy of this space.
Satchel (similar here)
Lush Cinched Dress (here)
Faux Leather Beret (here)
Charles David Boots (here)
