Almost a decade ago I was more interested in forum management than anything else.
Blogging was something new and I noticed more and more webmasters were talking about it. And, since I am as curious as a cat, I HAD to try it.
In few minutes I had a Blogspot account and added 2-3 articles.
It didn’t click though.
I hated the idea of having someone else ‘host’ my blog, so I started looking at a self-hosted solution. I was already running a small network of sites, had a reseller account with Hostgator (still have it) and installing WordPress was a breeze.
Now we’re talking.
It was September 2007 and I started my Romanian blog, dojoblog.ro, with almost no agenda at all. I already had few forums (webmaster, martial arts, women etc.) and loved creating content there, but suddenly I felt the urge of just blogging for ‘myself’.
It was (and still is) a general blog, which took off nicely in our blogosphere. It earned me some money from various advertisers, but most importantly, it earned me many clients for my web design business.
Writing about blogging, web design, SEO etc. was easy, since I was doing this every day on my other websites and was also working with various clients from all over the world.
Together with my ‘general’ articles, travel stories and miscellaneous other posts, these articles convinced my audience that I know what I’m talking about.
Of course, being the design manic I am also kept my blog looking nice and fresh (doing a redesign almost every year), which again helped my potential customers see something from my talent and versatility.
To this day, blogging about web development has helped me earn many clients and establish my home based business.
You can guess this is not my only client ‘funnel’, but it’s so far the BEST of them all. I work via Elance / Upwork, still post in various forums (which allowed me to get targeted traffic to my web sites), there are people who know me personally (or are referred by friends or past customers).
Yet, I’d dare say that a HUGE chunk of my clients came from my blog, which was never set as a ‘serious’ business blog, it was just me writing about my every day life, travels and some of my online work.
This is the reason why now I really took business blogging more seriously and started a web design / development blog on byDojo.com (my business site and portfolio). You’ll be able to read all kinds of useful articles about running a successful web site.
The first article there is inspired by my positive experience with blogging:
The 11 Top Benefits of Having a Company Blog
Hope it will inspire you.
I can say, without any doubt, that, keeping a nice company blog and investing some time and effort in it will be worth it.
