Why To Blog As Yourself (Even if That’s Not What You Sell)

I’m Holly, I run a copywriting company, and I make money by not blogging about copywriting.

I didn’t start out this way, of course. Cottage Copy is a month old, and about the only thing I knew about business online then was that you needed a blog on your website. I’d read all the sites about SEO and advertising and blogging, and had them memorized. I knew what I had to do. So, I promptly sat down, and created a week long series of posts about copywriting. I was all excited. I wrote posts about ghostblogging, website copy, and all kinds of other things that were relevant to my audience. I wanted to teach them about writing: after all, the blogs and the articles all said to be informational. I announced my series on my blog, like everyone said.

And then, nothing happened.

Now, this isn’t unusual for a starter blog, and my research had told me that too. So I didn’t worry too much. I accepted it, and moved on… until one Really Bad Day, when the stress all finally caught up with me. It was one of those days that you just want to crawl into a hole in the ground and ignore the fact that other people exist. In response, I did what every writer does naturally: I wrote a blog. I didn’t even mean to publish it: I just felt the urge to get it out somewhere, and my netbook was handy.

I’m not sure what convinced me to hit publish on that post, but something in me said it was an okay thing to do — that it was acceptable to be myself on the internet, because damn it, it was my blog space. I did the usual thing: posted the link on Twitter, and went to get some coffee and try and drag myself back to reality. And then, that wonderful thing that can happen on the internet happened. Some people read my blog. Then they linked it to other people. One of these people happened to be Havi Brooks, who linked to it on Twitter. Thirty-three comments, two hundred site visits, and ten paying clients later, a miracle had happened: my business was real, and in the black.

Now, being a rather dense person, I tried to go back to writing about copywriting. After all, that was my product, I needed to tell people about it. Again, no response. As an experiment, I tried another personal post: this time, about what drives a writer to quit her job and start a business with no backup plan. Comments galore, more clients. And slowly, as I heard more feedback, and dealt with more clients, I began to understand it. “I love you, you’re so real.”, they said. Or, “I hired you because I know you from your blog and I know I like you.” In some ways, it was baffling. It wasn’t my copywriting skills at all, it was me. That felt a little freaky and uncomfortable for awhile. Some days it still does.

There are so many businesses on the internet these days that it’s hard to be unique. Because the barrier to entry is so low, anyone can start doing what you do, and clients and consumers are starting to care more about who you are. Personality can be what gets you the job, especially in a service business. Now, I’m not saying that you shouldn’t ever blog about your business. After all, how are your readers going to know that you’re good at it without you sharing some knowledge? But I will say, from my dramatic and accidental blog experiment, that the best way to make money is ultimately by being yourself. And a blog is a best tool out there for that. It’s not the easiest lesson to learn, and it’s a much scarier route than blogging about your business, because it’s personal. When people comment and hate your blog, it feels like they really hate you, not just what you do — but in the end, it’s worth it. Letting a client know who you really are, deep down, can be the most honest way to make money and build a business.

Holly Jackson runs Cottage Copy, a copywriting and consulting firm specializing in handcrafters. She can be reached at holly@cottagecopy.com.