Do You Find Blogging Easier or Harder Than You Thought it Would be?
Before I started blogging I had this preconceived notion that it would be an easy task. When you’re outside the blogosphere looking in, it seems easy. You simply install your favorite blog software, load the Misty theme so your site will look like John Chow’s (well, his old theme anyway), start typing and watch the traffic and money roll in, right? It can’t get any easier, can it?
You’re in Dreamland
If the above scenerio is what you’re thinking, think again, because it couldn’t be further from the truth unless you want your blog to only last a few weeks (like most blogs do). To keep your blog alive for the long haul, you’ve got have an extreme amount of discipline and dedication. Before starting Random Jabber I was like everyone else. I read all of the blogs giving advice to beginner bloggers and even though I understood what they were saying, it didn’t really sink in until I had to manage my own.
Here are two things I’ve found to be difficult since starting Random Jabber:
1. Write Consistently
With a full time job, I don’t get to write as much I would like to. I have been writing around one or two articles a week, which is enough, but unless your content is outstanding, your blog will likely grow slower than others pumping out an article every day. My traffic always suffers on the days I’m not able to write. On days I do write and usually the day following it, my traffic spikes at around double what it is on the days I don’t write. The lesson here is obvious. If write on a consistent basis your traffic will grow.
2. Networking
I think when everyone starts a blog or a site for the first time, there is the “build it and they will come” mindset. I had it, and you know you had it. As anyone who has been blogging for a couple months knows, it doesn’t work like that. You can write the greatest articles ever, but what good is it when know one knows? In the blogging world, sometimes you really need to toot your own horn and let everyone know that you’ve got a blog and it’s worth reading.
Yes, it’s true that search engine will eventually index your site and you’ll start seeing traffic. But, the problem with that is that it takes a while. Google will index your site the quickest, but the others tend to take longer. Example being that Yahoo just recently started indexing more of my pages. Up until a week ago, Yahoo had only indexed my homepage and this blog has been alive for four months. Another interesting stat is only 2% of the traffic that Random Jabber sees is from search engines. 86% of my traffic is from referring sites. This really tells you that I’ve been trying to get my name out there by commenting on other sites and doing link exchanges. I think this is one very important aspect of starting a new blog, but again, I thought it would be easier than it is. It takes up a lot of time to read other blogs, comment on them, stumble them, etc.
Is Running a Blog Harder Than You Thought?
Running a blog is definitely harder than I could have ever envisioned it would be. There is so much that goes on behind the scenes that makes it like having a full time job. As I get more comfortable running a blog, things are getting easier, but I know that the more traffic that comes in, the harder it will get. I’m up for the challenge, are you?
After you launched your blog, was it easier or more difficult than you thought it would be?
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One hundred percent harder than I thought it would be. One thing that is universally missing from most “how to blog” posts is the INTENSE amount of time it takes. I’m glad to hear others are suffering with me! 
Posted on Sun Aug 26, 2007
Strangely, I find it too easy.
I started last year, not even really knowing what a blog was. I just did it as an experiment. I had no experience of writing or anything. I just scribble down whatever comes into my head, without much editing and just publish.
I used to do a post a day, but now I find I’m doing two or three just for the hell of it.
People seem to like it, but what am I doing wrong?????
Posted on Mon Aug 27, 2007
It is way harder than I thought. Very time consuming. I like it though and I’m too stubborn to give up yet. But it’s hard being pulled in too many directions. I suspect Grandad is retired and doesn’t have to juggle day jobs and other responsibilities. Emma
Posted on Mon Aug 27, 2007
Gregg: Yeah, a agree. It’s definitely something you have to stick out for the long haul. Many people get into it to make money and that’s fine, but you also have to realize that it won’t happen over night and you’ve got to love doing it. Heck, I admit I want to start bringing in money, who doesn’t right? But, I have realistic expectations because I’ve been around the web for a while and know how long it can take. It does yield almost instant wealth for some, but not the majority.
Rebecca: I don’t know if I’d go as far to say I’m suffering, but it’s definitely not easy. I really don’t see how people are managing hundreds of sites when I have a hard time with my one.
Grandad: Wow, I only wish I found it too easy. Well, I shouldn’t say it’s hard, because the actual blogging part is easy. I have all kinds of ideas and can write an article no problem, but finding the time to write and promote is what gets me. I can go a couple days usually and write consistently and then I will go a week without writing. It’s just hard to manage my full time job, family, my addiction to golf, and still be able to give my site the attention it needs.
Not sure of your situation, but as Emma said, with a full time job it’s much harder finding the time, but there are a lot of people that do manage a full time job and blogging, so maybe I just need to suck it up?
Emma: Yeah, I enjoy the challenge and don’t give up easily. There may be stretches that my blog will go a week or so without updates, but I won’t quit it and I just hope that my readers stick around through those times.
It’s almost reassuring to know that there are others out there in the same boat and that others can relate to what goes into managing a blog, full time job, and life outside of the internet.
Posted on Mon Aug 27, 2007
I find it both harder and easier than I expected. I already knew how hard it was to keep a website up-to-date, so that was no surprise to me.
My concern wasn’t and isn’t to bring in money (ad revenue) or to actively grow an audience. I’m actually fine with people taking what they need from my site and just leaving. Yeah, passitivity! My interest are so varied, that I just can’t imagine that I could grow an steady audience and not bore myself. I feel, I’d have to limit myself to something, one or two foci and stick with them. That said, I did limit myself, to not actively talking about technology, since that makes up a large portion of my work, other blogs and websites I contribute to, and my daily conversations.
So the easy part really is the posts themselves, but the hard part is my desire to not just be totally random ramblings. I don’t need every article to be fleshed out and perfectly edited. But, I do want the content that I put out to be well regarded, by whomever accesses. I wanted to be able to answer all those questions, that I seem to rarely get answers for when I go searching. So, I didn’t want to just state, I like this song, or this episode of whatever. I wanted to provide information about the artist, the song itself, lyrics, a clip, links to video, etc.
So I find my posts are very, time consuming. I currently have around 30 in-progress posts, because I need to complete the research, before the post can go live. Yeah, its a lot of work, I’ve added for myself, but its nice when someone comes in, because they were looking for something, and then follows every link I’ve posted in the article out.
Sure its just entertainment; its somewhat personal; but I’ve found I’ve started growing a following inadvertently. I find I have a small base of around 200-300 people who seem to come in regular. But when I post regularly, Google, Yahoo, and MSN really seem to reward me a lot. This is probably in part-Expression Engines ability to produce clean urls, my effort to use Expression Engine to make sure every post has good meta data, and that I always have outside references. I give a lot of link love to a variety of resources. I figure if someone came to my site looking for information on a topic, the least I can do is give my opinion, and a lot of pointers so they can form their own.
Posted on Mon Aug 27, 2007
I think the hardest part is getting the word out… or I should say the part that is the most time-consuming. For me at least 
Posted on Mon Aug 27, 2007
I confess I have a fair bit of spare time, which helps! I’m semi-retired and my time is more or less my own.
Of course, my style of “writing” doesn’t require much in the way of thought. If I were writing for [say] a business, I would have to be much more careful in my choice of words, syntax and general construction. I would probably spend a full week writing a post and still not have the courage to post it.
Posted on Mon Aug 27, 2007
I’ve found blogging easier than I thought it would be.
That being said, It’s still difficult at times (especially writing quality content on a schedule) but I’ve found it to be much easier to launch and successfully grow a blog as opposed to some other web projects such as social networks or message forums.
Posted on Mon Aug 27, 2007
Running a blog is much harder than I thought.
My original blogging days were a simple on-line journal of my activities and thoughts for my friends. It was easy, and it came in spurts of a month or two at a time.
However, my pursuit of a more professional blog is much harder. It’s rather difficult to pump out quality content on a regular basis - and then throw a busy schedule on top of that. It’s hard.
So far I’m not doing so well - but I hope to improve. Currently I have about 11 RSS subscribers - which is suprising considering my lame content and lack of comments. But even so, it’s still kinda encouraging to know that someone is reading my blog…
I am currently re-designing my blog to give it (in theory) a professional/custom look. We’ll see where that goes.
At any rate - I am really hoping to muster up quality content at least once a week with two-ish ‘short posts’ thrown in there as well. (hope being the key word in there)
Posted on Mon Aug 27, 2007
I didn’t really know what to expect, because when I set my blog up I didn’t really know what a blog was.
It certainly isn’t easy, and takes a lot of time, commitment and dedication. However, I’ve learnt so much this past year, and made some great friends through networking, so I don’t have any regrets at all.
Posted on Tue Aug 28, 2007
I absolutely think it is harder than I thought or expected. I wasn’t expecting to make any money off of my site and I’m still not but it is still hard to blog consistently and find interesting things to say to not bore the readers to tears.
I’m more of a coder than a designer so the design area is also something I struggle in. I’m not awful but I prefer purely CSS powered layouts instead of images.
When I started blogging, I was about 18. I thought people actually cared if I talked about my day step by step and what not and honestly, back then they did. Now that I’ve been blogging for 5 years (albeit not straight for the past 5 years nor with the same site address), I’ve learned quite a lot and my network has definitely changed.
Posted on Wed Aug 29, 2007
allgood2: Wow, you have around 30 articles started just waiting to be finished? This is a goal of mine, but I’ve not yet found the time to start writing enough to have this many waiting. I would love to write about 20 quality articles and just use ExpressionEngine’s ability to release them about every other day or so, so for a small period of time Random Jabber could essentially run itself while I work on other things.
Yeah, I knew it was hard running a website, I guess I was just misinformed on exactly how difficult it in fact was. I’m getting better at it though. This is still my first real site so there will be a transition period where I’m getting used to managing everything so it goes smooth.
Sara: Yeah, getting the word out is definitely time consuming. I easy, but it’s hard at the same time. It’s so time consuming that it makes it hard to do because while you’re out there promoting, you’re not actually doing anything productive with the site. If that makes sense?
Grandad: Yeah, if I were writing for a business, I would be the same way. I still take my blog serious and try to put a great deal of effort into everything I write to ensure everything is correct as far as the construction, grammar, punctuation, etc., but I too would be a little nervous if I were actually writing for anything other than my own personal enjoyment. If people don’t like what I write now, no big deal, if it was for a business and no one was reading, then I’m in trouble.
Paul: Yeah I’ve heard that forums are a real pain to get going initially. A lot of it involves the author actually creating conversations with their self to give the illusion of activity. That would be tough to keep up. So, in that sense, blogging is definitely easier.
Brian: I like where the design of your blog is headed. I think it looks cleaner than your previous version and is a step up. Yeah, the great thing about blogging is that no matter what you write, chances are someone out there in the world will enjoy reading it. Heck, sometimes I sit in amazement that people actually read my blog. When I started I was almost sure no one would stick around to read what I’m writing, but I was wrong.
David: You’re a real inspiration to the rest of us. From not even knowing what a blog was a year ago to having over 1500 subscribers today, that’s amazing!
Jamie: Yeah, talking about my day to day stuff is what I didn’t want this blog to turn into. I kind of left it open for those types of posts every now and again by calling it “Random Jabber” but I wanted to stick to a few topics rather than a hundred topics. It can be hard sometimes to think of something to write and do it consistently and sometimes for a lot of people, the more they do it the harder it gets simply because they run out of ideas. Hopefully that won’t happen to me and I can continue to build my stock pile of ideas which I keep in Google Notebook.
Your pure CSS design is nice. Easy on the eyes and easy to read. I love the minimalistic approach with sites. Many people get to much going on and it’s just to cluttered. I’m a designer and can’t code a lick html/css so I like to throw in a few images to jazz it up little.
Posted on Wed Aug 29, 2007
I like where the design of your blog is headed. I think it looks cleaner than your previous version and is a step up.
Heh - lol. I do not have anything of mine up right now - nor have I. I have thrown up two different themes untill I complete mine (which only exists on paper right now...). I am actually about to throw up another theme - but I believe it shall be able to keep me held over untill I complete mine.
The only thing I have shown is a logo - which I have actually re-designed. lol Even so, I am going to start coding the new look a later this week! I am excited.
Posted on Tue Sep 11, 2007
WOAH!!! Where’d the rest of my comment go? I had quite a bit more.
I shall try again.
Yeah, the great thing about blogging is that no matter what you write, chances are someone out there in the world will enjoy reading it.
That is very true. The problem is finding those who will read your blog…
Heck, sometimes I sit in amazement that people actually read my blog. When I started I was almost sure no one would stick around to read what I’m writing, but I was wrong.
lol I feel that same way sometimes.
But you have a great blog! I really enjoy reading it and it has opened my eyes to some new aspects of the web world that I was not aware of earler. Thanks for that!
And keep up the great work!
Posted on Tue Sep 11, 2007
Brian: Ah, I see you’ve got a new theme even since I wrote this post. hehe.
Sure you had more to your first comment...I know you’re only trying to pad your comment count! j/k
Thanks a lot for the nice comments Brian. I’m glad you enjoy reading my blog and I’m glad to have you as a reader. Hopefully I can continue to write useful content and assist you in your online endeavors.
Posted on Tue Sep 11, 2007
I am still in the honeymoon period at the moment! I have been haveing a lot of fun building my blog. but consistency is going to be the big one, trying to retain the momentum.
Posted on Tue Sep 18, 2007
Yeah, I suppose I’m still in that same honeymoon period. I’m having a lot of fun building Random Jabber. It’s not growing as fast as I would like it to, but that’s my fault. I’ve not posted enough quality articles. I have a stockpile of article I ideas though, I just need to get writing.
You’re right. Consistency is key. If you post two articles one week and then don’t post again for three weeks, you’ll definitely lose visitors.
Posted on Tue Sep 18, 2007
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My name is Deron Sizemore and I am a web designer, web publisher, blogger and serial internet entrepreneur living in Lexington, Kentucky.
Everything about blogging was harder than I thought. It has taught me some valuable lessons about staying organized and on task. Blogging definitely takes up more time than you’d think, especially if you’re serious about it.
It’s also hard to keep posting day after day, especially when you don’t see a lot of revenue coming in from adsense or your other sources. What people need to understand is that it takes a lot of time and hard work to reach the top and make a lot of money. Many get burned out after month or so, but if they just keep it up they’ll reap the benefits later on.
Posted on Sun Aug 26, 2007