Lessons from the First Year of Blogging, a Free T-shirt Giveaway, and My Free Ebook

Today The Skool of Life turns 1 year old. When I started this blog a year ago I had no idea where it would take me. It was the beginning of an adventure that has completely changed my life and opened up a world of opportunities that I could have never imagined when I pushed publish for the first time. This first year has come with so many valuable lessons that I wanted to share with you. Some of these I might have said before and some could end up being blog posts in and of themselves.

Relationships/Collaboration: You’ve probably heard this to no end but relationships are the fuel for the fire when it comes to building a successful blog. From the moment you push publish and go out and comment on somebody else’s blog for the first time, you are part of a tribe. Of course within that tribe there are the mom tribes, the sports tribes, the comedic tribes, the minimalist tribes and many others. But the fact is that you are part of one, and the members are all here to support you and see you grow personally, professionally and financially. I can easily tell you my life has improved in all 3 of those areas in the year since I started The Skool of Life.

Talk to Everybody: I don’t believe in the idea that there is anybody too big or small. I think there’s something to be said for talking to everybody, especially when you start out. Some ego driven move will cement you in a person’s mind forever as the person who was too big for them. One of the most successful bloggers in the game told me, he never turns down interviews and is incredibly nice to everybody.

Small Favors Have big Payoffs: You might think something as simple as telling somebody about a plugin or telling them about a blog to read doesn’t matter.  But you’d be amazed at how much that one small favor will do for you. I met a great friend at a networking event and she was looking to start a blog. I sent her an email with all the blogs I read and a summary of all of them. Recently when she met the owner of a large restaurant chain here in LA who was looking for a social media marketer, she dropped by name. It’s just proof that even the smallest of favors will go a long way. Just to be clear, you should do those favors with expectation of nothing in return because that’s the only way it pays off big.

Guest Posting: The biggest mistake I made in the early days of my blog was not giving away my best content. I had so many articles that would have definitely been accepted at bigger blogs and I wasted them on my own blog. Sounds crazy right?  Considering that I was a nobody, fear of giving away my content made absolutely no sense. Give away your best stuff in the beginning.  Don’t worry about whether you’ll have more brilliant insights and blog posts. Trust me, you will .

Headlines Can Make or Break Your Post: I’m not the first person to say this, but I’ve had headlines that kill a post and make a post. I’ll give you my personal favorite example. A while back I published an article titled “How to write a blog post in 20 minutes or less.” The original idea for the title was The Stopwatch Method for blogging. Think about what the article is really about and aim for that to be your title.

Write Every Single Day: For every blog post that makes my personal cut to actually publish, there are 3 that you never see. I don’t spend hours on those 3. Usually I’ll spend 10 minutes on each one and if they are all crap, then I take one idea from each one and turn that into something substantially better. You don’t have to publish everyday, but if you write everyday, not only will get faster at it, you will get better at it. If you look at any major blogger and go look at their first post you’ll see that it’s nothing special. In fact I encourage you to go back to the archives of the biggest blogs you read and look at the first post. You’ll see that they were all once nobody’s operating in a vacuum.

Blog Comments: I used to try to comment on as many blogs as possible. I still hit a decent amount considering how many I read. I would say it’s best to write some very lengthy comments on a few well known blogs than it is to right short comments on a bunch of blogs. In my mind this is the most effective way you can get people to subscribe to your blog based on your comments.

Don’t Worry About Traffic: At the start of Q1, I set a goal for 1000 Readers. It didn’t happen because I got derailed with the launch of BlogcastFM. I got back on track with The Skool of Life and I’ve stopped worrying about traffic or readers or subscribers. The truth is, I write because I enjoy writing. Don’t get me wrong. It’s nice to know that there are people who are reading what I write. But in the end, I wouldn’t sweat it too much. Focus on what you can do today. The traffic will eventually come.

No Silver Bullets: It’s likely that one of the first things that most bloggers do is a google search for how to increase traffic to my blog. Well, I got news for you. There’s no silver bullet. There’s no one thing that’s going to work. It’s about trying different things and seeing what works. Everyone is different so the the strategy that worked for one person might not work for you. But, it doesn’t mean you can’t borrow from their ideas and adapt them to your own needs.

Quality Trumps Quantity: I said this in the 32 lessons I learned from 32 years of life and I want to say it again. Always go for quality over quantity. Focus on building a relationship with the people who read your blog and comment regularly. Who you have a relationships with and the quality of those relationships is far more important than how many relationships you have. Just yesterday BlogcastFM ended up on the front page of Slashdot. We got about 6000 visits in one day.  Of those maybe 6 converted to subscribers. That’s a piss poor conversion rate if you ask me.  Just know that lots of traffic doesn’t always translate to something great.

Authenticity: This is really a tough one because nobody can teach you to be authentic. You either are or you aren’t. Authenticity is important in your writing but it extends beyond that. When you attempt to build a relationship with another blogger, don’t do it because you are trying to get something from them. Do it because you genuinely like what they write about.  You’ll find that a genuine approach to building a relationship with that blogger is going to much further in the long run. It might seem like a longer road, but believe me it’s a more effective one.

Use your blog for Personal Development: As I mentioned above, I’ve benefited personally, professionally, and financially from everything I’ve done here with The Skool of Life.  It doesn’t matter if your blog isn’t’ about self help. It still serves as a great personal development and goal setting tool. I have a friend who is a filmmaker and I told him to start a blog about his film. The blog has kept him on track and he’s making consistent progress on the production of his film. I think a blog can be a useful tool in accomplishing any goal. It gives you the discipline of doing something on a regular basis and that can translate into so many other areas of your life.

Revenue Models: While I don’t think you should ever get into this for the money (frankly because you’ll be fighting an uphill battle), you do want to think about how you’ll eventually make money. Your blog may never make you money, but it will open up many opportunities for money if you take just a few steps in the right direction. For me the moment that made major changes financially was the development of the Q1 Marketing Plan. That landed me my first freelance client and I recommend a marketing plan for anybody who wants to eventually make money from their blog.

Experiment: One of the greatest things about the platform of blogging is that it lends itself to conducting tons of experiments. It’s so unbelievably flexible that any crazy ass idea that you have is something that you can try. If you want put up videos of you dancing with cats, you can. (although I’m not sure how you’d dance with a cat). If you want to put up crazy pictures you can. If you have some wacky idea, try it. BlogcastFM was born out of my simple idea “interviews with up and coming bloggers.” I had no idea where it would lead when I started it. So, if you have an idea for a weekly series or experiment, DO IT.

Idea List: I always keep a list of ideas for blog posts available. I just jot them down and forget about them. It’s like planting seeds and letting them come to fruition. When they come to fruition you write the post. Strangely, you’ll find that you hardly ever refer back to the list because you always have ideas so there’s never this worry of not having any ideas. Use the idea list for topics, product ideas, etc, etc. You’d be amazed at what you are capable of if you just take a chance on one idea.

Try to Make a Difference: The most rewarding thing about this in my mind is knowing that what you wrote about or what you’re working on inspires somebody else to follow his or her dreams. When you get a comment like “I really needed this today”, there’s something about it that makes you feel so much better than a check in the mail.  I’ve been trying for a while to figure out what I want the mission of The Skool of Life to be and I think that it’s to provide people with the inspiration to take action and make changes in their life.

Never Give up: I recently interviewed Neil Pasricha, the owner of 1000 Awesome Things and author of The Book of Awesome. His final words to me and to all the listeners on our podcast were “Never Give Up.” Neil is a really inspirational guy whether you are a blogger or not.

In conclusion, all I can say is that this has been an incredible ride. From practically broke, living at my parent’s house at the age of 31, to living what is practically my dream lifestyle (the only thing better would be not having to use a wetsuit when I surf), it has truly been an amazing first year. I can’t thank all of you enough for all of the support, you’ve given me.

My Gifts to You:

Win a Free T-Shirt from Reflect My Life: A few weeks ago I met Caroline and Drew, the owners of a very cool company called Reflect My Life.  Some of you might have seen their t-shirts on Steve Pavalina’s blog at one point where he posted a video of himself with the t-shirt. Basically, these are t-shirts with affirmations written backwards, so you see them the right way when you look in the mirror. Caroline and Drew were kind of enough to allow me to do giveaway for you guys here at Skool of Life.

Here’s how you win:

1) Become a Fan of Reflect My Life on Facebook

2) Leave a comment on their wall, letting them know you came from Skool of Life.

We’ll pick  a winner by the end of the week and get one of their shirts out to you.

THE SKOOL OF LIFE-GRADE 1

I took what I considered my best posts and I’ve assembled them into this short 40 page ebook. If you’re new to The Skool of Life, I’ve included quite a bit of of my original work which seems to be buried in the archives. The Skool of Life: Grade 1 is yours to keep (no email address required). I’d love to hear what you think about it and feel free to pass it on to your friends. Just click on image at the top of this post to download it.