Love Your Business: Guest Post #11



All month long join me here as I welcome amazing contributors with one thing in common
we love our business {blog/shop/etc} and we want you to love yours too!
To keep up to date with this series view all posts here.

Hi guys, my name is Danielle, and I blog about outfits, projects, favorites, or whatever is on my mind at Dinosaur Toes, and run a handmade jewelry shop of the same name. I’m so excited to be included in this series so that I can share some things I’ve learned in the last two years of blogging.





I’ve heard opinions from both sides on whether or not to include your personal life on your blog when you’re a business owner, and while I think there are valid points to each, I always come back to this one thought: people want to know who you are, not just what you’re selling.

I won’t lie, when I first started my blog, I had no idea that there was such a friendly and amazing community of creative and like-minded people out there, so my only goal was to drive more traffic to my shop. After my first few posts of shop updates, discount codes, or pictures of things I’d made, I started to explore and find blogs I liked. There was one commonality: these people were sharing their day to day life.





It seemed awkward at first – thinking of what I could possibly share that people would find interesting enough to read – since I’m just a twenty-something with a parrot on her head living on a farm, but I started to find that the more I talked about my day, myself, my best friend Flojo the parrot, my sometimes goofy sense of humor, or anything really, the more people opened up to me and took an interest in my blog.

With my blog, I had to reevaluate and look at things objectively; if people are buying handmade rather than from large, faceless companies, it's because they want that personal experience, and they want to "meet" the artist. They're certainly interested in what projects you're working on, but they're also interested in your animal companions, where you live, what your hobbies are, etc. It didn't take long after I started to make my blog more personal and less business-oriented that I started making friends, both with people I'd never had any dealings with in the past, and with people who'd purchased something from my shop. I also noticed that my shop was receiving more views from my blog after it was more personal than it had when I was all business.

I know that things work differently for different people, but if you're new at blogging, or if you're looking to make a change in your blog, I think the best advice I have is to just be you; let your personality shine through, have a voice, and let people get to know you!

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About the Author
 Twitter // Shop // Blog

6 comments:

  1. Very cool! Nice to meet you, Danielle! :)

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  2. Looove Danielle's blog :) I'm working on making my blog more personal, its just tough to know what is ok to say and what is just too much!
    xo Heather
    http://ahopelessnotebook.blogspot.com/

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  3. this is a great post! thanks for sharing :)

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  4. I started my blog with the intention of sharing my shop as well, and have found that people enjoy my personal posts a lot more. I still post shop updates once a month, but that is about all that I share about my shop now. You're right, people want to get to know the face behind the blog/shop. Thanks for sharing :)

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  5. I totally agree - just be you and your blog will attract the right readers for you. Great post and I love that I found a new blog to read :).

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  6. What a great spotlight! Im off to get to know this girl more :)

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