Finding Your Blogging Voice

My first foray into blogging was not on this site here, for business, but on my hobby site for fun in my spare time.  I am very competitive and I turn everything into a challenge that I must conquer.  I find it helps to motivate me to accomplish things and move forward in life.  My hobby blog was no different.  I challenged myself to become a blog superstar.  To become the blog everyone wanted to read and subscribe to and in case you are wondering; no that did not happen, and no it is not the “it” blog.

I bring up that blog because that is where I found my blogging voice.  I’ve written previously about why every business should have a blog and it is something that I advise my client’s to do.  One of the objections that I hear is:  “I’m not witty/funny or know how to write eloquently/formally.”  Basically, they do not know how to find their blogging voice.  I do not think that you have to be intentionally witty or funny to blog or write in a formal style, not if that is not true to who you are and how you speak.

When I first started writing on my hobby blog site, I first tried a more formal approach.  My thought process was that I always made good grades on term papers in school and graduate school is almost entirely writing and reading.  I figured if I could make it through grad school and did well writing in school, surely I could write a few articles/posts for a website blog.  I kept it formal and I did not see much traction or success.  I do not believe that the formal writing style was the problem, but that it was not my genuine speaking voice.

With time, I became a bit lazy and the formal style dropped.  Instead, I began to write more like I talk/speak.  I started speaking to my readers instead of treating them like professors requesting my paper for a grade.  When I started doing this, I saw more traction with my blog in the form of engagement from my audience.  They answered my calls for guest post submissions, commented on posts and my traffic and subscription numbers increased.  I no longer have the time that I used to, to devote to that site (the woes of entrepreneurship), but the site continues mainly through guest blog post submissions.

I believe to find your blogging voice, you must find your actual real life voice.  How do you speak when you talk about something you are passionate about to someone in real life?  How do you explain it?  How do you give out advice and tips?  That is the same voice that should be used on your blog.  Speak to your readers and not at them.  Unless your topic is of a scientific/technical nature AND the audience that will be reading the information needs to consume the information in a formal way, use your natural voice.