Today I learned I know a few things about blogging, and so I thought I would share them with you.

The first thing I learned is that you have to decide pretty early if you want to be a blogger, or if you want to be a Blogger. The first is a hobby, the second is a career, and only you can decide how much effort, energy and expense you are willing to invest into your blog.

The first thing you need to know is that you don’t have to know what your blog is going to be about when you first start. Lots of Bloggers will tell you that you need a theme, but I didn’t have one when I started writing for LMBG. All I knew was that I had stuff inside of my head that I had to get out of my head, and I started from there.

It was only later that this blog turned into a Mental Health / Spirituality blog. Blogging is in of itself an act of self discovery, the more you write the more you advertise and the more you build your network, the more you will understand where you are going and what your goals are.

Logo

You don’t have to know everything at once, but once you start to figure it out you absolutely need a logo. I suggest Fiverr. I have an artist there who has created two logos for me and both times I got exactly what I wanted. Clearly I favor the second over the first, so let’s talk about the logo that I’ve chosen to represent this website.

The official Logo for LMBG looks like this:

This is what I assume Saint Mary Jane really looks like. A Black woman, perhaps from the Congo who smokes weed because it elevates her third eye and allows her to understand the messages from the Gods and Goddess’s of the Universe.

I chose this logo because I smoke a lot of weed, and because that girl looks a little bit like me, but I chose the color green not for the weed, or even for money, but because it is representative of the Earth to which my feet are firmly and forever planted.

Earth connection is incredibly important to me, it’s something I crave very much and do not have a lot of in my life, so I find other ways to incorporate symbols of the Earth in my life…except for plants. I refuse to own plants because I can’t take care of them. I have absolutely zero green thumb, and I don’t like killing things.

The point is that your logo shouldn’t just represent your brand it should represent who you are as a human being, the ideals you are looking to project and the desires you have for your future endeavors.

The camouflage represents Soldiers, but not the kind like the Governmental Military, the ones fighting against sexual abuse and trauma, because I consider that a battle that no person should have to fight but too many do.

It’s to remind me and everyone else that I will never forget what it felt like to have my body turned into a doll, dressed up and abused at the will of my abusers. It’s to remind the world that I will forever and always be a part of that fight.

And that’s a lot to ask from a single logo, yet there it is in green and brown. Once you have your logo, the avenues to advertise who you are and what you are doing are open wide to you. You can use it anywhere you want, its your’s it represents your brand and who you are as a person. Use it as wisely as you possibly can.

Advertising

This is a hugely important and widely forgotten part of getting your blog out there to the masses. When I first started I figured as soon as I started writing posts people would come running to see what I had to say, but the small audience I have now I have built up mostly through social media.

That’s because of the pandemic, you see this was the original logo for the website, and I used her to print off 1000 love letters that I hand out at special events. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to go to events because of the pandemic, but I have them ready and waiting for when I can.

It’s not enough to just promote yourself on social media if you want this as a career, you have to go out to the world and invite the world to you. I highly recommend printing off stickers and leaving them at places you might frequent around your community, like the Library or City Hall. Restaurant or Bar bathrooms are a good place to leave a random sticker just don’t…stick it to the wall that’d be rude.

Hand out love letters (I sincerely hope you do, I hope to make this the backbone of my advertising platform.)

Networking

One of the other things I plan to do with this website is to promote Black Authors but it’s not so that I can likes and clicks, it actually circles around to one of the fundamentals of this website. I grew up not being exposed enough to Black culture, not reading Black authors and not seeing girls who look like me.

Promoting Black Authors to girls who look like me and feel alone in the world is the least that I can do. That being said I am going to try only to promote books by Author’s that I’ve read.

Networking is super important, because it gets your name out there but it also exposes you to other writers and professional Bloggers who are on the same path you have. Join Writer’s groups and don’t unlike me, be afraid to put yourself out there.

STOP Reading How To Be A Better Blogger Lists.

That includes this one, some of this advice may work for you and some of it may not, the point of this post isn’t actually to help you, it’s to remind me that I have skills I didn’t know I had.

Blog the way you want to blog, and you’ll find success. Lisa K from Marakulus asked me today if I am where I want to be according to my blogging goals. I am about a year in and I think that yes, the answer to that question is I am where “I am supposed to be.”

I didn’t expect big numbers of comments and lookers and readers right away, but based on the growth of new Blogs I think I am exactly where I should be.

That being said the ultimate goal is to have thousands of readers and hundreds of comments, but I know that I keep going at the pace I am going, if I keep working and chipping away at the majick “how to be a famous Blogger” formula I will get there.

There is no one route to success any Blogger, it’s a baby Industry, just figuring out what it is and learning to walk, so again there is no one formula. Everyone will have their different path, truth is you get out of it what you put into it. The more you promote the more you network the more you advertise the more you will experience rise and growth.

Your blog is your place on the web. It is your sanctuary where you go to escape the world and share your experience within it. Create that space, manifest the idea that your voice needs to be, and deserves to be heard and all will fall into place.

Above all else never forget that writing is a Craft and it is one you practice, not perfect. There is no perfect way to do anything, there is only learning as you go, and becoming along the way.

Good luck and happy Blogging,

Devon J Hall