Why Taking Risks Is Good For Your Blog

When we first begin blogging we are open to taking risks as everything is still new and let's face it, starting up a blog is a personal risk. As we develop our hard won following we worry about how taking risks might mean we lose some of our following or alienate potential sponsors, blog posting routines can lighten our load but we can forget that readers actually enjoy reading our blogs because of variety and personality.
 

 What Happens If We Avoid Ever Taking Risks With Our Blog?

 
The short and sweet answer is - in my personal opinion playing it safe can lead to boring content, lack of motivation and maybe the dreaded bloggers block.
 
 

 

How To Stop Playing Safe With Your Blog

 
 When you're in a one man band, with no one else to bounce ideas around, you need to create a stimulating environment for yourself and the best way to do that, in my experience, is to step out of your blogs comfort zone once a week till you feel more at ease with taking what seems like a risk . If this seems a tall order at first, make a list of all the thing you want to try and have been teetering on the brink of but never yet done, score your ideas from what feels like the lowest risk for you to the highest risk, out of 5, starting with the lowest risk factor and building up and try taking one risk every couple of weeks.
 
It helps me to look at it from an acting perspective, if you think of yourself like a well known soap actress, who has got in a rut with her role, your agent suggests breaking out and playing a small part in an indie film with a relatively unknown director. Whilst acting in your new role, you overcome your fear of change, learn new techniques , feel more empowered, develop a new fan base, attract new directors to the character you play in the film and on top of that you come back to the soap and act your pop socks off and get a pay rise!
 

Manage Risks Still Give Us A Sense Of Control

 

 I admit, the larger the following the more difficult taking risks may potentially be, particularly if your very dependent on the revenue that your blog brings in, however managed risks are fine - why not include your readers in your new direction or thoughts behind a new project or post and ask them for their feedback on your new addition to your posts. It could be a good opportunity to ask readers to score your post topics including your latest inspiration for a different style of post. In my opinion even taking a risk with one post or one area of my blog, that perhaps does not do as well as I had hoped, is still worth it, as from that one change in direction I make I might then generate ten new angles for writing interesting posts that get a good response or start thinking more creatively. Bottom line if you get bored with your blog posts, your readers probably will and if you hit a wall well enough said!
 
 

 

 Try Something New, Loosen Up, Leap before you look! -

 
 Don't think too much about what you're about to do, the greater the risk your about to take with your blog, the more likely you are to talk yourself out of taking the risk and then you end up right back where your started!Why not write a review for a brand, enter a blogging competition, create a new character for your blog, collaborate on a photo shoot, experiment with your blog voice, be more humorous, irreverent, warm etc or join a writing workshop or group and experiment on the group first, before you take your new writing style to your blog. Most importantly don't compare your risk taking efforts to other fashion boggers, they are relative to only one person, you! I believe we can develop our blogging style alongside our regular readers.
 

The Risks/Adventures I'm Taking This Year!

 

My own blog My Passport To Style, is in a process of major risk taking, next stop, change of blog platform eek! Blog overhaul to make My Passport To Style more hospitable for guest posters and just generally more user friendly, a photography course and planning a blog meet in the North UK!