“Listen, just be yourself” Haven’t you heard this being thrown at you every now and then? Although I second that opinion and would have told all and sundry to be themselves at various points in my life, I seem to have second thoughts about bloggers “being themselves” especially when blogging. For various reasons, it might not be as great an idea as most people seem to think. Here are the reasons why being yourself could be bad for your blog:

If you don’t have an opinion, don’t blog: I have met many people for the past few years now and I happen to see that some people are just not opinionated. Well, my wife isn’t opinionated at all, for a start. She doesn’t seem to have an opinion on anything; it’s almost as if she is fine with the way the world is and she one of those few people who are completely at peace with themselves and the rest of the world. Well, that’s great. But she would be a terrible blogger. When you blog, you must have an opinion. You got to have the courage to say what you want and not be intimidated by hundreds of negative comments you might get.

Being Stubborn won’t help: While being opinionated is good for a blogger, being stubborn isn’t. If you are stubborn and if you are closed to any kind of input your readers give you, you aren’t going anywhere. You can’t afford to lock yourself in your little world and think that the rest of the world wouldn’t matter – that’s because you never know when you might want to step in there, would you?

If you are being yourself all the time, you wouldn’t change: Change is important; it makes you a different person every day. Change can make opportunities present themselves to you and show you ways to figure out what you want in your life. If you are being yourself all the time, where are you changing? How do you propose to improve yourself if you thought that you were the best? You got to keep your mind open and accept criticism gracefully, learn from your mistakes and move on.

Being yourself won’t let you succeed. Develop the ability to change, be flexible and move faster when you can. Do you?

Are you being yourself?

I often advocated the need to run your blog as a business and there is a good reason for it: A blog is perfect answer for the “entrepreneurial seizure” that grips many people trying their best to kick themselves out of their cubicles since it is easy to start and doesn’t take much investment to begin with. It is probably the same reason why most bloggers don’t consider having a business plan made for their blogs. Here are some reasons why you should have a business plan for your blog:

• It gives you a direction: Most entrepreneurs think of a business plan as a document that is necessary to acquire funding. They think that it is an instrument to woo the venture capitalists. A business plan isn’t just that; it’s a document that envisages the route your business is going to take. It charts out a map for the entrepreneur to follow and late lead others. A business plan gives rigidity and support for an entrepreneur. If bloggers operate their blogs like businesses, they ought to have a business plan to get a sense of direction.                          What is the purpose of the blog? What is one thing that this blog has to do? Is it providing value? Where should the blog be in say 5 years from now? 10 years from now? 30 years from now? Should it be run solo or be multi-authored? Where does the revenue come from? Who controls the blog? What are the expenses incurred when running the blog? Without these answers, you are crawling in the dark.

• It can correct you when you meander: Our lives are never the same; change is our collective middle name. While you are operating and running your blog, you will realize that there are lots of juicier and sexier things to do than to sit and write posts.  The prospect of blogging might not be such an exciting endeavor after all. So, what do you do? You meander, deviate and go off the road. A business plan is like a whack on the top of your head; it makes you come back to where you left off and pursue your passion.
• It lets you be on top of numbers: To be a successful blogger, you must learn to love numbers. Trust me, I hate them and I still have to deal with them. I thought it would be easier to deal with numbers if I develop this love towards it (it’s possible; people in countries like India often have arranged marriages and they fall in love after their weddingJ). Apart from knowing all about the readers – their habits, characteristics, temperament, you should also be on top of other numbers like revenue (one-off/recurring/both), expenses and other long-term plans. It must also include forecasts like expected revenue from advertisements or affiliate marketing or a combination thereof, contingency funds, payables, etc,.

Having said all of that, the business plan for your blog doesn’t have to be elaborate. Just a few pages of what matters would do.

Customer service issues have always been a sore point for businesses but bloggers never had to contend with these things. You already know that customer service is everything a business has to deal with and the profits businesses make are directly proportional to the experience a customer goes through when I feel that bloggers have a thing or two to learn from some customer service best practices. Here are some tips you can learn from some of the best practices learnt from customer service success stories:

1. Going out of the way works: It’s human; everyone likes to feel special and be loved. There isn’t a customer who wouldn’t want to be pampered. What would bloggers want to learn from there? How about panmpering your readers? I was thinking about this when I thought about something Mike and I did with Blogging elements. We gave a few freebies away earlier and I think it is best to do just that. Everyone loves free stuff and everyone loves to be pampered. Why not make your readers feel special?

2. Being Polite: There are a few bloggers like at Itty Biz who can get away with profanity but I don’t think it’s a good idea to say anything that might not go a long way with your readers. I know it is easy to get agitated and say anything that fancies you. I also know that the essence of blogging is all about being personal and opinionated. However, I still think that you should remain polite with your readers. It won’t hurt and it won’t kill, so why not?

3. Thank them: It is always a good idea to thank your readers. It so happens that many business have found success with customers being thanked, cared for and even gifted.Find a way to gift your readers — maybe you could give a free ebook on your niche away or perhaps you could offer them a free access to your membership site. Think about it, this single step alone can fetch you life time customers.