When I restarted blogging five months ago, I didn’t rewrite my about page. I didn’t write a short bio for Twitter or Medium either. I wanted my readers to make their minds by reading my posts, not by the two sentences in my short bio.
The Need for an Up-To-Date About Page
The page views of the about page of my blog is only 2% of the overall traffic. This figure looks small, but that 2% could be the most important 2%. Those visitors might be the most interested ones in my blog.
Not having an up-to-date about page can become a problem, because I write posts on a variety of topics.
- Personal Development, Life Lessons, Leadership, Motivation
- Blogging, Writing, Marketing
- Entrepreneurship, Startups
- Business, Management
- Investing, Cryptocurrencies
My first time readers might get confused when they visit my blog or sign up to my email newsletter. They might expect posts on one topic, but receive posts on another. I want to clarify my position for my first time readers.
Which Topics to Expect from Me
The majority of my blog posts and page views are in the personal development category. Lately, I didn’t write much about this topic. This doesn’t mean that I stopped writing about this topic. Personal development is a topic that I’m interested in.
Blogging, Writing, and Marketing
Lately, I write mostly on blogging and marketing. It’s a topic that I’m trying to figure out.
I document my thinking process, my plans, and my progress. Some of my readers enjoy that insider look at my journey. Some of them give me feedback and tips. All of that helps me make my mind on how to carry on toward my goals.
Entrepreneurship and Startups
I see blogging and marketing as a part of entrepreneurship and starting up a business. Most of my posts on entrepreneurship and startups are also on blogging and marketing.
I have some posts on the inner game of entrepreneurship as well. I plan to keep writing such posts.
Topics I Stopped Writing About
There are two topics that I don’t plan to write anymore. Those two topics are management and investing.
Management of established businesses doesn’t excite me anymore. I’m more interested in starting something from scratch and turning it into an established business.
Investing
I don’t like to write about investing for two reasons. First, most people don’t have any funds to invest. Second, my investing strategy is extremely boring. I believe in dollar cost averaging and buying and forgetting until retirement.
People want to read about trading, technical analysis, and the latest cryptocurrencies. My posts don’t satisfy the “turn $100 USD to $10 million USD, buy a Lamborghini, and party with models” crowd.
Who Am I?
I’m a 39 years old software developer living in Genk Belgium. I’m originally from Istanbul, Turkey. I completed my PhD in Informatics in 2012.
Throughout my career, I’ve always been in the technical side of business. My focus was on B2B software. With my blog, I dive into the commercial side of B2C. That’s quite a switch and there’s a lot to learn.
From an Expert to a Novice
There’s a big contrast between being an expert B2B software developer and a novice B2C marketer. That’s a challenge.
I always wanted to build a business in B2C marketing, especially information marketing. This goal kept my mind busy for too long. I want to stop procrastinating on this goal and do my best to achieve it. If I succeed, that would be great. If I fail, I would let go of this goal and move on.
Using My Experience as a B2B Software Developer
Even though I’m a beginner B2C marketer, I don’t feel like I’m a complete novice. I bring all the experience in my career to my new venture.
Qualities like analytical thinking and focusing on what matters help me in this challenge. I apply the scientific method and reverse engineering to my marketing goals. I developed these qualities and experience in my B2B software development career.
Extracting Lessons from My Marketing Experience
One thing that helped me a lot is to know how to extract lessons from my experience. I spent only five months on my blog. Yet, I learned a lot about B2C and marketing. I documented those lessons in my blog.
Using B2C Marketing Lessons in B2B Software Development
The experience transfer isn’t one way. I transfer the lessons I learned from my blogging experience to my software development job.
In blogging, I don’t have time for busy work. Busy work contributes little or not at all to my end goals.
After five months of blogging, I developed an eye for what the end user would be interested and what they wouldn’t. Anything that wouldn’t interest or benefit the end user, directly or indirectly, is busy work. I try to avoid that to the extent possible.
Ease of Use
Another lesson I learned from blogging is the importance of ease of use. My blog post have to be extremely easy to read. A reader won’t read long sentences, long paragraphs, or long chunks of text.
An end user won’t be able to use complicated software, no matter how capable that software is. Now, I pay more attention on how usable a solution is before offering it to an end user.
My Marketing Goal for July 1, 2019
My goal with my blog is to build an audience of 100K Medium followers and 20K email newsletter subscribers by July 1, 2019.
This goal requires a lot of domain specific lessons to be learned. Moreover, it also requires some personal development, productivity, leadership, motivation, and entrepreneurship lessons. I’ll write on those lessons as I come up with them.
Conclusion
An up-to-date about page explains my readers who am I and what my blog is about. As the topics discussed in my blog get diversified, an up-to-date about page becomes more and more necessary.
I will use the information in this post to update my about page. Moreover, I’ll use this information to write my short bios for Medium and Twitter and the welcome email of my email newsletter.
Your Turn
Is there any information that you would like to see in an about page that I haven’t mentioned here? Let me know in the comments and I might include it in the new version.
Burak BilginSoftware developer with a Ph.D. and 15 years of experience. I write daily on personal development and life lessons. Sign up to my email newsletter to receive a weekly overview of my latest content on personal development and life lessons.