a website & community for women who write & blog
Chances are you hate to hear the words, “You need to build your brand.” Thinking of yourself as a brand may feel gross or even wrong. But it’s not. Building a personal brand simply means defining and clearly conveying what you’re all about — who you are, what you do, and why you do it.
I call it The Virtues Project.
Every year in the Early American Literature class that I teach, I assign my students a project for which they emulate Benjamin Franklin’s renowned self-improvement project. In his Autobiography, which we study in my class, Franklin details his attempt to “arrive at moral perfection.” Franklin made a list of 13 virtues and a book of charts to track his efforts to maintain these virtues perfectly.
Franklin’s project went on for many months, but I challenge my students to pick 7 “virtues” that they will track for 7 days. They usually pick bad habits they want to break like biting their nails or cursing or good habits they want to adopt like exercising and eating vegetables. It’s so fun to read about their results!
But I recently realized that I could use a revised version of Franklin’s project to keep myself on track for 2017.
Every woman should write like a lady and think like a boss.
Hold on. Hear me out.
This will be the year I believe in magic.
This will be the year I dream my wildest dreams and wholeheartedly believe that each one of them will come true.
Believing in magic doesn’t mean I will work less. This will be the year I hustle harder than I ever have before. But this year I will accept that sometimes hustle isn’t enough. Sometimes you need magic.
And magic is that place where gumption meets grace.
If you’re new around here you may not know this, but See Jane Write is not my only blog. I also blog at WriteousBabe.com. Sort of.
To say that I am inconsistent with my other blog would be an understatement. This year I’ve only published 25 posts there. I published more posts than that at SeeJaneWrite.net just last month!
You might be tempted to blame my inconsistency on my busy schedule. With managing a business, freelancing, and teaching, how could I successfully maintain two blogs? But honestly, I think time management has little to do with it.
I struggle with consistency with WriteousBabe.com because I lack purpose. With See Jane Write I have a clear mission and a clear audience in mind and this keeps me motivated day after day. Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for my other blog.
This is why I believe all bloggers should enter 2017 with specific goals for their blogs. (Sign up for my free online training on goal setting here.)
But that’s not all you need to make 2017 a happy new year for your blog.
Here are the three things you need to make your blog successful in 2017: