Be Intentional, Find Your Voice

This is an interesting time, it seems.  Many people I know have blogs and for whatever reason, have stopped writing.  Sounds similar to what I did.  Over the years, I have had spells where I didn’t write anything for a week or 2 or 3 but I always bounced back.  This last time for me was more like months of no writing.

I averaged about 1 post per month and that one post was pretty weak, in my opinion.  In my case, I walked from my well established, well read blog and started this one.  My wife told me before I did this that I would lose most or all of my readers but I really didn’t know what would happen.

At it’s peak, last spring, CTM was averaging 650+ subscribers and by year-end, I was down to around 550 which is still decent.  This blog has around 85 subscribers and that’s pretty good for being less than a month old. 

So, in a similar way to what I have done, shifted gears, changed focus or whatever you want to call it, I see many others itching to do the same thing.  I’m happy with the initial results I have seen with my transition but there is certainly no formula for success as each situation is different.

I think CTM definitely went stale, I can say that.  I would also say I became bored with it and for a long time, couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t write, I couldn’t think about writing, it was all a heavy weight.  As I started coming out of that funk, I felt that I needed to do more and that led me to starting fresh at this new site.  The main cost was maybe losing 80% of the subscriber base that I had but honestly, half of those people probably didn’t read my blog anyway.

If you are considering changing your focus or walking away from the blog you have to start something new, I would encourage you to consider what you want to focus on.  CTM was a focused blog and it did better than I ever imagined it would.  Now I’m here and my focus is leadership, volunteers and even a little church tech.

So, figure out your focus, and ever go as far as defining your niche.  Who do you want to reach?  Spend time praying about this and thinking it through.  What is this voice that God has given you?  How does He want you to use it?

There is hope for a stale, stagnant blog but you first have to find your voice and get serious about what you want to say.