Why I Unfollowed Almost 90% of Blogs on My Bloglovin’ Feed – and You Should Too
“Everyone's an expert." “Anyone can say anything” – how much do you believe in these two statements?
It seems that lately, many people who run a blog think of themselves as experts. First, we saw a few people turn their blogs into businesses. Now, it seems that everyone who starts a blog has this as their end goal.
This can be quite dangerous – for me, there’s a huge difference in someone who’s been blogging for six months, to someone who’s been blogging for three years. But which one of them is an expert?
Both of them? Or neither of them?
The trend in blogging nowadays is for people to be encouraged to position themselves as an expert. We’re all growing a social media community so why not teach others how to do it? We’re all trying to create great content, so why not teach others to do the same?
The problem is, that when everyone starts having this mindset and chooses to blog in this way, this is all we read.
This direction might benefit you – but who’s to say it’s benefitting your readers?
It got to a point where I was logging onto Bloglovin’ to read and comment on the blogs I love, but I didn’t read any of them. I didn’t want to read any of them, because they were all the same.
Here’s how to grow your mailing list.
Here’s how to double your social media followers.
Here’s how to make money from your blog.
We’re made to think that we should be doing all these things. But usually, when we’re trying too hard, that’s when the results don’t come. So we become frustrated, angry and get caught in the comparison trap.
But when you do things naturally and take it one step at a time, that’s when you see results.
There’s no one size fits all on the internet. What worked for someone, doesn’t mean it’s going to work for you. If it did, then everyone would be doing it.
So that’s when I’d had enough. I looked through all the blogs I followed and any who had started posting generic blogging and business advice posts, I unfollowed. I was seeing these type of posts everywhere – I wanted to read something different.
It was only at this point that I realised something.
We shouldn’t really be advising our community. We should be encouraging them.
We should be motivating them to achieve what they want to achieve. Not telling them how to do it.
This then got me thinking about my own posts and how I write them. I’ll admit – I did wander down the “advice” route. But then I realised that I was just regurgitating everything that had already been done. I was following the crowd.
Sure I was growing an online presence, but where is my authority on those subjects? Do I actually have the expertise to teach people about them?
Maybe. But not enough to base my blog around it. Yes, my own advice can help you, just as your advice can help others. And if you choose to listen to it, great – I hope it helps you. But you also have permission not to listen to my advice.
You have permission to not listen to anyone’s advice.
I realised that actually, the purpose of my posts is to inspire other people growing an online presence and open up discussions. Community has always been one of the most important things to me – you can only get that by being on the same level as your audience, not one step ahead.
So why did I unfollow almost 90% of blogs on my Bloglovin feed? Because I wanted something new. I wanted something refreshing. Don’t get me wrong – I found lots of new blogs to follow and even went back to ones I’d stopped reading when I was writing all the advice posts. But I’m glad to say that I’ve silenced the noise. The same noise we’ve been hearing for months now.
I encourage you to do the same.
Do you want to be the same? Or do you want to be different?
You can blog about what others are blogging about – as long as you do it in a different way.
Don’t you think it’s boring being like everyone else anyway?
A Final Note...
This isn’t to say you can’t share advice posts. I’ve found that my strongest skills lie in careers – applying for jobs, writing CV’s and interview tips. But I also know I’m going to pick up a lot of tips in my new marketing job – but this doesn’t mean this is all I’m going to write about. Share how to build a Twitter following, but share it from the tactics that have worked best for you. That way, when you share what you know, you’re not sharing your expertise, you’re sharing your personal experiences. That’s a lot more believable.
re you getting tired of hearing all the same noise? Will you make a change for the better?