Whoa! Where did the past three weeks go? Has Health Blog Helper been abandoned?
No, no, just simmer down. The reason I've been away is that I've been really busy with No Meat Athlete and with a new blog I started as well. It's called Thinking Bettor; it's a blog about gambling. (Put another way: It has absolutely nothing to do with health!)
It's likely that you have no interest in gambling. So why am I telling you about my new site?
Because Thinking Bettor might still be worth something to you. If not for its content, then as a demonstration, especially if you're a brand new blogger interested in seeing how I would do things from the beginning.
A Different Approach to Starting a Blog
I get a lot of questions about how to start a brand new blog: how to set up a new site; what plugins to use; how to get those initial readers; how to get noticed by Google. While I have some opinions about these questions, those opinions have been shaped more by what I've learned than what I actually did with No Meat Athlete.
When I started No Meat Athlete, I did the things I saw all the other healthy living bloggers doing. And it worked, but it took me six months of daily posts to get 500 subscribers. That's a lot of work!
Since that time, I've learned (from watching bloggers in other niches) that there are far better ways to go about starting a new site. Ways to grow your subscriber base more quickly and with fewer posts. Thinking Bettor gives me the chance to actually put it all to the test. And eventually, I'll put together a series of posts based on what I learn in the process.
In the meantime, it's likely that I'll be posting less frequently on Health Blog Helper. I'll write when I'm struck by inspiration, or when I learn something new that's so effective I simply can't wait to share it. And of course, I'll still offer blog coaching. But I won't be sticking to any regular posting schedule, so you can't get mad if several weeks pass between posts. Deal?
Some Other Health Blog Resources
Since posts on Health Blog Helper will be a little less frequent, you should check out some of the other sites about health blogging that have popped up recently:
- Hollaback Health – Rachel Wilkerson has contributed a lot of posts to Health Blog Helper, and Hollaback Health is a site she started that brings together several health bloggers who post regularly about interesting topics in the health blog world and social media. Okay, so it's not so new. But it's good!
- Healthy Living Blogs – The most useful part of this site, in my opinion, is the index of health blogs, by both location and alphabetical order. If you're looking for bloggers to build relationships with for guest posting, linking, or other collaboration, that's is the place to go.
- Fit Bloggers Guide – A brand new site co-founded by Ryan from No More Bacon. Ryan is great at design and knows way more about technology than most of us ever will; he's an invaluable resource for learning how to deal with the technical issues of blogging. Tons of useful stuff here, and very well organized.
The one thing I'll say about all these sites is to read as much as you can, but don't just do what everyone else does! There's so much of the same in the health blog community. Above all else, be different! Study sites like Copyblogger and Problogger as well, and learn what successful bloggers are doing in other niches. And then be different from that too!
Experiment. If your readers won't tolerate that, are they really the readers you want? Who are you blogging for, anyway?
Thanks Matt,
Thanks for these resources Matt. One of the reasons your blog resonates with me, is that I too don't want to blog daily, giving a blow by blow of what I ate and how I felt – partly because there are so many such bloggers out there who already do it way better than I could.
Those blogs have their place – and really are in the original spirit of blogs – and I read some of them, but, as they say, that just ain't me.
I visited Healthy Living Blogs and it is hard to find blogs that have the same philosophy.
One thing that I find a bit difficult is how to write posts that are more topical and researched – less stream of consciousness – while still making that personal connection that is so important in building a reader base.
Maybe that could be a future topic for one of your posts.