I've been writing online since 2008. The tangible benefits have been:
- I wrote a simple HTML template for a friend that mimicked the style of a popular website. I wrote about it and put it up for download. Someone asked if there was a WordPress theme for it so I made one. I ended up making low/mid 6 figures overall, including sales for several years and selling the business.
- When I was doing freelance development, I got a few clients from my contact form. Not nearly as much as I hoped and usually smaller projects, but it was something. Every new client leads to introductions to other clients, which was the main pipeline for business for me.
- Everything technical I've written about has helped me level up in that topic to make sure I'm not leading someone astray or sound like an idiot!
- When my site was WordPress, I got a number of very kind, personal comments on some of my less technical posts. Not tons, like 3-4 that I can remember fondly. It's such a wonderful feeling to have this momentary, text-based connection with someone you know nothing about. Brought back BBS days a bit.
- I got one really nasty comment that I still remember. Really brought me down a while but I used it to move past some of my own feelings about my work. Turned out to be a silver lining!
Intangible:
- Writing regularly has been both a great outlet for me, as well as an important secondary skill at work. I'm always known as "the writer" on the team, and I think that's helped me advance in a lot of ways.
- With 1K+ page views a month on a variety of topics, I can't help but to think that I'm helping some people with some things. That makes me feel good enough to keep doing it.
- My work writing is intensionally concise and dry (in most cases), my journaling is free-form, and my fiction is nascent. But blogging publicly feels like the place where it all comes together. I try to make it fun and casual while also accurate and concise. It feels like the most challenging writing that I do.
- I wrote a simple HTML template for a friend that mimicked the style of a popular website. I wrote about it and put it up for download. Someone asked if there was a WordPress theme for it so I made one. I ended up making low/mid 6 figures overall, including sales for several years and selling the business.
- When I was doing freelance development, I got a few clients from my contact form. Not nearly as much as I hoped and usually smaller projects, but it was something. Every new client leads to introductions to other clients, which was the main pipeline for business for me.
- Everything technical I've written about has helped me level up in that topic to make sure I'm not leading someone astray or sound like an idiot!
- When my site was WordPress, I got a number of very kind, personal comments on some of my less technical posts. Not tons, like 3-4 that I can remember fondly. It's such a wonderful feeling to have this momentary, text-based connection with someone you know nothing about. Brought back BBS days a bit.
- I got one really nasty comment that I still remember. Really brought me down a while but I used it to move past some of my own feelings about my work. Turned out to be a silver lining!
Intangible:
- Writing regularly has been both a great outlet for me, as well as an important secondary skill at work. I'm always known as "the writer" on the team, and I think that's helped me advance in a lot of ways.
- With 1K+ page views a month on a variety of topics, I can't help but to think that I'm helping some people with some things. That makes me feel good enough to keep doing it.
- My work writing is intensionally concise and dry (in most cases), my journaling is free-form, and my fiction is nascent. But blogging publicly feels like the place where it all comes together. I try to make it fun and casual while also accurate and concise. It feels like the most challenging writing that I do.