One of the fabulous things about blogging in the lifestyle categories is that we have a bit more free reign unlike business or news blogs to talk about our personal lives and share what's going on with us behind the screen.
Some of us in fact have built our blog topic around our personal life like what The Pioneer Woman has done with her life in the country with her hubbie the Marlboro Man and their kids. I've done something similar to The Pioneer Woman with Back in Skinny Jeans, Noshtopia, and The Everyday Blogger where I have shared my own personal challenges of trying to live a healthier life like a breakup from a 3-year relationship, finding out about the Ex's new girlfriend on Facebook, and an ED relapse.
People love the personal touch
Sharing your own personal story can help make your blog exceptional and more meaningful to readers because they can see that you really do "get it" and that you are human too like everyone else. Being personal is a key reason Oprah has become so successful because she has shared her own epxeriences with some very personal issues like sexual abuse and weight challenges.
As much as sharing your story is wonderful and touching it can also be TMI (too much information), and that TMI can affect your brand and traffic. For example, it's courageous to tell people that you are getting divorced and why, but going on and on, post after post about what your Ex did to you, and how bitter and angry you are can turn readers off because they are there to get something of value not to be your dumping ear.
Continuing with the divorce example, with too much TMI, if you happen to be a food blogger, you can end up branding yourself the "bitter divorced food blogger" versus the "living in the everyday food blogger." Not many people want to visit the "bitter divorced food blogger" so seeing a drop in traffic would not be surprising.
Will TMI be this blogger's downfall?
In another example, a well known personal development blogger, Steve Pavlina announced that his 2009 New Year's resolution theme is to explore intimate relationships of the polyamorous nature. Steve has been married for 15 years and has two elementary school aged kids, and his wife is on board with Steve's plan as she is open to do the same.
Indeed, the subject of polyamorous relationships is related to personal development and discovery, but the nature of the subject has dramatic polarizing morals and values attached to it. Already, you can see how many people would be turned off by this subject and automatically start lookign at Steve as some relationship deviant. It will be interesting to see how this pursuit of Steve's relationship focus will affect his blog brand and traffic.
My personal two cents is that the polyamorous angle will hurt more than help because one children are involved, it's not just between two consenting adults. And two, this is not HBO. Watching a subject play out in fictional scenarios is not the same in real life. The test will be to see who wants to see a personal development specialist talking about the "other women" outside of his marriage. And if people are still coming to the blog, is it because of a desire to see a trainwreck in the making or because they genuinely think Steve's polyamorous exploration has something valuable to add to their lives.
On the revenue side, what kind of brands will want to advertise or do business with someone who's openly "cheating" as most would see it? If traffic and number of advertisers do dwindle significantly, what will Steve do to re-strategize. And most importantly, how will the polyamorous angle hurt and affect his brand which he spent many years building up. Could all that hard brand building be torn down overnight?
Keep personal information focused
My personal recommendation on sharing personal information is to keep the information concise and consistent with your blog's message and spirit. There will be subjects that venture into polarizing territory so you as a blogger have to determine how much risk you're willing to take with your brand and traffic.
When there is a specific point to your sharing, you are giving the reader something to learn from as well as giving them an opportunity to bond with you on a human level. Having a specific point can help you write the post so that your reader feels hopeful, uplifted, or inspired in some way, and it increases the odds of that reader sharing your post or linking to it from their own blog.
But now I'm curious, have any of you tried something polarizing on your blog, and what happened? Did you produce the results you were hoping to achieve or did it become a disaster and if so what did you do to rectify the situation?
