Using your Strengths and Weaknesses to Become a Better Blogger Photo by Eirik Stavelin
Using your Strengths and Weaknesses to Become a Better Blogger

Using your Strengths and Weaknesses to Become a Better Blogger

by Kwame · 58 comments

There are many blog­gers in the blo­gos­phere who are doing pretty well with their blogs. Then, there are those who don’t seem to be going any­where with their blog. Chances are, the blog­gers who actu­ally have some­thing going for them have taken a very impor­tant step in reach­ing that suc­cess. Iden­ti­fy­ing their strengths and weak­nesses, and mak­ing the best of each.

Iden­ti­fy­ing what you are good at when it comes to your blog is a very essen­tial activ­ity that will go a long way to improve your blog­ging flow. We are going to look at just how we can do this.

Iden­ti­fy­ing Your Strengths

To help iden­tify your blog­ging strengths, you need to answer a cou­ple of ques­tions. I have com­piled a short, but self-defining list of ques­tions to help you iden­tify your strengths and weak­nesses blogging.

  • When it comes to blog­ging and every­thing it includes (writ­ing, pro­mo­tion, main­te­nance, etc), what are you best at and what do you enjoy the most? What type of con­tent or arti­cle types do you write well? What pro­mo­tional technique(s) are you best at using? What ways of mon­e­ti­za­tion works best for you?
  • What advan­tages do you have over other blogs in the blo­gos­phere? How many RSS sub­scribers do you have? How many Email sub­scribers do you have? What is your blog’s traf­fic ranking?
  • What do you have more of that you can put into your blog­ging activ­i­ties? Do you have time to blog? Do you have money to pay writ­ers for your blog’s con­tent? Do you have money to pay for your blog’s marketing?
  • What do your blog’s read­ers com­mend you for when they leave a com­ment on your blog?

Find­ing the answers to the ques­tions above will help you deter­mine your strengths in blog­ging. You can write your answers on a piece of paper, or put them in a text doc­u­ment. A piece of paper will work for you because you can place it by your desk or any­where around your home that you can review it. You must aim to pro­vide absolutely hon­est answers to these questions.

After answer­ing the ques­tions, take a spe­cial note of any­thing you didn’t list in your answers. For exam­ple, if you answer that the pro­mo­tional tech­nique you are best at is social media mar­ket­ing, then it means the other meth­ods of mar­ket­ing — guest blog­ging, search engine opti­miza­tion and arti­cle mar­ket­ing are some things you may want to work on improv­ing. We will talk about weak­nesses later on in this article.

Lever­ag­ing Your Strengths

Learn­ing how to lever­age your blog­ging strengths will help you make the most of your blog­ging activ­i­ties. Lever­ag­ing gives you a big advan­tage over other blogs because you use your iden­ti­fied strengths to add more value to your blog.

To bet­ter under­stand lever­age, let us look at the lever­age China has over the man­u­fac­tur­ing industry.

Many com­pa­nies like Nike and Apple have set up man­u­fac­tur­ing plants in China because China pro­vides almost all of the resources (cheap labor, large labor mar­ket, cheap raw mate­ri­als, etc.) needed to man­u­fac­ture the prod­ucts of these com­pa­nies at an excel­lent price. Many retail­ers also pur­chase most of their items from Chi­nese whole­salers to sell them in their retail shop. China learned how to lever­age their strengths (in this case, their resources) to their advan­tage and now they have taken over most global industries.

The fol­low­ing ques­tions will help you find a way of lever­ag­ing your own blog­ging strengths to add more value to your blog.

  • What do I want to achieve with my blog? How can I achieve my blog­ging goals using my strengths (expertise)?
  • How can I get my blog’s vis­i­tors or email and RSS sub­scribers to pro­mote my blog? Think of giv­ing them some­thing extra to moti­vate them to talk about your blog to oth­ers. You can host a con­test with some stel­lar prizes. Prefer­ably, give out a prize related to your niche.
  • What other ways can I mon­e­tize my blog? You can think of sell­ing prod­ucts such as your own eBooks, plug-ins, web­site themes or ser­vices such as pre­mium con­tent (by paid sub­scrip­tions), writ­ing or design ser­vices. These are just a few exam­ples from me; don’t limit your­self to my ideas alone.

Lever­age is all about adding options and improve­ments based on your strengths. You need to con­stantly aim at using your exist­ing strengths to improve your blog. As the old adage goes, “use it or lose it.” You need to iden­tify and use your strengths the best you can. Oth­er­wise, you will lose that lever­age on your strengths as a result of wor­ry­ing too much about your weak­nesses. Instead, work at using other alter­na­tives to your weak­nesses and aim at con­stant improve­ment in all areas of your blog­ging activities.

In your quest to lever­age your strengths, remem­ber to take your blog’s read­ers and vis­i­tors into con­sid­er­a­tion, espe­cially when it comes to adding other mon­e­ti­za­tion meth­ods. You have to remem­ber, with­out your com­mu­nity, your blog is noth­ing. So if you choose to throw ban­ner ads all over the place, expect those ads to have a neg­a­tive impact on your com­mu­nity.

Remem­ber, that any change you make to your blog, some­one may not like it. You can’t try to make every­body happy. Make choices you think will be most ben­e­fi­cial to your blog, and if some­one doesn’t like it — it’s their loss for not sup­port­ing you try­ing to grow your blog.

Iden­ti­fy­ing Your Weaknesses

It is very impor­tant that you pick out your weak­nesses in your blog­ging skill set. They are just as impor­tant to know as know­ing your strengths — maybe even more important.

Do another self-analysis by answer­ing the fol­low­ing ques­tions below:

  • What do your read­ers crit­i­cize you for?
  • What are your worst traits when you are writ­ing an article?
  • What is the impact blog­ging has on your per­sonal life?
  • When it comes down to main­tain­ing the tech­ni­cal aspects of your blog, what do you know?
  • What holds you back when you really want to work on your blog?
  • What are your com­peti­tors good at that you are not? (Of course, if you want your own unique­ness and not copy what they are doing, you don’t have to see this as a weakness)

Basi­cally, your weak­nesses are the things that affect your blog­ging career neg­a­tively. Write them on a piece of paper or note pad. Put them right under your list of strengths, because they are just as impor­tant to know as your strengths.

Mak­ing Improvements

Once you know what you excel at and what holds you back, it’s time to work towards improv­ing your weak­nesses. Do you have enough resources ready to improve your blog? Can you invest some time and maybe money to improve on your blog­ging weak­nesses? You need to ask your­self ques­tions to find out if you are really ready for improvement.

Even if you have a nag­ging edge for improve­ment, it is not enough because some­times the feel­ing will be there but there wouldn’t be much time or avail­able resources to go ahead with improvement.

The three basic things you will need in order to make a sound improve­ment on your weak­nesses are:

  • Mind­set for improve­ment - Be will­ing to improve and think pos­i­tively about the things you are doing. You won’t improve if you think you can­not improve. You need to have a vision for con­stant improve­ment of your blog..
  • Time -You need a lot of time in order to make improve­ment. You need it because you will be spend­ing much of it on improv­ing upon your weaknesses.
  • Edu­ca­tion & Train­ing - By this, I don’t nec­es­sar­ily mean going to col­lege and earn­ing a diploma or degree. Read­ing blogs for blog­ging tips and join­ing paid tuto­r­ial sites that teach you how to improve at some­thing are all forms of education.

I didn’t include money because some­times, it is not impor­tant. You may need money to cre­ate resources when you lack them though. For exam­ple, you may need money to pay for edu­ca­tion (that is, if you opt to pay for tips rather than find free sources of infor­ma­tion), you may also need money to buy some­one else’s time (hire a con­sul­tant who can help improve your weak­ness) if you don’t have any time of your own.

I will how­ever advise that you work on improv­ing your blog on your own. If you get stuck, get some­one to take you through the process and work on it your­self by fol­low­ing the process. It is bet­ter to learn and mas­ter it your­self than to pay some­one else to make it bet­ter and keep on pay­ing him or her to main­tain that improve­ment again and again.

Final words

Tackle weak­nesses one at a time. You don’t have to burn your­self out by try­ing to make two, three or even 10 improve­ments at a time. You may not get any­where if you try to improve in many areas all at the same time.

Tackle your great­est weak­ness first. List which weak­ness you will want to tackle first in order of pri­or­ity and you will do just great.

You can skip one weak­ness and tackle the next one if you are get­ting frus­trated. For exam­ple, if you are get­ting frus­trated design­ing your blog, take time off from it and work on some­thing you think you will have more tol­er­ance for. How­ever, you do need to come back later on and work on that design. You should also note that some things take more time than other to improve, patience is a virtue here.

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Article by Kwame

I am a young entrepreneur who enjoys sharing tips on blogging, entrepreneurship and social media. I share these tips on my blog, Sociatic, where I also talk about web apps and desktop apps.

  • Summary

    Knowing what you're good and and what you're bad at when it comes to blogging are crucial pieces of information to know. If you know what you are bad at, you can work towards improvement, and when you have an idea of what you're good at, you can use those skills for greater results.

  • Key Points

    • It is important to identify the things you are best at. Even though you may already know them, take a moment to write them all down.
    • Leveraging your strengths is a very important step towards using your skills effectively. Learn alternative ways to implement your strongest skills on your blog, and always work to master that skill.
    • Figuring out what you are bad at is important so you know what skills in particular you need to take the time to improve upon.

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Keith December 28, 2009 at 11:43 am

Identifying strengths and weaknesses for yourself can be challenging to say the least, sometimes I ask for criticisms from fellow bloggers, family, and friends to help me be more objective and open about them.

Nice write up, most people don’t think to look that deep to help with their writing and social skills.
Keith´s last blog ..Do you Use Disqus Or Other Comment Sign In App?

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Kwame December 28, 2009 at 1:45 pm

Thanks Keith. I will be sure to check out your blog and offer my honest opinion ;)
Kwame´s last blog ..What Value Does Your Blog Provide?

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Nezine December 28, 2009 at 12:11 pm

Informative article.

What does it mean when you do not get any comments? Does it mean the topic is not popular, not worth commenting on, too complicated to understand or does it mean that you are not well-known blogger so readers do not bother?

When should a new blogger start to get the idea thath he is heading the right way?

For Bloggers Who want to Stop Writers’ Block

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Kwame December 28, 2009 at 1:43 pm

Thanks for the compliment Nezine. To answer your questions, if you do not get any comments, it does not mean people are not reading it or that your article was not helpful. The thing is, it is not everybody who will like to leave a comment. Some articles are read over 100,000 times but get less than 100 comments. If your article is too complicated or not useful, most of the time, someone will leave a comment to let you know it sucks.
You will know when you are going the right way when you get people saying good things about your articles in the comments are or elsewhere like a social media site. If people start sharing your content and subscribe to your blog, you are going the right way. However, you must know that it takes time to build a great blog. I hope I answered you well enough. If you want to know anything else, let me know :) .
Kwame´s last blog ..What Value Does Your Blog Provide?

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Dennis Edell December 29, 2009 at 5:10 am

Are you promoting each article after you write them?
Dennis Edell´s last blog ..Again – Pick My New Domain Names With A chance To Win $10!

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 10:44 am

Yes Dennis, I promote each of my articles after I publish them.
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Nezine December 29, 2009 at 12:04 pm

What is the best way to promote blog articles? Is there one method is far better than others?

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 12:28 pm

Well Nezine, there are numerous ways of promoting your articles. You can read this article Seth Wrote sometime back here on Blogussion to get some ideas: http://www.blogussion.com/marketing/blog-promotion-marketing/

Look at the “Promoting Online” section. Remember that some techniques work for some people better than other techniques so you have to do some testing and see which techniques brings you the most targeted traffic and work at improving on it and then later, you can try the second technique you are good at and then improve on it.
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Dennis Edell December 30, 2009 at 3:11 am

Sorry Kwame, that question was for Nezine who seems to be having problems. :)
Dennis Edell´s last blog ..UPDATED – ONE MORE DAY & MORE BLOGS! Again – Pick My New Domain Names With A chance To Win $10!

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Dennis Edell December 30, 2009 at 3:13 am

My best traffic generator to date is commenting around the net after each and every article posts. There are certain techniques I apply to it, but that’s the gist.
Dennis Edell´s last blog ..UPDATED – ONE MORE DAY & MORE DOMAINS! Again – Pick My New Domain Names With A chance To Win $10!

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Kwame Boame December 30, 2009 at 10:44 am

No problem Dennis. I agree with you that using comments to promote your blog requires a lot of dedication and some technique if you want to realize any visits at all.
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Jez @ Mobile Phones with Free Laptop December 28, 2009 at 3:12 pm

Great blog, you obviously put a lot of effort into writing your blogs. I agree with the point you make about time and needing to dedicate a lot of it to the blog if you want it to succeed!
Jez @ Mobile Phones with Free Laptop´s last blog ..Mobile Phone Free Laptop

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Kwame December 28, 2009 at 4:30 pm

Thanks Jez :) . Putting effort into serving your blog’s readers by providing quality blog is a good thing to do if you want them to keep coming back for more. Finding time to blog is very important. Drawing a time-table for your blogging activities should be basically divided into three parts; time for researching, time for writing and time for promoting. If you can estimate how much time you need to do this or that, you will be able to draw a blog time-table that will work.
Kwame´s last blog ..What Value Does Your Blog Provide?

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Blog Handbook December 28, 2009 at 4:03 pm

Constant improvement is the way to go. You just have to have the right mindset if you intend to make it as blogger. Unfortunately improvement takes time, and you can not rush things.
Blog Handbook´s last blog ..Simple Blog SEO Tips for Beginners

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Kwame December 28, 2009 at 4:32 pm

Exactly. Improvement is not easy but it always proves to be worthwhile. Ask any expert ;) . Thanks for commenting.
Kwame´s last blog ..What Value Does Your Blog Provide?

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Chad @ Tech201 December 28, 2009 at 5:58 pm

Identifying your weaknesses is a crucial part of improving your chances for success is just about any venture you undertake. The most important part of this, though, is the ability to be brutally honest with yourself on what those weaknesses are. This is much easier said than done.
An old standby thing to do in sales/marketing organizations is a SWOT analysis. Again, be BRUTALLY honest with your strengths and weaknesses, then you will better informed when it comes to knowing how to address them or make them work for you.
Chad @ Tech201´s last blog ..Forget All Those Folders and Stay Organized With Desktop Search.

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 10:27 am

Yes Chad. Thanks for the addition :) . Your blog looks great.
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Blogger Den December 28, 2009 at 7:40 pm

Nice share guys! As always you’ve got some great content posted here, I’ll have to share it on Blogger Den as Blogussion is pretty popular with the community over there.
Blogger Den´s last blog ..6 Steps to Follow to Make Money Online

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 10:46 am

Thanks Blogger Den. Blogussion has an awesome community and is getting even more popular as the days go by.
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Jayce December 28, 2009 at 8:04 pm

Knowing our own strengths and weaknesses not only good for blogging but to our life too. ;)
Jayce´s last blog ..How to hack Facebook account profile

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 10:48 am

Yep. You are right Jayce. Thanks for mentioning this :) .
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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David Wei@Your Money Online December 28, 2009 at 9:00 pm

If we don’t know our strengths and weaknesses, we can’t go further anyway, just as I mentioned in one of my post: The First Thing of Online Business and Anything is to Understand Yourself.

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 10:57 am

Thanks for sharing your article David.
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Dana @ Blogging Update December 29, 2009 at 1:00 am

Really great article which tell us to use our strengths and weakness to achieve success in blogging. And i find this article also can use in other field too. It is always great to know our strength and our weakness, and it is greatest if we find how to use both of it.
Dana @ Blogging Update´s last blog ..How To Get Google AdSense Code

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 11:22 am

Your compliments and additions are very much appreciated Dana. Knowing your strengths and weaknesses enables you to know where you have to improve.
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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chandan December 29, 2009 at 1:34 am

The another point is what we have to keep in mind the analyze our visitors, from where they are coming, if visitor coming from search engine by searching for some keyword to our blog and we do not write the things what they want then we should write on that topic on our next post.

I am not a good writer but try to improve my writing by learning from other.
chandan´s last blog ..List of Edu blogs

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 12:03 pm

You are doing a great job by trying to improve on your writing Chandan. Your efforts will be worthwhile in the end. Trust me.
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Link Exchange Forum December 29, 2009 at 1:58 am

Blogging could be a good way to work on your strengths, yes you examine your weaknesses, then figure out your strengths and figure out how to move your weaknesses into the strengths!
Link Exchange Forum´s last blog ..hi guys

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 11:50 am

No better way to say it. One thing I have noticed is that we are all in some kind of beta mode. Nothing is ever in a perfect state. Even the big websites and blogs online still work at improving their assets. So we are all moving from beta to better. Keep that in mind :) .
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Dennis Edell December 30, 2009 at 5:18 am
Kok Siong Chen December 29, 2009 at 4:32 am

Wow! You have provided a great information for me as a new blogger. I will try to follow what you have recommended to improve my new blog. Thanks for sharing!
Kok Siong Chen´s last blog ..Autosomal Aneuploidy – Cytogenetic Abnormalities

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 10:30 am

I am glad you find the article useful. You should subscribe to Blogussion to get updated when new articles are posted.
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Arafat Hossain Piyada December 29, 2009 at 5:13 am

Finding weakness always good and that I do in each Sunday but in my case I compare my skill with another same niche blogger and try to find where they are good and where I am better. This help me to graph my work for upcoming days. By the way, you really done a great job and explain it deeply. Thanks for this high quality thoughtful article.
Arafat Hossain Piyada´s last blog ..Photovisi – Lets You Create Your Own Photo Collage Online Free

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 10:36 am

Thanks for the compliment and thanks for reading Arafat :) .
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Dennis Edell December 29, 2009 at 5:17 am

I’d say my main strength is writing. I enjoy doing it and get many compliments on both content and style…getting kudos for style is very important, especially if you’re different from most.

My main weakness is anything of a design/graphical nature…this was obvious from a very early age when I couldn’t draw within the lines. LOL. Funny perhaps, but it does follow you. I outsource this.

All the other stuff, SEO, Promotion, etc., and so forth has been weak, but not a weakness if that makes sense…I seem to use up my time writing. This is already being put into the plans for 2010.
Dennis Edell´s last blog ..Again – Pick My New Domain Names With A chance To Win $10!

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 10:41 am

I have looked at your blog and I think you are doing pretty well. You are right when you say “not a weakness if that makes sense”. The main reason why I blog is to help people find solutions to what they may not know. I learn from my own experiences and the experience of other people and share it with those who do not have the experience yet. If just 1 person comes to read your blog and leaves one comment that shows that he or she is satisfied, you should be satisfied too. I am now drawing my plans for 2010. Thanks for commenting Dennis :) .
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Dennis Edell December 30, 2009 at 3:08 am

It appears we blog for the same reasons, which is good.

I definitely don’t lack for comments, that part is pretty well mastered. Time for me to move on to other avenues. :)
Dennis Edell´s last blog ..UPDATED – ONE MORE DAY & MORE BLOGS! Again – Pick My New Domain Names With A chance To Win $10!

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Kwame Boame December 30, 2009 at 10:59 am

Congratulations Dennis. I like your vibrance and enthusiasm on here :) .
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Dennis Edell December 29, 2009 at 5:18 am

Btw, excellent article. My guest post door is open if you’re interested. :)
Dennis Edell´s last blog ..Again – Pick My New Domain Names With A chance To Win $10!

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Kwame Boame December 29, 2009 at 10:42 am

Okay Dennis. I will add you to my list :) .
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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Dennis Edell December 30, 2009 at 3:08 am
Mark December 29, 2009 at 10:46 pm

I like your concept on discovering first all your strengths and weaknesses so you can make any necessary improvements. In this way, you’ll be able to get a positive result that can surely make your readers appreciate you more.
Mark´s last blog ..School Grants For Minorities

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Kwame Boame December 30, 2009 at 10:41 am

I totally agree with you Mark. The main aim is to create a satisfied community. Thanks for the compliment and addition ;) .
Kwame Boame´s last blog ..Google Brings “Olympics” To Webmasters; Are You On Your Mark?

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scheng1 January 2, 2010 at 6:05 am

That’s true. I like writing more than promoting. However, promoting is the part that will get traffic and backlinks.
No matter, a balance is needed.
scheng1´s last blog ..Baby and Fresh Air

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Kwame Boame January 2, 2010 at 12:15 pm

It’s important to find a balance between your blogging activities and you need to be a good time manager before you can have that balance. Thanks for commenting Scheng and Happy New Year to everyone here ;) !

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ysfirdaus January 4, 2010 at 9:05 am

Hi kwame… is finding our strength and weakness like using SWOT analysis method? thanks for sharing the idea..
ysfirdaus´s last blog ..December 2009 Blogging Recap

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Kwame Boame January 4, 2010 at 12:05 pm

Yes, it’s part of SWOT analysis.

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JennaM January 6, 2010 at 1:06 am

My biggest weakness is the strain that blogging has caused between my friends and I. My personal life has taken a huge hit which is ironic since I blog from social locations like coffee shops. I really need to work on this before the conditions become worse. thanks for writing the article, it really opened my eyes up.
JennaM´s last blog ..Lindsey – Day and Night

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Kwame Boame January 7, 2010 at 2:28 pm

Tanks to you too for reading the article Jenna. I just checked out your blog and I think you are doing a fantastic job there; very inspiring content, generally speaking. More grease to your elbows ;) .

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Orkut Scraps January 10, 2010 at 1:57 pm

nice informative post, I am a beginner in blogging,, the post is very useful for me
Orkut Scraps´s last blog ..How do you celebrate the New Year

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Kwame Boame January 10, 2010 at 5:35 pm

Glad you loved it :) .

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Arden January 18, 2010 at 7:28 am

This is very useful for me as a novice blogger. Thanks for posting this! I will surely benefit from this as I grow in the blogosphere. :)
Arden´s last blog ..5 Hindrances Of Regular Posting

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Kwame Boame January 18, 2010 at 12:31 pm
NC Elliot March 25, 2010 at 4:56 pm

Hi, thanks for the tips, they’re very helpful! I’ve only recently started writing a fashion blog for http://www.outfitlandia.com and if you get some free time, I would really appreciate some feedback on my first article? Thanks :)

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