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One of the topics at BlawgThink was how much a person’s blog should say about them personally vs. professionally. Fred Wilson’s post The Soul of A Blog answers the question for me:
… most people like getting a sense of who I am. They can quickly scan past the posts they don’t want to read. But having those posts there gives them a sense of the other parts of me.
As I said to my friend when he told me about Dan’s comments, “a diversity of post topics is the soul of a blog”. All head and no soul makes for a boring read.
I’ve struggled a bit with this issue and thought about starting a second blog devoted to more personal matters. The funny thing is, I get much more reaction from writing de profundis than I do from my posts on professional matters.
I’ve actually been studying this – for business bloggers – who includes personal info and who doesn’t and which is the better way to go?
I’ve been looking at it from a marketing to women perspective. I found many women bloggers were much more comfortable sharing personal information.
But as I did more research, I found many men business bloggers also share personal information.
I think one reason why women and men like blogs that include personal info is – it gives your blog a voice – a personality – it makes it unique – it helps build a relationship between the blogger and the blog reader.
I find myself more vested in blogs that include personal info – I want to go back more than to blogs that are strictly factual.
Holly
I definitely include personal comments, especially regarding things I like (music, websites, etc.) that are not directly related to the content of my blog. However, I often try to draw a lesson or find an attribute that will somehow relate back to it all. I love cross-pollinating ideas, so this works for me. On the other hand, you are unlikely to hear me talk about my family or friends. Even colleagues I do not mention by name unless they are already “public” or give permission.
Here is one of my favourite posts not directly related to work, inspired by a concert I attended:
“Lessons Learned at a Foo Fighters Concert; or, I Want to be Like David Grohl When I Grow Up”
link to conniecrosby.blogspot.com