Take a class for a fresh start!
With the desire to build a more vibrant blog, I signed up for the 4-week Blog Triage class with Cynthia Morris and Alyson Stanfield. I've decided to give myself a little wiggle room by doing the self starter class; I'll miss out on the class feedback and consulting (so hopefully you will share some comments along the way!) but I wanted to take a little pressure off myself since I'm shocked that I decided to commit (or re-commit) to another new thing. Today's assignment is to describe the people I want to visit and read my blog.
This is a bit challenging because I know who some of you are. There are fellow artists as well as designer and writer friends from my previous graphic design career. At least a couple of my stores and galleries follow along here so they can get to know me more and pass that connection along to their customers. The hard part is that I have so many potential readers... fellow artists, collectors, stores and galleries that carry my work, people who are reading my book and fellow jewelers looking for tips, students who want to pursue a jewelry career, as well as customers from art fairs. This isn't even mentioning friends and family (or spammers). Who is my ideal audience, though? That's tricky because I hate excluding anyone, yet in my heart of hearts I would like to write to people who have a piece of my jewelry (or a collection) and are looking for a connection to me. They (you!) want to understand a full-time artist's life and live vicariously through it. Posts for this person will appeal to other readers who can pick and choose to read posts by subject matter.
Does this sound like you? Am I missing anyone? Am I targeting the right mark? What I crave most is to get more comments and feedback on my blog so I know I'm striking a chord. Many people do email me directly rather than post a comment, which does achieve the same effect of us having a dialog yet it misses out on potential networking. So don't be shy... let me know what you think! And thanks for following along as my blog goes through a makeover during the next month.