By Adrienne Erin
Contributor, Online Career Tips
Blogging about the industry you work in can provide a lot of benefits beyond simply giving you an outlet to post your opinions. Writing a blog about your niche can help you to:
- Establish yourself as a leader in your industry
- Provide expert commentary on issues other people are talking about
- Show you’re a go-getter with a strong work ethic
Most importantly, it can help you find a new job. Don’t believe it? Here are four ways blogging can lead you to a new place of employment.
1. Establishing Your Bona Fides
Getting your own platform to share your ideas is a great way to make people listen. When you are in a meeting, your boss may not give time for anyone to share their opinions, especially anyone more than a notch or two down the totem pole. However, online you’re free to opine about anything and everything in the industry, within reason, which can help you catch the eye of others in the industry who will judge you on your ideas, not on how long you’ve been contributing to your current company.
2. Moving You Along a New Career Path
Blogging can help you gain experience in an area where you don’t currently work. For example, say you are a high school science teacher, but your real passion is power systems, and you’d love to get a job working with gas generators, marine engines and solar tubing. You could start a blog that delves into your passions while keeping your day job. If you build up enough expertise and establish enough connections in your blog world, you’ll be able to figure out how best to go about finding your dream job. Heck, a company may even come to you with an offer after reading your insights.
3. Doing Something No One Else Does
A terrific way to turn your blog into a career opportunity is to find a niche that no one else is occupying and really own it. A few years ago, before social media was widely understood, someone thought writing the ultimate guide to Pinterest would be unique. Now with the popularity of that social platform a need for that kind of insight has exploded. Supplying these types of topics will place the writer in demand at a time when authority figures on the topic are being sought.
4. Getting Lots of People Reading Your Blog
Invest in whatever it takes to get your blog more widely read. The more people who read your blog, the better your chances are of connecting with someone who can hire you. Here are some ways to publicize your posts and grow your readership:
- Link to your blog on all social media accounts
- Include your URL on business cards
- Put your URL in your email signature
- Tell your family to tell all of their friends (word of mouth works!)
- Experiment with basic search engine optimization (SEO)
- Exchange links with other bloggers
- Create a blogroll to visually reciprocate the link exchange
- Invite guest blogging within your industry to write for you
Getting the Right Offer
With the right strategy and know-how, you can parlay your blog into not just a job offer, but a job offer you’d actually take. Make the commitment to your blog and it will pay off, perhaps quite literally.
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