What better time is there to post about receiving award than at the start of a new year? Last Fall, I was nominated for the Blogger Recognition Award by Tana from Debt Free Forties, a financial management blogger who somehow happened upon my own blog. Thank you, Tana, for passing on the award.
I’ve been struggling with writing over the past few months, which is why I haven’t been so active, and also why I haven’t mentioned this award yet. My original plan to post once a week has failed, but I’m working on changing this.
So what is the Blogger Recognition Award, anyway?
It’s an award given to bloggers by bloggers within the blogging community. It’s like a pat on the back given by other bloggers to say, “Hey, I like your blog, you’re doing a good job at what you do.” In other words, you are shown appreciation for the work and dedication that goes into blogging.
Blogging is some serious work, especially if you’ve decided to shell out some money for your own website (such as at Joyful For Jesus). While blogging definitely involves writing, it’s only one part of the process. Blogging and running your own website involves a steep learning curve in terms of website analytics and design, marketing strategy, and advertising. And anyone who knows me knows that computer tech knowledge is not my forte, but I still like to do my research. Someday I’ll write a post about blogging in more detail, but for now, just know that it’s incredibly time-consuming and anxiety-inducing. And yet, at the end of the day, I love the feeling when I finally publish a post.
To accept the Blogger Recognition Award, I need to follow the following rules.
Award Rules:
Fulfilled requirements
– Thank the blogger who nominated you and provide a link to their blog. ✔
– Write a post to show your award. ✔
Requirements to fulfill
– Give a brief story of how your blog started.
– Give two pieces of advice to new bloggers.
– Select 15 other bloggers you want to give this award to.
– Comment on each blog and let them know you have nominated them and provide the link to the post you created.
How did my blog start?
Fun fact: I didn’t start as Joyful For Jesus. I was in grad school in March of 2017, and I needed a stress release from writing papers. I started up a free blog under WordPress, didn’t really expect to start my own website, nor did I even have a niche. But over the following months, I realized that my writing gravitated towards writing about my faith, Jesus, and how I interact with the world. I decided to take the plunge and start a niched website, aimed at young adult Christians who need to know that they’re not alone in their walk with God. And because my middle name is Joy, I thought I’d work with that. And thus, Joyful For Jesus was born.
Some advice for new bloggers:
1) Take your time to research.
When I started with my own website, I had no idea what I was doing. And sometimes, I still have no idea. It takes a lot of time to work through tech problems, figure out a niche, come up with post ideas, and figure out where you want this site to take you in a few years time. It’s okay though to not have all the answers.
You don’t have to own your own domain to start blogging, and you don’t have to have it all figured out right now. You have time to learn. Some things I’ve learned over time that are super important: Have a good web host that will answer all your tech question needs, and your success as a blogger will rely on your marketing strategy. For a web host, I use Siteground because they’re available for all my questions 24/7, and believe me, there are a lot of questions. My marketing strategy could use some work, but at least I’m self-aware!
2) Your aesthetic is important, but focus on your content.
I notice that there are a lot of blogs out there that have really impressive themes and amazing presentation, but their posts are riddled with grammar mistakes or filled with unsatisfying clickbait. And that, as a reader, is super frustrating. Your readers will be attracted by your presentation, but become disinterested if you have nothing to offer. The purpose of your blog should be to be helpful to the world around you.
It’s like when I meet a guy who looks cute yet can’t contribute something to a conversation. Like yes, you go to the gym, but can you tell me about the last book you read? What’s your view on Jesus? How do you feel about my excessive use of puns, and can you match it?
Make sure your blog contributes to the already-existing conversation. There will bound to be some common ground between you and other blogs of your type, but your posts should have a unique spin because they come from you.
Bloggers I nominate for this award:
Take a gander at these 15 amazing bloggers and their blogs. Enjoy!
- Stacey Patrick at Gracefully Overcoming
- Audrey Rusch at AudreyDenna
- Julie at Stuff of Heaven
- Jodi at Once Upon A Time Girl
- Hannah Faith at Hannah Faith
- Sarah at Ellah At Home
- Rachel at Rachel Lydia Light
- Natalia at Natalia Drumm
- Meghann at Bring Us Closer
- Kathleen at Kathleen B Duncan
- Nancy Reynolds at Raising Teens Today
- Stuart M. Perkins at Story Shucker
- Faith Raine at Quirky Letters
- Tonye Tariah at Freedom at the Crossroads
- Joshua at Taking Up My Cross
Nominees, keep your eyes on your blogs because I’ll be commenting!
To my readers, thank you for reading! More posts are on the horizon.
Looking forward to reading more of your informative blogs. Thank you Sarah Joy.
Thank you for reading!
Thank you so much for the nomination! I love your blog. I also totally agree with the tip of focusing more on content, rather than aesthetic. It’s much more important to think of how your blog is contributing to the lives of others, rather than how it’s making you look. I often remind myself of this 🙂
I’m so glad you agree! Keep up the awesome blogging work. 😀
Thank you so much for the nomination! I’m honored! Loved reading about how you got started. So much of it rings true with me – everything from not knowing what I was doing when I started to the constant battle of learning the “tech side” of blogging. It’s been a roller coaster to say the least! Still, despite the pitfalls and learning curve, there is no greater feeling than having people respond to something you’ve written. Thanks again Sarah Joy for the nomination as well as your candid and heartfelt advice!
Thank you so much Sarah for the nomination. I did not expect this. It’s great to hear about how and why you created this blog. I agree with you in that, when I initially started blogging 7 months ago; I didn’t know where I was going to be taking this blog, I just wanted a place to write my thoughts about God and share it with others because I have a hard time starting conversations with people face-to-face.
When I started, I just thought I’d focus on the basics on what my relationship with Chris was like at time, but as I started interacting with fellow Christian bloggers like T.R. Noble from Inside Cup; I started expanding what I wrote about and sometimes one post leads to an entirely different “sub section” of a Christian’s walk with God.
I just wanted to once gain thank you Sarah for the nomination. I pray that you continue to trust in God and let Him take the wheel when He needs to guide you to a specific topic to write on.