3 Ways to Encourage a Blogger

Faithful Blogging is hard work. I suppose about any goober could install Windows Live Writer and link it to a blogging platform like Blogger or WordPress and then set to typing up whatever random thing comes into his/her mind. But Christ-honoring mostly-daily blogging is hard work.

Blogging can be difficult and painful. Comments can be nasty. Words can be misunderstood. Articles that you worked your tail off on will usually disappear somewhere in Al Gore’s basement where he houses that computer that runs the entire internet.

Bloggers can get discouraged.

Therefore, I thought I would let you know 3 ways to encourage a blogger. Not because I am fishing for encouragement at present…wait a week or so, that way I don’t make the connection…but I am writing this article to help you encourage other bloggers. And you ought to do this if with those superhero bloggers.

These are in order, with #1 being the most encouraging (at least to me).

3. RT, Share, +1, link, etc. Whatever you use in social media use it to let others know that you were digging on an article. When our articles have more life than just a day it is encouraging. It’s the 21st century way of patting somebody on the back. If you like something you read hit the share button.

2. Post a thoughtful comment. Most people only comment when they want to either show how amazing their own knowledge of a subject is or to tell you that you are a moron and your children will probably turn out worse than Hitler. It’s nice to have people thoughtfully interact with something you wrote.

1. Tell us you are using it in the “real world”. Hands down the most encouraging comments and emails are the ones where somebody tells me they are using what I wrote for a bible study, a sermon, a discipleship group, etc. When somebody hits print on an article and turns it into a hard copy that means something to me. It communicates that the article was useful enough for them to want to keep around for awhile.

My overarching aim for blogging isn’t to simply get traffic or have people say, “wow Mike sure did a great job in writing this article”. My aim is that people would be helped because their joy in Jesus has grown because of something that I wrote. There are ton of other bloggers with the same aim—encourage them by specifically letting them know that they helped you delight in Christ.  

If you are a blogger, what encourages you?

If you are not a blogger but you benefit from reading blogs, I encourage you to think of a few bloggers and make it your aim to strengthen his/her day by sending a little word of encouragement.