Everything I learned about Blogging, I learned from Penelope Trunk

So the truth is, I’ve been blogging since 2001, long before I ever came across Ms. Trunks blog. I’ve created and sold three successful blogs before I ever came across her writing. I only found Ms. Trunk’s blog, earlier this year, when I was looking for perspectives on career and divorce. However, over the months, I have gone back and read almost every single one of Trunk’s post and laughed, cried, cringed and wondered.

Penelope ascribes to an unconventional method of blogging….honesty. The kind of honesty that makes her vulnerable to a point where even I’ve felt uncomfortable reading it. YET…I cannot stop reading. It’s the kind of writing that makes me want more, like a soap opera laden with sound advice. I’ve pinpointed four elements of her blogging style that make hers a stand out.

1. Be Yourself

If there is one thing I can say about Ms. Trunk is that she is who she is and she is unapologetic about it. As a blogger its important to write in a way that reveals who you are in an authentic way to your readers. Sometimes that means being vulnerable, or funny, or pithy, or brutally honest, if it is who you are, you should find a writing style that allows you to come across that way. When I was operating my first celebrity gossip blog, I often had friends tell me, “It’s as if I can hear your voice saying exactly what you writing.”  Finding your voice and being able to blog in a style that communicates that voice is important to your audience. People are drawn to bloggers who tell interesting stories, your stories are unique, they are interesting, go with it.

2. Admit your Faults

As professionals, as parents, and as lovers, there are many things we probably aren’t supposed to admit. Professional women aren’t blogging about the guilt they feel about the time spent away from their children. Entrepreneurs aren’t opening talking about their company financial struggles or if their company going broke. In one of Penelope’s blogs she openly admits that she didn’t pay the electricity bill on time and it had been shut off. Guess what? These things happen in everyday life, yet most people are scared of admitting their faults and in turn don’t blog about it. Why not? These are the stories people want to hear, these are the stories that let people know you are human, these are the stories that allow you to seek help and advice, these are the blog posts that allow you to grow.

3. Use research to support your statements

Using other people’s research to support your own thoughts helps. It helps for two reasons, one others are more inclined to believe you and two, it shows that you are doing your homework. How often have you read a blog posts with lots of matter of fact statements and wondered, “Where the hell is the proof of that?”. Back up your blog posts with research…it makes you look smart.

4. Sex it up and dumb it down

Is there anything sexy about career advice? Not really. Penelope manages to make her career advice blog sexy by using stories to illustrate sound career advice. For example read this blog post about the effects of a long commute, now read it until the end…I’ll wait. You like how she took a seemingly harmless and slightly mundane topic and turned it into a scintillating tale?

This blog, Chrystiecorns.com is new. My goal is to make this a space where I share thoughts from my internal dialogue. I am a professional, a mother and someone’s ex-wife, I have a lot to talk about…so here goes nothing….like I once said, it can only go up from here.