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Like a lot of blogs and sites, this is a one contributor affair. I come up with the ideas for the content, I write and maintain it and I do the Wordpess and Thesis customisation.
Whilst doing that, I give it my tone and personality. I like to write in what I think us a relaxed but intelligent style because that’s how I perceive myself. I write about things I like again because they reflect my business and to some extent my personal life. I am however discreet because it would be easy to put off potential clients and buyers by being too touchy-feely or by moaning too much.
Really putting personality into a web site
I came across Be Awesome Online today whilst reading Copyblogger. It’s not often I click through to a particular contribtor’s web site, but this time I did and I’m glad because it got me asking questions of myself.
At first look, Catherine Caine’s site is a well-designed sales engine. That’s not a criticism, on the contrary, it shouts load and proud what it is and does it in a pretty engaging way.
When you dig a bit deeper though into the blog pages, she reveals far more. She’s (probably) not yet a six-figure blogger and has trouble getting to the end of the month sometimes. She also suffers from energy sapping depression in the winter months with Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD).
She is refreshing because a real person shines out from under all that writing that she says she loves doing.
Honesty as a sales tool
Now I’m no advocate for Catherine. I’ve never met her and in fact until a few hours ago, I’d never even heard of her. What I like about her is that sales blurb is saying, “Come on guys, we all feel the same way about this. We’re all a bit scared sometimes, we all doubt our abilities, lets just be honest about it”.
There’s arguments for an against calling one or two-man bands a “brand”. It doesn’t matter whether you call it a brand, an identity or a personality, if it isn’t distinct and doesn’t show up, something’s wrong.
Have I been doing it wrong?
This site reflects was I am and when you call me, email me or just make a comment (because you will, won’t you?), you’ll know exactly what or who to expect. The picture at the top is really me, in my office in front of my Jackson Pollock, staring into the webcam on my iMac.
I have fears and there are times when I don’t think I’m going to make it. I have days when everything goes wrong and I just want to give up. Freelancers don’t have an awful lot of support networks and it would be good that sometimes we could use these “social” media to be a little more ourselves than what we would like to pretend to be.
Like Catherine, we just might come over as more personable, more approachable and in the final analysis, more fun.
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