I used to think my way of writing was my biggest weakness as a digital marketer.
I’m very into storytelling over educating, and I prefer to draw on my own experiences when teaching, over just regurgitating facts.
Plus, I use more words than is strictly necessary to get my point across, and we’re always told to be concise in content writing. People aren’t going to read all that, after all. Thanks to Buzzfeed listicles, we’ve been trained to have short attention spans and most people just skim read things now.
You’re doing it now, aren’t you? No judgement if you are!
Here’s the thing though: doing things differently, doesn’t make it wrong.
Believing my way of writing to be a weakness has held me back in more ways than one.
I stopped offering copywriting as a service. I invested money in courses that shan’t be named, that didn’t teach me anything I didn’t already know. I second-guessed every caption and every blog post, and for a long time just stopped promoting blog posts at all.
The blog posts I did promote were the highly educational listicle style ones I don’t even personally like.
And the stream of consciousness ones I really like (like this one) stopped being a thing.
The only place none of this changed was in Laura’s Letters, and the only answer I have for that, is that letters are meant to tell a story - why else would you write one?
I don’t know exactly what it was that brought me back to embracing my style, but I do know it came from a realisation that I was in serious danger of losing who I was to what I thought I needed to be in order to have a sustainable business.
Basically, I over-corrected. I went from only storytelling to only educating and selling, and everything suffered for it. My creativity, my engagement, my relationships with my followers, and my sense of worth as someone worth hiring.
So here’s the other thing: I am good at what I do, and what I do isn’t wrong just because it’s different.
You can (and should) do things that you’re good at, even if (especially if) it means resisting the status quo.
Doing things your way is what makes you stand out, that’s what makes you memorable and remarkable. If you have to change something about who you are in order to succeed, is it even a success?
Until next time, be kind to yourself and create something remarkable!
Laura x
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