Guest blogged

by Wayne Hurlbert

It was one of those days.

The demands of real life required my attention for the entire day. I had almost forgotten that in my numerous blogging effforts, postings to various message forums, and composing e-mails, that I had a working life offline.

As I conducted business beyond the computer, I was struck by a bizarre light of realization. My living is earned more heavily as a result of what I do on the internet, than what I do in the supposedly three dimensional real world.

My myriad of writings and postings have resulted in more writing and consulting work than I ever had before.

Offline businesses employ me to write things for them, and to provide them with marketing and public relations advice. Why? It seems they liked some of the ideas that I have expressed in the cyber based blogging community.

In many ways, it’s rather unusual to find paying projects as a result of what some people have dismissed as a “hobby”. For some of us, blogging has grown past the hobby stage, and is now a marketing and publicity vehicle for earning our living.

After all, we do have to eat and live somewhere. Something has to pay those bills that arrive in our mailboxes. If they are paid as a result of maintaining a blog or two, that’s just fine with me.

As blogs become more mainstream, more writers will find work projects as a direct result of their postings. That day may not be that far into the future.

I’ll admit it’s a great feeling to get offered some work, whether high paying or not, as a result of my blogging efforts. There is a certain sense of satisfaction gained from the acknowledgement that one’s writing has market value.

I’ve sold some freelance writing articles in the past, but I’ve never had the response that my two blogs have provided. As a result of daily postings, on what could easily be dismissed as a diversion, I am making a nice chunk of my living.

Of course, a lot of that living requires me to be away from my computer, and out visiting with clients.

That means I have to blog later in the day!

Wayne Hurlbert writes about the marketing and public relations value of blogs for business on Blog Business World. Wayne also provided daily roller derby news and commentary from a business perspective on Wayne’s Derby World.