I'm going through an identity crisis

I don't know who I am anymore. As a blogger, anyway. To be honest, I just started this blog on a whim, without much thought. Well, my only thought was, "Let's just give it a try and see what happens." Since then, I have a loyal following of about, oh, 2 people. And one is my husband.

Well, on a whim (See, I can be spontaneous), I attended the BlogHer conference here in Chicago last weekend. As of last Friday, I didn't even know what BlogHer was...but then I was reading someone else's blog and she mentioned it and I thought, "why not?" So Saturday morning I skipped my Weight Watchers meeting and drove down to Navy Pier to sit through workshops and meet other women bloggers only to find out the my blog is TOTALLY LAME! I had no idea. I've been introduced to this whole new Blog world that includes blogs that are better than mine, like Dooce and Sweet / Salty and magpie-girl and Fully Operational Battle Station

Okay, now I won't have any readers because you'll all be busy reading these other, BETTER BLOGS.

The conference left me a little embarrassed. So I decided that either I start taking this blog more seriously, or just keep limping along with David as my only reader (in which case I can just start talking to him more which means there's no reason to have a blog whatsoever.)

Here's what I learned at the conference:

1. Mommy Blogs are rampant. But they're becoming passe. Which is good because I'm not a mommy (yet).
2. People actually make money blogging. I guess you can advertise on your blog, get hired to write for corporate blogs, etc. The really popular blogs like Dooce get thousands of hits a day, so they're attractive to advertisers. Therefore, I would need to start getting more than 10 hits a day to earn money advertising on my blog.
3. To get lots of hits, you have to keep feeding your blog with new entries...like every day. You can't be lazy like me and just update when you feel like it.
4. To be taken seriously as a blogger, you need a unique design. Not a Blogger template (like this one).
5. You need to "brand" yourself. Which is part of the reason I'm having an identity crisis. What is my "brand"? Who am I? I'm not a Mommy Blogger. I'm not a Political Blogger. I'm not a 20-something hipster that writes irreverent posts filled with four-letter words and sexual escapades (like Dooce). So WHO AM I?
6. Being at the conference made me feel like I was in Junior High, wanting to be invited to the party with all of the cool, popular kids.
7. The really good blogs include great photography. I need to buy a camera. Any suggestions?
8. I need to decide what the purpose of my blog is. To make money? (To be honest, I don't really care about that, although it would be nice.) To keep in touch with friends and family? (In that case, staying small is okay.) To have a place to be heard? To have a voice to the "outside world?" I need to do some soul-searching.

The last workshop I attended was lead by Jen Lemen and Magpie-Girl and the title of the workshop was "Small is Beautiful." Most of the attendees had small readerships and they were claiming they didn't want to get any bigger. They wanted a small, loyal readership and a space where they could bare their souls. They said getting any bigger would force them to compromise, to change their voice, to become obsessed with the stat counter (the thing that keeps track of how many readers you have). I liked the vibe of that workshop. It seemed authentic and geniune, and it wasn't all about making money or being famous or whatever. I felt less pressure, like maybe I didn't have to figure out how to get thousands of readers a day. Maybe I want to keep this blog small and intimate, and keep my voice authentic.

All of this to tell you to stay tuned for possible changes to the blog. I think it's time to go to the next level, even if I'm never a Dooce.