Last year I shared 13 lessons I've learned as a blogger of 13 years, but now in year 14 I realize it started way before 2010.
Let's take a journey down history lane on my life as a writer and how this life has been a growing need in me all along.
I’ve mentioned the origin of my original 2010 blog multiple times. The quick summary is I became obsessed with beauty gurus and made my own beauty YouTube channel. After some time, I realized I had much more to say so I started my blog to accompany it. End of story.
Except, not really.
The first time I remember writing down a story was in elementary school. I had a dream about a prince on a pegasus, so I got a notebook, and starting scribbling all of it down. After this, the next time I wrote a story was years later, also in elementary, where I wrote a short story about a girl in high school that fell for a vampire.
Clearly, I was ahead of my time.
But overall, I wrote poetry for most of my life. Those random stories were one-offs. You can read more about my journey to publishing in a previous post, including how my debut publication was actually a poem about love being a garden.
But back to blogging. Do you remember Livejournal? Were you around for that experience?
I made my first blog when I was a freshman in high school, circa 2005. Little 15 year old me felt very dramatic and "misunderstood." I just wanted to be seen as special. The usual for a teenager.
Social media wasn’t big yet (I didn’t know anything about Facebook, though it was a year old at the time), so I created a LiveJournal.
On my LiveJournal I would say absolutely anything and everything that came to my mind. Even the more profane things like how awkward it was when my Mom had “the talk” with me when I started dating Chris. Nothing was off limits. I didn’t understand yet that content on the internet could potentially live on forever. I deleted this online journal after a few months.
Then, I created a different LiveJournal. One that I "kept a secret." Sort of. I liked the idea of my thoughts being out in the open so I didn’t make my journal private. Instead I followed all of my friends journals but I didn’t tell them it was me. That didn’t work for long because of course they figured out it was me. So I deleted that blog too.
Now onto my third LiveJournal blog in three years. This one actually still exists (I wouldn’t dare post the URL now). I do read it every so often to remember how far I’ve come. I used that blog on and off for three years. This time though, I didn’t follow my friends, in fact I didn't follow anyone. It was a literal online journal.
But, I wanted a proper blog. I had started following Really, Are You Serious? in 2009 and really liked the idea of sharing my thoughts with the world and making a career out of it. This time I wanted to share my thoughts on music, art, really anything I felt like. Thus, Miss Random Bliss was born. Krystyn from RAYS actually designed my blog too. I eventually set that blogspot blog to private. I wonder if I can get back into that account...
The idea for the name was the concept that I would follow my bliss, without niching down. Sound familiar? I'm horrible at niching, it just wasn't meant for me.
Then, we enter my fifth blogging era, rebeccakelsey.com. Someone owns that URL now, which drives me insane since they aren't using it. I had this blog from 2010-2018, but didn't continue to pay for it when I moved to rebeccaksampson.com, which I regret.
Despite being my fifth blog, it wasn't my fifth site. I've had many short lived poetry and photography websites, that I created and closed in college. I became addicted to creating my own spaces, apparently. In a moment you'll see that habit has continued.
I've always prioritized exploring and sharing my passions and that love has taught me so much about technology, blog formats and platforms, and marketing. Marketing and social media ended up becoming my full-time job, so it's all helped me get to where I was meant to be.
This was the last design from that blog, which I had self-hosted on Wordpress:
I did really love that blog and design, and saved a lot of those posts so I could reshare them in the future after I left. The one in the preview as eventually reshared: How I Kept My Pregnancy a Secret
Around the time I was pregnant, I was also paid as a freelance blog writer. I wrote hundreds of posts for other publications, both anonymously and as myself, from 2015-2018ish. It was how I supplemented my income until I got into publishing, helping cover what we needed as a growing family while I worked in more entry-level jobs.
Freelancing is something I'm starting to do again now, but in a more picky way. When I first freelanced, it was for survival. I have the privilege of not needing to accept each job now that I'm more established in my career.
I have very few regrets, but I do regret leaving the rebeccakelsey URL behind when I left. I still think it was a good idea to leave Wordpress, because that platform stressed me out, but I wish I had gone through the trouble to keep that link.
We are getting closer to present day and my announcement...
Now we've made it to sixth era - rebeccaksampson.com - hosted on Wix. I initially had a very confusing design where I said I was the Creator of Worlds (and Babies).
Sounds kind of gross now, looking back on it.
But now a few years later, the site is cuter, don't you think?
Cartoon Rebecca was created by @sennydoesarty.
Yet, I didn't stop there. While I maintain this blog, I also have three other author websites. View each here: R. K. Sampson | Rachel H. Drake | Aria James Publishing
One of the side effects of having three pen names and a publishing company, it seems, is needing a significant online presence.
Moving From Wix and Kit to Substack
And it doesn't stop there, because, surprise, I've joined Substack, and transferred over my mailing list services from Kit to this platform.
If you aren't familiar with Substack, it's a blog, newsletter, and social platform combined in one. It also combines paid membership features like Patreon.
What does that mean for this blog that I've maintained for six years?
Nothing, and a lot.
There will be exclusive content on Substack, but I'm not leaving this website. I regretted losing rebeccakelsey and I don't want to lose what I've created with you here.
Plus, this site has that longer-standing SEO that has helped me so much over the years, like I shared in my 13 year anniversary post. People find me here and I'm not going to leave new readers hanging when they need information.
What content will be exclusive to your Substack, Written By Rebecca?
My personal content posts, like this one, will be exclusive to Written by Rebecca moving forward. This also means, I'll be writing more of them. Once I opened my Substack, I realized one thing quickly: I've been holding back.
A big part of me hasn't been posting here as often as I planned (though I have posted more in 2024 than in 2023), because I felt like every post had to have a purpose. And by that, I mean bigger SEO value, rather than what was on my mind to share.
Yet, I was so worried about making each of those informative posts perfect, that I barely shared those too.
I was putting so much pressure on myself and when I joined Substack and saw how personal and social it is, I was hooked. Do you remember a decade ago when commenting on blogs was more common? That's normal on Substack. Communities are engaging with writers in a way I haven't seen in a long time.
What content will be posted here?
Reviews and how-tos that people will want to Google, to be frank. There will be more of it than you have been seeing, because I won't be as worried about being perfect, since now this will be an avenue of my blog, but not my main blog. I already feel the pressure to be perfect lifting.
I'm not leaving, and if you've joined my newsletter previously, you are still on the list! Even though the list is hosted by Substack now, you don't need to be a Substack member to get emails from me.
If you are subscribed my newsletter, I'll still add links to this blogs's contents in those updates, so you can get the best of both worlds.
What's next?
You'll hear from me more often, I'll be writing more consistently but across multiple platforms, and all the content here is getting spruced up!
I plan on looking through these years of content and updating all newsletter plugs, as well as re-opening my old secret password locked webpage so I can add more free gifts for readers like I used to. Stay tuned for when I update this is back live so you can get those archived work sheets and sneak previews of my books. I'm really excited for how this pivot has opened doors for me and brought a new energy to my writing than I've had in a long while.
Is maintaining five websites, with this Substack now included, insane? Yes.
Will I do it anyway? Yes.
If you are reading this and are not subscribed to my insanity, I would love to keep our lines of communication open. You can now join my newsletter here so that you don't miss those personal posts:
And you can also go straight to my Substack, Written By Rebecca, to read the posts you've missed so far.
Thank you for reading, Kind Friend. I'm so grateful for you and for the opportunities I've had to share my voice over my life. I don't know where I'd be without it.
Remember you are unstoppable,
Rebecca
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