Welcome! It looks like you're new here. Be sure to subscribe to my RSS feed so you don't miss a thing! Thanks for visiting!

If you just wrapped up your junior year of college that now is the perfect time to start a blog of your own. Blogging is (relatively) easy, lots of fun and could be the one thing that sets you apart from the crowd when it comes to applying for a job in a year’s time.

Benefits:

I think the biggest benefit of starting a blog in college is the ability to use it as a resource when it comes time to apply for a job. If you work hard at your blog, you’re proud of it, and it is well crafted and well written than it is certainly something you can put on your resume or mention in an interview. A potential employer is able to check out your site, see instantly how hard you work at something you’re clearly passionate about and the ability you have to write and communicate well. Plus, while “blogging” is certainly a common part of the lexicon in today’s world, there is still a certainly mystique to having one (especially one that is at all successful) and an employer who is reading hundreds of resumes and interviewing dozens of people is likely to at least remember the author of that cool blog he/she checked out. And that alone puts you ahead of the game.

I would recommend blogging about any (appropriate) topic you’re passionate about for sure, but if you can match your blog to the industry you’re looking to enter and have it serve as a go-to resource for that industry, than you might as well pick your cubical decorations now because you’re golden.

And of course in the mean time, you may be able to earn a little money from your blog. While it probably won’t be a lot, if you work at it a bit, you’ll be able to at least cover the cost of web hosting and maybe have a little left over for beer money.

Plus, and most importantly, blogging is fun. researching is fun, writing is fun, networking is fun, designing your blog is fun. But, not only are all of these things fun, but they all come in handy when you’re looking for a job!

Drawbacks:

While blogging is definitely lots of fun and it could be very beneficial to landing you a job, it’s tough and time consuming. Posting worthwhile posts daily is tough, it’s hard work and it takes a long time. Thus, time management is crucial - you’ll still need to get your schoolwork done and, if you’re going to be a senior, than you want to enjoy your senior year as much as possible and you don’t want blogging to get in the way of that.

And, as I mentioned, it’s certainly possible to make money blogging but unless you put an enormous amount of time into it (or get really, really lucky) chances are you won’t be making much. I certainly wouldn’t rely on it as your sole source of income during the school year, unless you want to completely cut out pizza and beer (and who wants to do that?!).

Resources:

If you’re new to blogging, I would definitely recommend reading problogger.net, it’s a great resource for every aspect of blogging, for beginners and seasoned bloggers alike. As a platform I would recommend WordPress above all the others and, if you’re going to shell out the money for paid hosting (which I always recommend) over using a free service like blogger.com or LiveJournal or something, I’ve had very good experiences with both BlueHost and WebHostingPad. Good Luck!

photo credit: Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com

Popularity: 17% [?]