3 Lessons From 1 Year Writing About Snowboarding

I got a message the other day from another snowboarder wanting to get into blogging and writing about their own snowboard tips and experiences.

I’m not the best writer, but I think I’ve done enough things right that we’ve grown every month from our tiny 1-2 readers per month up to 6000+ readers per month.

So here’s my list of tips for anyone wanting to start writing about their own snowboard travels, experiences and share their tips with others:

1) Genuine belief in the topic beats bad grammar

You don’t have to be the best writer, but whatever snowboard topic or life topic you write about, believe in it.

For example, some of the most popular articles on this site aren’t snowboard tips. They were blogs about chasing dreams and taking risks to continue my love for snowboarding.

Your writing and grammar doesn’t have to be the best, heck, I make grammar mistakes and mess up my punctuation all the time, but if you really believe in what you write, it will show and people will connect with the writing.

2) Offer value – don’t cheat your readers

I once saw a guy on SnowboardingForum.com asking for tips on starting a snowboard blog. His blog had one short post on GoPros, 2 ads and affiliate links to buy GoPros so that he could earn commission from Amazon.

I have NOTHING against earning money from a snowboard blog, but do it the right way. Don’t copy and paste an info sheet on GoPros and stick affiliate links all over your blog. That’s stupid.

Offer value to your readers. Your snowboard writing needs to offer value in the form of good information or entertainment to your readers if you want them to come back.

When I visited that guy’s snowboard blog, I felt like this guy was out to make a buck for himself and didn’t care about any of his readers. Not exactly the best first impression for new blog visitors.

You should genuinely care about your readers.

3) Show yourself

Don’t be afraid to show personality and be yourself. In fact, you need to show personality from time to time. No one wants to read a snowboard site that feels like they’re reading a history book.

Be open, honest and don’t be afraid to write about yourself or throw in jokes. Heck, I’ve written snowboard tips where my illustration photo was me in a cow hat or me sitting in a hot tub. Both were completely unrelated to the blog.

I’ve even been known to make references to the hotness of Jessica Alba in some of my snowboard tips. Be yourself and talk and joke around just like you would with your friends.

Don’t be afraid to show bits of yourself when you write about snowboarding.

One more thing…

One more thing I’ll add is don’t get into flame wars if someone disagrees with you. If you write about snowboarding (or anything) for long enough, you’ll meet people who don’t agree with your opinion.

Treat your readers and critics with respect, even if you don’t agree with them.

So basically if you want to get into snowboard blogging and writing:

1. Write about stuff you believe in
2. Offer value & care about your readers
3. Show your personality

Hopefully this was useful to any of you guys wanting to start writing about your own snowboard journeys.

- Jed

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