Here in the UK, we’re just passing the longest day of the year already, and it seems like only a few weeks since the winter passed and spring arrived.
One of the best parts of the warmer weather is that you can get out in the garden and see to all of the jobs that you wouldn’t do in winter, like planting up pots and baskets, clearing the flowerbeds and mowing the lawn.
I was out in the garden the other day having a tidy up, and it struck me just how similar gardening and blogging actually are.
Run with me on this one – I will manage to persuade you that these two seemingly incompatible activities are actually much more close in characteristics than an initial glance may suggest!
A little investment goes a long way
When we undertake a good stint of gardening, one of the best things about the task is that we get immediate, visible results from just a little investment of our time. We can look out of the window and see a vast space which needs clearing out, building up, and populating with plants and shrubs before it can be everything we want from an outdoors space.
Blogging is exactly the same – when we start out, the prospect of developing a site and filling it with content can seem daunting, but, like with gardening, a few good hours of work can reap massive visible dividends in a short space of time.
They both need regular maintenance
Anyone who gardens regularly knows that it is a never-ending task. Even with the best infrastructure in place, we still need to head outside for a few hours a week to tidy up. Plants need to be pruned back, sweeping needs doing, and we need to pull up weeds and keep things clear.
Our blogs are the same – unless we pop in for a small amount of time each week we’ll end up with an overgrown space which quickly becomes unmanageable. By clearing spam, responding to comments quickly and making sure we have the best software and good content, our blogs will continue to serve us well long in to the future.
You can outsource
There are two aspects to gardening – the heavy landscaping tasks, and the smaller more manageable activities such as pruning and cutting back. Gardening and blogging both share a similar benefit – if we are faced with something too complex or technical which is difficult to achieve, we can call on an expert to do it on our behalf.
With blogs, we can maintain them to a great standard with articles, but when it comes to the more technical aspects such as graphic design, site builds or upgrades, it makes sense to outsource to people who can do things a little quicker and more effectively than we can ourselves.
From little acorns, big oak trees grow…
Planting a seed, a small shrub or a bulb may seem like a very insignificant thing, but a few months or years later our garden will be a mature, well-populated and majestic place.
Our blog is the same – plant the seeds for great customer service, online brand reinforcement and product sales now, and your blog will flourish and grow over time.
Neglect them, and they wither up and die
Sadly, people often neglect their gardens even if they put time and energy in to them at the beginning. Blogs and gardens both need a lot of ongoing love and support to flourish and thrive. Both pastimes are sometimes labour intensive, but without this regular maintenance and attention, we’ll lose both our beautiful garden, and our fabulous blog.
Did I convince you?
Please share your views in the comments below.
Nice analogy Andrew. You’re especialyy right about a neglected blog withering and dying. It’s just a shame summer is so short in the UK!
Charlotte
Yes…I wish the summer were longer!
Andrew
The best gardeners have been known to say, “The best time to pant a tree is fifty years ago. The next best time is today.” Even the smallest progress is a good step in the right direction in a garden. But also, the smallest neglect can grow exponentially until the whole garden dies.
Acting today, building and planting today, and those seeds will grow.
Delena
Delena
Exactly…totally agree.
Andrew
I never thought about connecting gardening with blogging. You’re right! I guess gardening can also relate to life. We plant the seed in our kids and we need to care for them so they can grow healthy and strong. Planting the seed in our blogs and taking the same care to make it grow. Nice topic.
Diane
…and I like you link to our kids.
I’m sure there are many more links we could find.
Andrew
Would I get away with saying:
They are also both quite nerdy hobbies!
danika
I wouldn’t say gardening is a nerdy hobby.
Andrew
From little to big is always about gardening and blogging. And both of them need lot of your work and time in the beginning, you can then loose off a little bit more.
Jane,
I think with blogging…if its your business…it will depend upon how much you want it to grow…before you ‘loose off’ a little.
Andrew
Perfect example! A gardener and a blogger does the same thing but differently. Just as a garden needs to be nurtured, a blogger too has to nurture the blog and often pull out the weeds away. Also, just as every season blooms special flowers, every now and then blogs also updates us with the latest topics. Good comparison, Andrew.
Gary
Good thought…a new type of rose… a new plugin!
A new type of weed…another way to send out spam emails!
Andrew
This is a great analogy and some great comments too. It is amazing how these life lessons come about just when we need it most.
Ana,
True! I’m sure we could connect blogging to many of our normal activities…shopping?
Andrew
I’ve used this analogy myself and they are very similar. Social media is too. I tell people to just keep planting seeds and not expect them to produce overnight, but over time you’ll reap a bountiful harvest.
Gail,
Very true. Problem is people are far too impatient…for the acorn to be a huge tree.
Andrew
Hi Andrew.
Before I started as a blogger, I used to do some gardening. My fruit trees needed a little maintenance but as you have said it has a lot of pay-off. Gardening and blogging have a lot of similarities but gardening is a lot more relaxing.
Glenn,
Weird but I find running my on-line business more relaxing. I find gardening a chore!
Andrew
Gardening is a good analogy. I also like the idea that blogging is a bit like making wine, since blogs do tend to get a lot better with age! (And that’s not just in the sense that the blogger knows more and more and therefore writes better posts. It’s also because Google seems to give you some credence just for having stuck around for a while.)
Matt,
Unless you are making Beaujolais!
Andrew
I agree with you Andrew. Why I never thought about that blogging and gardening have something in common. And in order for us to have a good garden, we need to watch over it every day to make sure that there are no insects or weeds that will ruin our plants. Same with blogging, to make sure that we can post of an ideal article, we made sure that it has an excellent quality and worth of the reader’s time. Thanks Andrew.;)
raverture
And we want our visitors to admire our hard work…whether it’s gardening or our blog!
Andrew
You are absolutely right! especially the SEO part which requires a lot of work. I usually spend three days to SEO my articles and the rest is blogging.
sanji
3 days! What for each article?
What do you do?
Andrew
Corinne,
I would prefer more sun than what we get here in the UK.
The last few days have been great though…nice and warm.
Yes…spam! It can destroy your blog. We all get it and can only do so much to reduce it.
Andrew
that is really cool post
but i am worried that my gardern is not growing as i expected 🙁 even though i am caring my blog but it is not growing
jibran
Perhaps what you are doing to your blog is not the right things!
Andrew
You definitely convinced me, you have to think about your blog like a garden. You have to keep it clean, keep it growing and make it look great 🙂
This movie is one of the top 3 movies I rate the highest in the cinematography. I also like Inception and Lord of The Rings 🙂 I know, I am geek 🙂
Never thought about outsourcing blogging. I guess that is what guest blogging is all about.