Here’s the problem: it’s EXTREMELY hard to be random nowadays. “General Interest” blogs don’t often fare well unless they have super-viral content and extremely powerful social network presences. I’m not a pro at social media. I’ve rarely had anything go viral, outside of a few miracles on StumbleUpon, which sadly no longer exists. I’ve had posts that have ranked on Google very highly (as high as #1 in fact for decently high traffic keyword phrases.) But writing for SEO became a thing of the past for me a couple of years ago. I just write what I want and try my best to title it just so it may steal a spot in Google’s Search Engine Results Pages (SERP’s).

That being said, everyone seems to be gearing up more towards niche sites. Many blogs today have very specific topics with very narrow audiences. This isn’t to say niche sites are bad; on the contrary, they can be very useful. But for people such as myself and many other fellow writers with whom I have become acquainted, sites for those of us who tend to be rather eclectic and all over the place with what we want to write about struggle in earning much of a living – again, unless you have an incredible social network and some super popular connections.

So is being random becoming a dying art? More and more, people are having to niche themselves, or worse yet, try creating so many niche sites that it becomes a hassle just to deal with them all. I think it’s far better to have everything in one place, let people come and decide what they want to read. But it’s not that simple. My first random blog failed miserably, garnering such a sad number of views per month that I’m embarrassed to even say. Even some NICHES are so over populated – baseball and inbound marketing are two I tried with EXTREMELY little success – read, none. I’d rather just write and write and write and let readers decide if they want to read it or not.

This is why I became so much more involved with blogging sites that encouraged being yourself and coming up with seemingly random topics. But, believe it or not, nothing that you write is truly random. You get to the topics you want to write about somehow, and you may discover that there are many other eclectics out there that may share a lot of common interests. I think these are the sorts of people that I want to write for, not simply aiming for a niche. I still have a couple of niche sites that I’m working quite hard on, but I feel that community around writing is far more important than simple page views.

I think it’s awesome to seem random, when in reality, you’re simply eclectic. The trick is to never give up and simply work your hardest to expand your network to gain promoters. If you’re struggling badly, that’s really all you need. Yes, it’s far easier said than done, but I’ve met quite a few people recently that are willing to prop everyone else they meet up. We have to each pay it forward with our writing.

I hope that being random – a.k.a. being eclectic – as a writer DOES NOT become a dying art. That would be very, very sad. 

~ Amelia Desertsong