Interview: Blogging With Adii - Freelancer & Strategist
Thursday, August 30th, 2007 at 8:00 am
Adriaan “Adii” Pienaar calls himself a “freelancer and strategist”, but more importantly, he is a keen blogger. His gutsy and transparent approach to blogging delivers quality content and a surprising amount of exclusive interviews. I for one, would like to take a leaf from Adii’s blog, so I asked him ten questions to find out what makes him tick…
First things first, what is your beverage of choice when blogging?
Haha - quite a funny question to start with. I’m all for chill vibes and my beverage of choice has got to be good red wine (a spicy Shiraz or proper Bordeaux blend in particular). Apparently two glasses of red wine is good for my health as well! :)
How long have you been blogging?
“Officially” I launched the blog in the last week of January (2007), but it was really crappy then and I didn’t really intend for it to become a central cog in my freelancing business. I only really started blogging properly at the beginning of March and my blog only took off when I redesigned my in June (My Polaroid Redesign).
So it’s been quite a journey thus far - trying to figure out what works and what will expand my audience. But it’s been a fun journey thus far and it’s been all about growing as a blogger and trying different things.,
Adii, looks like you are a very busy guy. Besides freelancing and studying, you recently got engaged (congratulations!), so how does blogging fit into your life - do you schedule time to blog?
Thanks for the congrats! :) I must say that since the engagement my life has been on a whole different level - it’s been truly amazing and super-exciting!
But yes, I have quite a hectic life between spending time with my fiance, doing my best at my studies and also freelancing. I’ve found that it works to write the longer articles over the weekend and schedule them for the week ahead. This means that I make sure that I have new content on a daily basis (during weekdays) and it allows me to add shorter, reactive-type posts during the week, which aren’t so time-intensive. When a weekend however gets a bit hectic, I normally just blog when the inspiration hits me.
What has contributed positively to the growth of your blog?
most of my new clients reach me through my blog I think there’s been a few things that has contributed to the growth of my blog, but I’ll probably narrow it down to three: perseverance, freelancing and networking.
With a new blog, it’s always tempting just to quit during the first month, because no one is reading your blog and even less people are commenting on your blog posts (which begs me to pose the question - “if a blogger blogs and nobody reads it, does the blog really exist?”). What I’ve done however is to pretend that I’m a top blogger and that everyone reads my blog - this mindset allows me to produce quality and interesting content irrespective of the amount of readers. It’s all about persevering when the going is tough and then reaping the benefits when the hard work starts paying dividends.
Second contributing factor is most definitely my freelance work. With the amount of work I’ve been doing, I get my name and tagline - “Adii - Freelancer & Strategist” - out there in the online space, which will obviously have a positive effect on traffic to my blog.
And the last factor that I would mention, is definitely my Mini Interviews. I’ve done some amazing interviews with famous online personalities - Matt Mullenweg, Lorelle VanFossen, Chris Garrett, Jonathan Snook etc. - and I’ve managed to get some great linkbacks from their site. The value that I’ve added to my blog is two-fold - the linkbacks means traffic and interviews with these well-known people definitely produces some quality reading.
What problems have you experienced in blogging?
I think my biggest problems are coming up with new content (the inspiration is seriously lacking at times) and also deciding which niche topics I should cover. As you will see, I cover a wide variety of topics to allow for optimal inspiration for new content, but this also means that some of the posts are too general at times and not suited to my audience.
In your opinion, what role does blogging play as a communication tool?
Blogging is definitely the best online communication tool - but not for personal purposes though. I’ve found that my blog is a bigger source of new client leads, compared to my existing design portfolio. Potential clients like to do business with someone that they feel they know and a blog creates the opportunity for readers to get to know the person behind behind the blogger. So by blogging, I definitely feel that professionals will add value to their business operations - be it in advertising revenue or in terms of new business leads.
How does blogging (directly or indirectly) benefit you?
As I mentioned above, most of my new clients reach me through my blog (I actually think it’s about 90% of my new leads now!). So that’s a direct benefit from blogging. An indirect benefit would definitely be the enjoyment and excitement of building a reputation online and seeing the blog grow - isn’t it everyone’s dream to be famous!? :)
Please recommend 5 good websites or blogs
These are some of the blogs in my feed reader at the moment…
- WPDesigner.com - nobody has played around with Wordpress more than Small Potato…
- Web Designer Wall - awesome design inspiration!
- Smashing Magazine - this is a great blog with some awesome Top 10 / 20 / 83 lists about cool designs, Web 2.0 applications etc.
- FreelanceSwitch - freelancing advice has never been this close and this helpful!
- Mark Forrester - another Cape Town boytjie (although he’s in the UK now) who is simply an outstanding web designer.
In 20 words or less, please share your very best idea for better blogging
Observe. Experiment. Anticipate. Evolve.
Finally, any last words?
It’s been fun being interviewed for once, after I’ve done 40-odd interviews on my blog. Thanks for the opportunity Imar and keep up the good work with Blogsolid. It’s great to see this type of quality coming out of South Africa!
Adii Says:
August 30th, 2007 at 9:02 am
Shot for the interview Imar! :) It’s great to come here and actually read an interview that I did, instead of interviews I did with other bloggers / designers.
Keep up the good work!
Memo Says:
August 30th, 2007 at 5:08 pm
Great blog! I’ve subscribed to your feed. :)
The link to Smashing Magazine seems broken?
Jan Says:
September 3rd, 2007 at 2:58 pm
Uau. It’s funny to read Adii’s interview because he’s normally the one who interviews. :) Great interview.