Every time I am asked by other Filipinos on what I do on my wee hours after school and I answer them that I “Blog”, I sometimes get a reaction that is bordered on utter disbelief or with a slight hint of disapproval. These are the people who are oblivious to the current online trend or to people who seem to dislike the whole blogging concept.

I made a little research and found out that the reason for this is that there are a lot of misconceptions that Filipinos have on the blogosphere. This thinking hinders them to see the usefulness and power of blogging.

I have listed some of the misconceptions that I have gathered through a mini-survey among my non-blogging friends and colleagues. Hopefully, this article would help clear out the wrong beliefs and it may even convince others to hop in on the wagon.

Blogs are only online diaries
This is a common misconception among those non-bloggers. Although blogging did began from online diaries in the early 90s, over the past few years it slowly evolved into something of its own kind. Today, there are actually a lot of blogs that are focused on many different topics such as news, technology, consumer products, and almost any subject a blogger can tackle.

Blogs are unprofessional
Some say that blogging is not suited for having a professional web presence especially for companies. However, there are already some companies that are trying out blogging for their business. This new marketing strategy is one out of the many new ways for companies to get in touch with prospective customers. There are also some certain individuals who make use of blogs as a way to promote their profession and themselves like webmasters, graphic artists, online marketers, and the like.

Blogs are just a waste of time
Many say that blogging is just a waste of time. You pour every ounce of your strength into building your blog and the results aren’t as big as you’d expect it to be. Although this may be true in some cases, blogs doesn’t necessarily go to waste as long as you know what you are doing (i.e. proper blogging techniques, blog marketing/promotion, community building, etc.) Blogs also offers different benefits like communities, improvement of writing skills, and even earning money.

Blogs requires good writing skills
This is one the main reasons why many people are afraid to engage into blogging. Having good writing skills is indeed essential yet it is not really a requirement to starting a blog. One doesn’t need to be articulate in writing as long as you can express feelings and ideas through written form effectively. There will come a time that your writing skills will improve as your blog progresses.

Do you have any other misconceptions about blogging before you started? Do you have anything more to add? Share your thoughts by leaving a comment below.