How Blogging Helped my Nursing Career

[Nurse Beth]

Becoming a Nurse Blogger

I love writing, and a little over a year ago, on a whim, I started a nursing blog. Starting a blog using Wordpress could not be easier. There are tons of guides and tutorials on the web, and it's fairly intuitive.

One of the early posts on my blog nursecode.com was "Traits of an ED Nurse" with 111,285 views to date and recently

"8 Things to Say When Your Patient Dies" has gone viral on Pinterest. What I've found is that when you write from your experience and your heart, it resonates with readers. Nurses have unique, compelling stories that people love to read.

But...nurse bloggers need an audience! Without an audience, the best material goes unread. So....how do you get your material out there? The best exposure for me has been writing for Allnurses.com because of the sheer numbers. Allnurses.com gave me an audience of pretty much one million readers. Hands-down, Allnurses is the largest nursing online forum on the planet.

Just the other day, I was talking with a nurse in my hospital from the Philippines who said she was an Allnurses.com follower back in Manila who had read my articles. I felt very grateful, globally connected and... humbled.

Affiliate Programs

Blogging affords potential income. There are many ways to make money from a blog. One way is to become an affiliate with a company, such as Amazon. It works on commission. You post an image or ad that links to the affiliate's site (Amazon). If the reader clicks through and makes a purchase, Amazon is able to track that the reader came from your site. The great thing is, if a reader clicks on an ad for a stethoscope, for example, and does not purchase the stethoscope, but goes on to purchase anything at all...you still earn commission for everything purchased during that encounter.

I am not particularly aggressive about monetizing my site, but even so, over December, I earned $488.00 from Amazon in this way. It's called passive income because it's income you you make without any action on your part- I like to say while sleeping. Some bloggers do quite well, especially those who are patient and realize that it takes time to build traffic to your site.

Sponsored Posts

Sponsored posts are when a company asks you to write an article for them at an agreed upon price on your site. An example could be a staffing agency. The benefit for the staffing agency is exposure to your readers and a link back to their site. This is similar to a paid product review. Nurse bloggers can be asked to review and/or endorse compression socks, stethoscopes, nursing apps and more.

Indirect Monetary Benefits

Exposure may be the best benefit of blogging. Blogging provides a platform and Allnurses provides exposure. Exposure brings recognition and opportunity. Within a short amount of time of starting my blog, I was offered a (paying) job blogging for bsntomsn.org where I am now their official nursing site blogger. I also write for other blogs on request. My charge per article has quadrupled in the past 18 months.

I am regularly approached to do (paid) product reviews, guest blogging, endorsements, interviews, and speaking engagements at national nursing conferences.

Networking and Making Friends

I have connected with and met so many other inspiring nurses entrepreneurs. When you blog, you join a tribe of like-minded nurses.

Blogging Gives You a Voice

I did not start blogging to make money at all. In fact, I would say it should not be the primary reason or motivation. The fact that I have made a little bit of income is a nice benefit that I never expected.

I started blogging to have a voice. I believe that as nurses, we need to get our voices out there. I am passionate about working conditions, nurse-patient ratios, supporting new grads, and so much more.

My husband Bob, who used to write a business column, smiled at me when I started my new hobby and warned: "It's lots of fun, but the time will come when you run out of things to write about." That was about 200 articles ago, and I like to tease him about that. It just hasn't happened. I don't run out of ideas-I do run out of time.

Have you considered blogging? If you have, it's probably because you have a passion and talent.

What are you thinking? If your heart is beating faster in excitement, I'd say... you're a blogger! Maybe you're already blogging. I'd be happy to help you on your journey. Leave a comment or your questions.

[Nurse Beth, MSN]

Jnic82 said:

I have been thinking for quite some time now writing for allnurses but I just don't have the confidence and skills to pursue it.

Thank you for your advice.

Here's a challenge-Pick a topic you are knowledgeable/comfortable with. 

Decide your purpose. Do you want to inform, persuade, spur a call-to-action?

Then just do it- start writing ?. You can do this.

[Jnic82]

That's exactly what I have been thinking for a while now.  When I was reviewing my previous posts in my blog, the tone of the writing seemed more like a personal diary - just me venting on my blog.

But there is this one post I wrote that was more informative and that one had likes and a response. 

So I've been going back and forth about trying to change my writing into an informative or persuave style or all of the above. 

You've been a big help. I really appreciate this.

[Jnic82]

Hi, I was just speaking with my cousin who is a doctor and he was skeptical about this whole freelance nurse writing career. Him and his colleagues write medical articles on the daily basis and gets them published.

However, they are not getting paid for the articles that they have written. He also mentions that there are nurses in his workplace that also had their articles published by did not receive conpensation.

Are you able to shed some light into this? 

I know he means well and just wants me to make sure I don't make a poor career decision.

[Nurse Beth, MSN]

Jnic82 said:

Hi, I was just speaking with my cousin who is a doctor and he was skeptical about this whole freelance nurse writing career. Him and his colleagues write medical articles on the daily basis and gets them published.

However, they are not getting paid for the articles that they have written. He also mentions that there are nurses in his workplace that also had their articles published by did not receive conpensation.

Are you able to shed some light into this? 

I know he means well and just wants me to make sure I don't make a poor career decision.

Academic articles submitted to peer-review journals are not compensated and should not be.

Writing for pay as a nurse expert is not academic type writing. I have been paid by the ANA, ANPD, Lippincott and HealthStream as a subject matter expert creating content for CEs, certification exam reviews, and items (test questions). 

I also have written for blogs on nursing job board sites, mostly short (700 words) on nursing related topics.

 

[Jennifer Romans, BSN, RN]

Your article is inspiring.  I have always loved to write and have written many research and technical articles as a staff RN involved in research but my passion is in health blogging.  It can be daunting to make time for a new outlet while working but I know if will be worth the effort in the end.

[Donna S.]

Hi Beth, 

 Do you have any advice for LPNs that are interested in freelance writing?

 

 

[Uzma Ruiz]

I just started blogging on Google...thanks Beth!