Being a top blogger isn’t for everyone. It’s incredibly rewarding both financially and emotionally, but you really do need to put a lot into it. What does it really take to become a top blogger?

Writing Even If You Don’t Feel Like It

Going through a break-up? Family issues? Just need a break? The truth is, if your audience is expecting a blog post every week and you miss one week for any reason, it’s going to hurt your reputation.

A top blogger is committed to writing even when they don’t necessarily want to write.

Be Willing to Reveal Yourself and Share Personal Things

The best bloggers in the world are willing to share things most people would shy away from talking about, even with their friends.

Steve Pavlina, who runs a six-figure personal development blog, detailed the emotional journey of him breaking up with his wife in intense detail on his blog.

Andrew Warner, who runs a blog where he interviews top entrepreneurs all over the world, shared both how he turned down a $170 million offer for his business and regretted it, as well as how he had just about no sex life when he was actively in business.

Topics like these, the topics people generally hide, are surprisingly what your readers may actually connect with you most on.

To be a great blogger, you need to be willing to share these things.

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Can You Take Harsh Criticism?

The downside of really revealing yourself is that it makes criticism really hard to take. When you’re really sharing yourself and being vulnerable, people’s jabs tend to hurt a lot more.

By being a public figure, at some point you’ll be attacked. It may be just one or two people, or it may even be a whole community of people who disagree with your opinions.

To be a top blogger, you need to be willing to stick to what you’re really about, even if it’s not the current popular opinion.

You Need to Love Your Topic AND Love Marketing

To be a top blogger on any given topic, you’ve got to love the topic. That’s a given. But to really be successful, you’ve got to also love marketing your blog.

In fact, during your first six months, for every hour you spend on creating content on your blog, you need to be spending another hour on marketing your blog.

Being a great blogger isn’t just about being great at writing your blog, it also means being great at getting your blog out there.

After reading through this list, do you still feel like you’re willing to do what it takes to be a top blogger? If not, that’s totally understandable. If so however, you may have a very lucrative and rewarding career ahead of you.