Life and Work with Lily Cooper

Today we’d like to introduce you to Lily Cooper.

Lily, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
I’ve been writing since I could hold a pen and so it was natural for me to eventually get a blog. I had about four other different blogs before I actually got serious and bought my own URL. I was in my freshman year of college when I started LilyxJean and then a year later I changed the name to TheRealLilyCooper to reflect my personality more. I interned for two semesters at the company Bloguettes, which really helped me jumpstart my blog and market it. As I started writing and blogging more consistently, I realized I really loved the marketing aspect of it as well and have used the knowledge I gained through Bloguettes, and events I attended to build my following and market myself.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
The best way to describe my journey is crazy. I never would have imagined myself enjoying marketing and taking photos for my blog, let alone having people actually read what I write. It has definitely been a learning process. I’ve gone through many different blog names (embarrassing ones), and went through different themes and colors.

I struggled with is what “niche” my blog was going to be. I blog about my travels, lifestyle, faith, recipes, and anything else I want to write and it didn’t seem to fit into one of the categories. I realized recently that you don’t have to have a niche to be successful. Just do what you love, and the niche will come along naturally along the way. You don’t need to label yourself and force yourself in a box.

I also realized that when writing, you do write for an audience, but you also write for yourself. So write fun articles about things that YOU want to write about. There are certain post ideas that are guaranteed to do well (such as how to get a lot of Instagram followers, how to run a successful blog, etc.), but a lot of the time they can sound robotic and repeated. When you write from the heart, your personality shows through the screen and connects you to your readers. Plus, it’s much more enjoyable to read. Your audience is there for you, not a robot.

Advice I would give to anyone starting their journey is to not stress about social media. Whether you have a huge following, or a smaller following, it doesn’t matter. As long as you do what you love and focus on the important things, you will be successful. And it doesn’t hurt to put down the phone and leave it behind sometimes. The real moments experienced first-hand and not behind a screen will be the ones you look back on the most.

Please tell us about The Real Lily Cooper.
I am a college student at Grand Canyon University studying Professional Writing and minoring in marketing and literature. I write, edit, and manage the University Blogs, write weekly for Odyssey, run my own blog, and works on other writing-related projects, so you could say writing is a huge part of my life. On my blog I mainly write personal pieces about my life whether it be a fun recipe I tried, a good book I read, somewhere I went, or a great Bible passage I found. It is a great creative outlet for me and I use it to be a positive influence on others through my faith and lifestyle.

Who have you been inspired by?
100% my mom and grandma have inspired me. I get my love of reading and writing from my grandma, and when I was little she would always buy me books to read when I visited. I have a huge collection of old Nancy Drew’s that she had saved for me. She was such a quirky and cute lady and I will always remember my tea parties and times I spent with her. My mom inspires me constantly through the way she goes about life with such an effervescent joy. She encourages me to grow with my relationship with God and has always supported me and my dreams. I look at her and want to be the same kind of person and mother she is when I get older.

Contact Info:

• Website: thereallilycooper.com
• Email: hello@thereallilycooper.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/thereallilycooper
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thereallilycooper/
• Twitter: twitter.com/lilycooper23

Image Credit:
Lily Cooper

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