If you’re a cybersecurity student in an area with limited internship opportunities, you may be wondering how to leverage every possible tool at your disposal to make yourself more hire-able. I’m thrilled to tell you that blogging can be an excellent solution.
If you’re a student, particularly in the field of cybersecurity, you should blog because writing and blogging have the tremendous potential to expand your creativity, in addition to polishing your writing and communication skills.
Why Cybersecurity Students Should Blog
#1. It’s An Exercise In Creativity
You should blog because it allows you to express and hone your creative skills. Cybersecurity is as much a technology and a science as it is an art so strengthening your creativity will help you in your information assurance skills as well. When blogging, you may exercise creativity when coming up with topics for new articles, or perhaps in finding some common problems and thinking of unique ways to address them. You may also exercise your creativity in creating or searching for a unique way to present the information to your readers, such as by using unique layouts, graphs, pictures, or designs.
#2. Blogging Is An Opportunity to Learn
As all instructors say, the best way to learn a topic is to teach it. Whether it’s physics, differential calculus, mathematics, or a niche hobby, teaching others is a very effective method for reinforcing the concepts in your own learning and skills repertoire.
Putting up a new post about a certain InfoSec tool or protocol with the purpose of educating others has the same impact, and will likely help you memorize the information more effectively than if you were just skimming through a textbook.
#3. Students Should Blog Because It Sharpens Communication and Writing Skills
Once you graduate and earn your CEH or Security+, any employer will know you have the technological skills required for the job. But what about everything else that goes into being an effective member of a security team?
Your ability to communicate patiently and effectively with coworkers at different expertise levels will likely require an ability to express complicated topics in layman’s terms. You will also need to be able to tie together different concepts and show how they are related and functioning together as part of a security protocol. And you can show that you have these skills through your blog.
Writing posts and filming how-to videos, after all, are the two most common types of communication that you would use on your blog in order to exchange ideas and information. If you create a respectable piece of content for your blog on a weekly or even monthly basis, you will begin to hone these communication skills and be better for it. The more you practice, the better communicator you will become.
And of course, if you choose to activate the comments section to your blog, you’ll have the added opportunity to improve communication and writing by responding to questions, comments, and feedback from other students or professionals in the field.
#4. Build Up Your Online Portfolio and Presence
Whether you’re looking for an internship or your first job, having a portfolio that highlights your skills is crucial when submitting applications. This blog will allow you to keep your resume online and easily accessible at a moment’s notice so be sure to publish class projects to leverage your hard work. Use your website and blog to its maximum capabilities to display your skills, academic performance, and experience. A contact form will allow your viewers and prospective employers to easily reach out to you.
Building up your portfolio will also help you have some control over your online presence. If you build it up well, your blog can be the first result when people Google you. Search engine optimization will help you out. Better content and SEO optimization will allow you to be discoverable in Google and other search engines.
#5. Networking
Social media is the modern trend for global networking. While blogging does not have the same exposure as LinkedIn, Facebook, or even Twitter, you can leverage the great content you are creating to network on those other social media platforms. You should always try to direct your new connections to your blog instead of your LinkedIn or Twitter profile. This will show them that you are building a brand for yourself and that you are skilled with technology beyond the cybersecurity aspect.
#6. Boosting Confidence
People who run blogs experience substantial positive changes in their lives. Most of them say that their blogs have helped them increase their confidence and become more outgoing. They report feeling less fear when speaking in public and can easily handle pressure during work.
Being able to hone your cybsersec skills and share your expertise with the world will inevitably help you feel more confident when attending a conference, for example.
#7. Easy Accessibility and Engagement
Thanks to the numerous blogging phone applications, maintaining a cybersecurity blog is now easier than ever. You can blog from anywhere whenever you are comfortable or inspired to reflect. You are no longer tied down to a desk and can write whenever the inspiration strikes.
And let’s not forget that we can take advantage of our content-rich digital age by embedding educational walk-through videos, social media feeds from prominent cybersec professionals or organizations, interactive content, and even polls and quizzes. Blogs have the potential to be more engaging and interactive for readers than ever before.
#8. Students Should Blog Because It Can Be A Source of Side Income
And of course, by starting a blog you will have numerous ways to make money online. Students should blog because they can incorporate affiliate marketing, Google Adsense advertising programs, or even launching your own freelance business. With enough content and traffic, you can utilize your blog to earn some side income each month while pursuing your cybersec program.
Starting a New Blog? – Primary Things You Should Know.
- Book a domain name for your blog and host it.
- Think about your writing niche and audience. Blog about something which you really enjoy. It should be your passion. If there is a particular branch of cybersec that calls to you, use your blog as an opportunity to explore that topic.
- Choose the Blogging Platform. You have plenty of options: WordPress, WIX, Weebly, Squarespace, Blogger, and tons of others. All have their own pros and cons, but most website owners and bloggers opt for WordPress because it’s flexible, easy to use, and SEO-friendly.
- Design the Blog. Most of the platforms will allow you to use pre-built themes. Choose one that takes into account usability, SEO, and mobile-optimization.
- Enjoy the writing and learning process and be active on social media.
- Seek professional training! There are some great online courses you can take free of charge to advance your WordPress skills to take your blog to the next level.
Education techniques are evolving and becoming more technologically driven each day. I hope this post will inspire you to incorporate blogging into your learning and job search. Everything in education, as well as business, is turning towards the Internet and blogging is a great way to sharpen your writing and thinking skills, express your opinion, and educate others. Once you start with it, soon you will realize that writing is a worthwhile skill.
