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Adam Hendle<br />
My name is Adam Hendle and I have been running the independent clothing<br />
blog iamthetrend.com for almost two years now as well as just launching my<br />
second site shirtlaunch.com. When I started IATT, I was completely new to the<br />
blogging world and pretty much a novice in the indie clothing world. Before going<br />
much further I have to admit that I was pretty naïve when starting it.<br />
If you go by-the-book, I pretty much did everything wrong when starting a website.<br />
I didn’t do my homework to see who my competition was or really do any<br />
research about blogging and capturing market. The funny thing is looking back<br />
on that lack of knowledge and research. I view it as a blessing.<br />
“Instead of putting my toe in the water first to test it out,<br />
I took one big running cannon ball into the pool.”<br />
By the Seat of My Pants<br />
—Adam Hendle, Iamthetrend.com<br />
I learned everything on fly from how to publish blog posts, to how to contact<br />
clothing labels, artists, bands, etc. The biggest thing I learned from all of that<br />
was you just have to go for it. Unfortunately there is no magic switch that you<br />
can just turn on when your website or blog goes live that just drives tons of<br />
traffic through your door you have to put in the effort and hours to gain respect,<br />
recognition and a following. If you want to be successful you have to throw your<br />
inhibitions aside and keep your eyes on the prize.<br />
As I mentioned earlier I think the <strong>not</strong> knowing how much competition was out<br />
there for me was a good thing. I didn’t worry about what others were doing, I<br />
just did my own deal and I really believe this kept my site unique. The moment<br />
you start peaking at your neighbor’s work is when you start losing your identity.<br />
Already almost two years deep into running IATT, I still have a ton to learn, and<br />
to me that is one of the most exciting parts. As an artist, musician, blogger, etc.,<br />
You have to embrace the unknown and try and learn something every day.<br />
THREAD’S NOT DEAD • Jeff Finley<br />
My Breakthrough Moment<br />
I think my breakthrough moment occurred about a year into running IATT. It was<br />
at that point that clothing labels, artists and bands really started coming to me<br />
asking to write about them. Site traffic also really started to pickup around this<br />
time allowing me to land some advertisers that help me keep the site running.<br />
Offer Something Slightly Unique<br />
My best strategy for standing out has just been to try and offer something<br />
slightly unique. In a world where basically everything has been done twice it’s<br />
hard to create something that is completely unique, but by allowing yourself to<br />
show through in your art, music, or writing, your work becomes more unique.<br />
My goal has always been to give a face to Iamthetrend.com, when people read<br />
my site the last thing I want is for it to seem like this lifeless machine that just<br />
posts black and white articles. By keeping the writing on my site fun, relaxed,<br />
and approachable I really feel that my readers come to the site for information<br />
delivered to them by a friend as opposed to a lecture.<br />
Case Studies & Interviews 102
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