sATURDAY mORNING lINK lOVE - jUNE 28, 2008
Just a quick rundown this weekend as I have a date with a picnic basket and a fishing rod.
Here’s what I’m reading this weekend:
- Are You a Marathon Blogger or Sprinter at Blog Herald
- What is Social Media? Should I Participate? at Blogging Basics 101
- 5 Blogging Goals Worth Chasing After at Daily Blog Tips
- 5 Events the Blogosphere Influenced at Performancing
Have a great weekend!
Do You Need to Be a Good Writer to be a Good Blogger?
The other day Jennifer asked if one needed a college degree to blog. I didn’t get a chance to respond, but I’ll admit here and now I never graduated college. I always loved to write, however, and as an editorial and administrative assistant in a busy publishing house, I was able to learn from some of the best in the business. I thank my lucky stars for that experience as it allowed me to be a successful freelance writer and blogger.
So do you need to be a good writer to be a good blogger?
Heck yeah. How many times have you come across a poorly written blog post and walked away either wondering what the blogger was going on about, or wanting to fix his misspellings or tighten up his sentence structure?
Now I’m not saying you need an advanced degree in communications, nor am I saying you have to follow a strict journalistic format. My point is that if you’re going to be writing for others you should have a good command of the language, a way with words, and the ability to get one’s point across without digressing too much.
What I love best about blogging is its informality. I can use my own voice and talk in the manner I feel most comfortable. The last thing i want is for someone to walk away from a read feeling as if I didn’t say anything or that I’m a really poor writer. Poor writing skills detract and distract.
Yes. You do need skills. Perhaps not in the formal sense, but if you want to blog, you should know how to write first.
Hello My Name Is: Spam
About 2 weeks ago I attempt to comment back to a reader at one of my WordPress blogs. I post a decent size comment, hit enter, and I’m popped up to the top of the blog. Weird; that never happens?
I scroll down and don’t see my comment. Hmmm. I try again and nothing. I feel uneasy, but all blogs have issues from time to time, so I head over to another one of my blogs, post a comment, and the same thing happens. Now I start getting a little nervous. I go to one of my favorite blogs that I don’t write and try to leave a comment - the same thing. I seemingly can’t leave comments anywhere.
Right away I do what you should not do about a blogging issue; I panic. I note that other people seem to be able to comment, so it must be me. In fact I thought it was my computer, on which I had recently downloaded some new software. I figured I messed up my computer somehow, so I try a system restore. I know; that makes no sense since it was an internet, not an actual computer issue, but as noted I panicked and was in the middle of a bad week to begin with. Of course system restore did nothing. Next I try posting comments on Blogger and Drupal platform blogs; which by the way I can do, so now I’m totally confused.
Finally, a very nice b5media co-worker tells me that maybe Akismet is sending me to spam. Well, finally an idea that actually made sense. This is why it pays to post issues at forums where other (more clear-minded) bloggers can suggest ideas. I check my spam comments and there I am, all spammy.
I email Akismet a support ticket and in a day they fix me up. That is until yesterday. The same thing happens; I can’t leave comments on any WordPress blog in the blogosphere. Do you know how frustrating this is for someone who spends most of their time either posting to or commenting on WordPress blogs? Pretty darn frustrating. If blogging is a huge part of your world, and you’re declared spam, it’s sort of depressing.
In any case, since this happened to me, and someone else I know, I figured I’d bring it up. Maybe save you some panic. If you’ve always been able to leave comments before, and suddenly can’t, maybe you’re also part of a system glitch. In this case head to Akismet and hit their contact form. Someone at b5media has also suggested emailing tech support for not only Akismet, but your blog network as well, which is another smart move.
Has this ever happened to you; twice, in the same month?
Blogging Detour: Music Now Playing
Do you listen to music while you blog?
I actually can’t blog without my music on, so there’s always something playing. Usually on my record player, because I’m a die hard LP sort of girl, but I also recently decided to get an iPod (shocking to all my friends), so lately I have iTunes going half the time.
Because I can’t blog without music going, I get curious about what other folks are listening to. That said, I’ll say what I’ve got going on, then you tell me about your music. Right now my current records (which are strewn about the floor) include:
- Little Queen - Heart
- A few Dead albums
- Goodbuy - Cream (I know, everyone hated that album, it’s my favorite though).
- Court & Spark - Joni
On my iTunes:
I actually have my thinking mix on there right now because I’ve had a lot on my mind. I guess the songs don’t make too much sense in terms of thinking, unless you’re me, but it will show you just how woefully behind the times my music taste is.
- Cowgirls in the Sand - Neil Young
- Strawberry Fields Forever - Ben Harper
- Hyacinth House - The Doors (the acoustic version, not the sappy studio version)
- I Got S**t & Corduroy - Pearl Jam
- Heroin - Velvet Underground
- Strange Currencies - REM
- Ruby Tuesday - Stones
- Root Down - Beastie Boys
- Three Hours - Nick Drake
- Sing - Travis
- Where’d You Go - Mighty Mighty Bosstones
- Blues Music - G-Love
- Jailhouse - Sublime
- Plus some random Bob Marley acoustic stuff
The mix above is good, because it sort of intermittently relaxes and wakes me back up. I’m not over or under stimulated. If I listen to all loud music while I blog, I want to get up, leave, and go to a show. If I listen to all chill music, well, I chill way too much and won’t blog well.
Um, does anyone else give this much thought to their blogging music, or is it just me? What are you playing right now? Or do you need quiet?.
Organize Your Bookmarks for Blogging Ease
No matter which bookmarks you like to use (I use both del.icio,us and my plain old browser bookmarks), you can save some time blogging, if you set them up in an organized way.
The method that works for one person, may not work for others, but I can share what works for me. I have a bunch of blogs and each gets two bookmark folders - one for basics and one for posts.
Example using one of my blogs, Declutter It:
The first basic bookmark folder is entitled “Declutter It” and has only three links in it; the blog’s homepage, my blog log-in, and the stats page.
My bookmark Blog Posts folder is a main folder and Declutter It is a sub-folder. In that sub-folder I have post folders titled like…
- Declutter - Post Ideas
- Declutter - Product Ideas
- Declutter - Link love (I use this as I find stuff that’s cool, when it’s full, I do a link love post).
- Declutter - Blogs to add (it’s nice to add to your blogroll sometimes).
- Declutter - Visual motivation (an ongoing series I add to).
If I have any promotions, contests, or special features, I add and delete those folders to my post folder as necessary.
All my blogs have their bookmarks set up like this, but personalized to fit the blog. For example, Offbeat Homes has a much bigger folder, because there are tons of home styles, so each type has it’s own folder. This makes it quick for me if I want to blog about glass houses vs. prefab; I just find the glass house post folder and see what I have in there.
Maintaining the bookmarks:
If you like using bookmarks, they won’t do you much good if you don’t keep them updated. Once a week, I go through mine really quick and delete any links I’ve used (and won’t need again) so I don’t waste time clicking on used links all the time. Also, I go through my feeds maybe three times a week, and I add new content links.
Of course I also have a network bookmark folder with all my social network sites in it, and another set up for ads (for personal blogs). In my case, once I got my bookmarks in an easy to search, easy to use format, I was able to speed up posting time, because I’m not always wondering where that one cool link went.
How do you organize all the links you need for your blogging gigs?
Get To Know You Question of the Week: Why Do You Like Blogging Better Than Other Forms of Writing?
Holy - what do you think of that long title?!
If you’re here, I’m going to assume that blogging is your writing format of choice, which begs the question, why? There are all sorts of writing projects you could be doing. How come you like blogging better than other types of writing? What’s the one major selling point of blogging for you?
My answer:
There are a multitude of reasons that I like blogging best, but if I had to choose one major reason, it’d be the social interaction. When I went full-time freelance, I was working only 1/4 of my time as a blogger. Most of my time was spent on other various writing projects, and there was very little social interaction. I almost went back to a full-time day job; in fact I did go back part time for a while. I got some random job at a flower nursery, because I just plain missed people. Being alone in my office writing articles and copy, is not a dream come true for me, I get fidgety and miss chatter with co-workers.
Once I started taking on blogging gigs more, and other projects less, I knew I could keep freelancing full-time, because the social aspects of blogging are abundant. Read more about my ideas behind the social aspects of blogging.
Now you:
Why do you like blogging better than other forms of writing? If you like another form of writing better, feel free to let us know why.
Do You Need A College Degree to Blog?
When people ask what I do (in the offline world) and I say “Blog” the person often looks confused, but once in a while someone will say, “Did you go to school for that?” Sometimes other writers will ask this same question on forums. The answer is no. I sure didn’t go to college for blogging.
Yeah, it’d be cool if there was a blogging major, but so far as I know, there’s not. As noted previously, I may not have started blogging had I not gone to college, but in general, blogging, and most writing in general, is free from the whole college degree issue.
I’ve written everything; magazine articles, web copy, proposals, business brochures, company handbooks, resumes, blogs, and more, and not once has a client asked, “Hey, do you have a degree?”
What do you need to blog?:
Of course you’ll need to like writing, or you’ll be miserable, but that’s sort of a given. Besides the basics that you need at any job - i.e. stuff like ethics, people skills, and time management skills, I think it all boils down to two main qualities; experience and personality. By experience, I mean experience in your topic. If your experience comes from college, fine. But your experience also may come from life, an employment experience, or a challenge you faced at some point. Personality is not a total requirement, but you’ll be a better blogger if you have a unique outlook on your topic.
You may disagree, but why I read a blog, is almost always for one of the above reasons - the blogger is smart about their topic, or has a unique personality, or both. I rarely keep reading blogs by blogger that don’t meet both.
In my case, I think that college did help me a bit in terms of being a better blogger. For example, I write a pregnancy blog, and the fact that I went to school for nursing helps. I know all that fancy science gibberish, and can rattle off meds and procedures. In other ways college was a total waste of time; considering what I do now. My minor was in technical professional writing, plus I have a degree in math, but I don’t feel that either have helped my blogging career. Trust me, no client will ever ask you jack about math. I keep waiting…
Life, volunteer, and job experiences have landed me far more blogging gigs than my college experience probably ever will.
What about you? What’s landed you more blogging work - college or life? Or maybe you think bloggers should have some sort of writing degree - if so let me know in the comments.
NBT Weekend Link Love - June 21, 2008
Morning bloggers. I really want to go out and do cool things, so I’ll just get to the point. Well, not really. Has everyone been keeping up with the Associated Press thing? If you’re not up on what it is and what it means to you as a blogger, I recommend you take the time out to learn about it, because how you quote the news can come back to haunt you. I’ll include relevant links when I can.
Her’s what I’m reading this weekend:
- What is Your ideal Dream Blog Job? at Blog Herald
- How to Be More Productive at Blog Herald
- CelebBuzz Launches a New Celebrity Social Network at Bloggers Blog
- Bloggers to AP: You’re Dead to Me at BloggersBlog
- TechCrunch is boycotting the Associated Press
- How Tech Savvy Do you Have to Be to Achieve Blogging Success at Blogging Tips
- Make Blogger Comments Reader Friendly at Blogging Tips
- Bob Cox of the Media Bloggers Association talks about the Associated Press on BlogWorldExpo Radio.
- The Bloggers Glossary at Daily Blog Tips (Darnit! They beat me to the punch. I had this planned too!)
- How to Survive Writing and Publishing on the Web - Lorelle on WordPress
- Stories I Am Watching this Week at Plagiarism Today
- Raiders of the Lost Archives at Men with Pens
Have a great Saturday!
Deb
Batch Processing Your Blog
Last week all my child care help fell through, leaving me no childless work time. It sucked, because child care or not, I’ve still got a load of client blogs, some articles, and my own blogs to work on, only now, far less time to get it all done. On the up side, it made my brain start scrambling for solutions. On another up side, or maybe more the lucky side, Darren posted a very timely post that you may have seen; How Batch Processing Made Me 10 Times More Productive.
This was just the right post for me to read last week because it made me realize I go about blogging time a little backwards. What I normally do is estimate how much time I’ll need to spend on each project, or blog per week, then I divvy that time up. What I started considering after reading Darren’s post, is that maybe I should divvy time up first, and work blogs into the time frame I absolutely can afford, not the time frame I think I need.
Example: I have 6 blogs that need around 28 posts each per week, 1 blog that needs 5 posts a week, and 2 others that get around 7 posts a week. Previously, I’ve been thinking this way, “I NEED 50 hours a week of work time, and that includes posting, networking, all that jazz.” What happens when I think this way is I run out of time, and I’m working 50+ hours a week, which leaves me little free time.
Solution: For the last few days I’ve been timing my posts - how long it takes me to write them. I’ve also been logging my networking / other task time. (a simple hand timer works good for this). I realized that on a good day, when I’m in top notch shape, 28 posts take me around 4 - 5.5 hours to write, depending on the blog. That’s a mix of short and mid-length posts. If you do the math that works out to around 34 hours of writing time. If I tack on a good 8 hours of networking and other blog tasks, that’s still only 40-43 hours per week of total work time. I win some time if I use this system. Yay.
My new plan: Since I timed myself, I know what I can blog on a good day. I decided to allow time for blogs, not make time for them. I’m giving myself a set amount of time each week to post at each blog. I’ll just set a timer and work for the alloted time. If I get done great; if not, well that blog’s time is spent, and I better pick up the pace, right? Because clearly each blog can be managed in the set time frame. I think this move should save me time, and allow for more me time.
How do you divvy up blogging time? Do you allow a set amount of work time per blog or project?
If you haven’t seen it, you really should read the batch processing post linked above. It’s one of the best blogging posts I’ve read in a while.
5 Tips for Letting Go of Your Network Blogs
Blogs are so personal. They truly become a part of you. Many of us pour everything we are into our blogs. We give them personality and our voice. It’s not easy to let go and watch someone else take over our network blogs. I never had problems moving on from more traditional writing jobs or turning down one client in favor of a better gig. It’s different with blogs. I’m too territorial - these are MY blogs.
I find myself in a position where I have to let go and it’s not an easy decision. If you find yourself in the same situation, here are a few ways you can make the break easier to bear:
- Give advanced notice - Let your editor know a few weeks in advance. This will allow her to find someone to replace you, and it will also enable you to tidy up any unfinished blogging business. For example, you may have some product reviews to complete or a series you’d like to end.
- Find your own replacement - For my favorite network blog, I recommended my replacement. I’m hoping she gets the green light because we both see eye to eye on our vision for this blog and I know she’ll do it justice. I also know she’d let me come back and guest blog once in a while. Which brings me to tip number 3:
- Offer to guest blog once in a while - Even though it won’t be “your” blog anymore. You can still come back from time to time as a guest blogger.
- Remain a part of the community - Don’t make a clean break, remain part of the community. Visit and share comments. Don’t take over - it’s not YOUR blog anymore - but do visit and share your own thoughts.
- Don’t burn your bridges - I’m hoping one day I can have a network blog again. I have nothing but nice things to say about my experiences as a network blogger. I love the sense of community among the network and my editors and managers are top notch bloggers and people. Even if I didn’t want to come back one day, I’m happy to call my blogging associates “friend” and will continue to support them.
It’s tough letting go. I’m not going to gloss it over. I almost didn’t apply for a much better opportunity because I didn’t want to give up my network blogs. My decision is the best for all concerned, however and I have no regrets. It’s going to be tough to see my blogs fall into someone else’s hands, but I’m not going to be a stranger. I’m not going to be posting to these blogs, but that doesn’t mean I can’t participate.
