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Belle Bean Dog - Being a Bad Blogger
ThetaMom - How to invest your blogging time wisely
ByWordsMusing - Not a big blogger?
ccnoffi - Blogging Pet Peeves Part 1 and Part 2
Kludgy Blogging - A whole whoppin slew of blogging must reads with a side of nougat!
If you just want some bare bone lessons, you've come to the right place.
Lessons Learned - Blogging
- Once you come up with a subject for your blog post you will quickly discover that it does take 20,000 bloggers to change a light bulb. After you hit publish you will be slammed with comments that "I just wrote a post on that topic!" Upon reading it you will feel like you sucked. BIG TIME. It's fine to continue to write on the same topic but be unique. Do something big like offer your readers a picture of a bunny with a pancake on its head for them to laugh at.
- Unless you can handle staying up until 4am with the only company being Mr. Disappointment, never ask for a few more followers so you can hit a milestone. Watching the number stay the same is not good for your esteem and trust me...you'd rather have someone who wants to be at the party to dance than someone who comes to just look at your appetizers and punch bowl and leave to never be seen again.
- So you finally hit it big and some online retail place has offered you to do a review/giveaway. They want you to use the keywords lampshades or headboards. When you do your post we all know that you are being forced to use these keywords to be in giveaway compliance. Don't patronize your reader into thinking that you have been looking for a lampshade for 6 months and it wasn't until you hooked up with this company that you found the perfect one. *eye roll*
- Word Verification and/or Auto Reply Responses on your comments. These services are extremely annoying to your readers who actually had something important to say. Plus I believe every time they are used a puppy is killed somewhere. Let the guilt lie on your shoulders alone because I don't want to kill a puppy. Take it off and save a puppy.
- Back to blog topics. You will soon discover that your best ideas come when you are driving, dozing off or you are up to your elbows in a nasty diaper. Your memory is not your friend and unless you have some way of quickly jotting it down (please wash your hands if you were the person up to your elbows) you are not going to remember it and will spend a minimum of 3 hours trying to hone in on a lost thought. If you still can't retrieve it...go read those 20,000 other blog posts on the same topic. Yup...that's what you were going to write about.
- Receiving comments. Folks this is a conversation and things go better if you look at it that way. Picture yourself listening to someone give their thoughts on a topic. You respond back with your thoughts on what they said. Then they just walk away without looking back. Hello rudeness! If someone has taken the time to actually read your blog (Praise the heavens because you have a reader!) and give their thoughts, take a few minutes to talk back to them. This does not apply if you have a commenting system that allows people to comment with no way of getting back in touch with them via email, Twitter, etc.
- Getting big. Let's face it (this is where I throw cold water on your face and slap you for good measure) unless you got something really special, you will probably not be the next best thing with a book deal. Here is the thing though...let's say you have 10 followers that are not family or real-life friends and they comment...HOLY CRUD!!! You have 10 people who actually want to listen to something you have to say. This is time for a celebration! I have 3 little girls that I gave LIFE to and feed cookies and they don't listen to anything I have to say. All you did was write and 10 random people listened??? This is amazing! Congratulate yourself!
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