I'm involved in a group blog, Writers on the Move, and have accumulated a few tips over the past couple of years or so to help you be a better blogger. A lot of these are common sense and common courtesy.
The saying is that the group is only as strong as its weakest link and when you have many weak links, the chain is no good. So when working with a large group on one blog where you have scheduled days to post, some rules of thumb to follow would be:
1. Preschedule your posts as much as possible, if on a blog that allows preposting. What this means is basically prepare your articles in advance so that you aren't scrambling at the last minute to post something. Be professional.
2. If you preschedule your posts to go up on your posting date, make sure you "publish" your post. Also, make sure you go to the dashboard and edit posts (if you aren't already taken there when you post the blog posting) and check to see that your post says "scheduled" and not "draft" by it. If it says "draft", you just need to click on edit and open the post back and republish. It should read scheduled and show the date it is scheduled to go up. If it posts immediately, then you didn't schedule the post correctly. The fix for this is to edit the post, do a copy of the whole posting, then delete that posting from post listings and do a new post.
3. Once your post is up, it is a good idea to stop by the blog and leave the first comment or as close to the beginning as possible, and follow the comments by email. Basically, this allows you to know when new comments are up and if they need a response. Also, it is just polite to respond to folks who have commented on something you have written. This is traffic for you as well as visibility and hopefully more sales of what it is you have to offer. The readers obviously liked what you had to say and if you don't make an appearance on your own posting, it comes across as if you are blowing them off.
4. If you can't follow the comments or forgot on your original comment, you can go back in and leave another short comment and click on the "subscribe" button on the postings. If you can't follow the comments, then you should check the blog several times throughout your posting day to see what folks are saying so you can answer any questions or respond to your readers and fans. (See my comment above about blowing off readers.)
5. Use tags or labels so that the search engines help keep you seen.
Remember common courtesy goes a long way. See you all in the postings - E :)
6 comments:
Great advice!
Alissa
ripleyadoption.blogspot.com
An excellent reminder post, Elysabeth, thankyou. It can be so depressing to blog week after week without anyone commenting even if it is only to say thankyou.
Your tips should help build regular readers.
I had a bit of trouble with scheduling at the start too, not realizing I needed to press publish as well.
Alissa, thank you for stopping by and commenting.
Annie, it can be difficult at first but I think some of these apply to our own individual blogs as well and should be something we are doing for ourselves. I'm a firm believer in the "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" rule as my grandmother taught me. Kidness begets kindness.
Thanks for stopping by. E :)
Congrats to Alissa for winning my Earth Day bookworm. Please email me at eeldering@gmail.com with your mailing address so I can send this out to you. E :)
Very helpful suggestions Elysabeth. Although I schedule regularly, it's very easy to forget to press the "post" button on a scheduled blog - I've done that many times! So best to also put in a reminder in the diary to check that it has gone up.
maggie, thanks for that tip. I don't remember to jot things like scheduled postings down in my calendar or anywhere else. I just tend to check things out when I log on - emails, plurk, blogs, et cetera - lol. But I probably forget some things some days so should put reminders out to myself. Just an FYI - your bookworm was mailed Monday and it wasn't too bad to mail it - E :)
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