Oct 27, 2011

Blog Dilemmas


Susan G. Haws

Recently, Wendy Jones blogged about writer’s platforms and blogs.  I often feel that the things I have to say related to blogging bear little resemblance to what I have to say with my fiction. They all reflect my beliefs, interests and opinions but do not necessarily appeal to the same audience. (I do have a neglected blog with a fictional bent but I am not sure I am ready to take it where I want it to go. Soon I hope.)

I enjoy this blog and am learning a lot by reading other posts and people's comments to my posts. I love other ANWA member blogs and blogs of other friends and favorite authors. I also just enjoy blog browsing. I have so many blogs I follow I am behind in reading posts.

I also love backgrounds and bling on blogs. I have wasted oodles of time looking for blog decorations only to squander more time trying and failing to install it on my blog. A few weeks ago I decided to visit my much neglected blog and play with the settings. Poof.  I made the pretty background disappear. So now I will have to get help to get it back. I have never figured out the intricacies of making the background changes at holidays and listing sites of interest etc. (I sooo like blogs decorated for the holidays and with lots of links and doodads.)

Thus my blog efforts devoured any writing time. The blog was supposed to be a side, supportive effort to my main objective of becoming a productive fictional author.  My dilemma is:  how to construct a blog that is constructive rather than destructive to my writing goals.  

Many months maybe even a year or more ago I thought maybe I might want to have a blog about care giving of elderly parents or losing weight and getting fit so I created related blog names. (Mostly, I suspect I was just having fun choosing names and seeing  if they were available.) But I felt the topics were too personal to blog about regularly, and they were not related to my fictional audience.

I have recently thought that perhaps a blog does not have to appeal to the same audience as the fictional writing. Maybe there would be some overlap, but as I have genre hopping interests anyway, why not.

Another thought I had was: how can I make one of my weaknesses a strength? Help myself and give support to others with similar struggles?  Again, care giving and weight management came to mind.

I would love input on my plans. Help me avoid previous blogging mistakes and frustrations. I plan to make a self improvement theme blog with a 90 percent focus on the struggle of getting rid of excess fat and becoming fit. Eventually I would like to include  interviews or guest posts. I would post on Sundays so that it is predictable. I am not sure of frequency, thinking of once a week, or bimonthly.  Then other topics of interest to me such as favorite books, pet antics, and care giving would be relegated to my original blog on a first Sunday of the month basis.

Do you think that blog and fiction should be closely tied? Do you think a weight loss journey would have appeal as a blog? Do you think posting frequency is appropriate?
Feel free to offer tips, especially if you know how to get my blog background back. Thanks. 

5 comments:

  1. This is just a P.S. for anyone that is giving input. Maybe I should just use the blog I have and state its new focus and blog type schedule? Thanks for any suggestions.

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  2. I am new to figuring out the blog thing too. I finally buckled down and have been trying to just get things written on my blog. Some say that you should have a different blog for different topics. However, a number of people I know have just one blog, just one FB page, etc. I know I can barely keep track of one my blog plus the every two weeks ANWA post here.

    I've been fighting with the settings and backgrounds for my blog too...sigh. Guess I better bribe one of my kids to help me.
    good luck!
    hugs~

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  3. I follow other people's blogs so I'm no help to you. I can't even keep up with twitter much less a personal blog.

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  4. Sorry I'm so late in responding. It's been a crazy few weeks.

    I have a few blogs, but I've found I'm much better at posting to just one blog. I think that's the best way to go, especially in the beginning. If you are able to post consistently on both topics for six months or so, then consider peeling away and making another blog. I don't think it would be terribly hard to copy and paste it, and this way you don't lose any audience you already have.

    Of course, I'm the one who was having such a blog identity crisis in the first place, so maybe I don't have the best advice!

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