The longer you blog, the more you learn.
The more you learn, the more you realize what you need to do in order to keep up.
The more you do, the more you realize that there is so much more you don’t know.
And this goes around in a vicious circle until you have blog burnout.
Follow any good blogging websites and the advice ranges from: do this, to do that, and never ever do that. Click on over to another site, and you will be told to do the exact opposite.
About the only consistent advice might be:
DO NOT USE WORD VERIFICATION.
That’s great advice.
I like blogging advice, and I like tutorials, hints, and ideas on how to do things, I like social media… but that’s just me. You might have other things that appeal to you. That’s OK, we all don’t have to be the same kind of bloggers, remember that village I wrote about a while back?
But there comes a time when we have to question if everything we are reading is important enough to us to follow through on, or should we just use our own judgement on certain things. How much free time do you have, and how much are you willing to spend blogging, and promoting your blog? And for what reason, monetary, growth, friendship? When did blogging become about learning SEO, key words, transparency and social media, and less then connecting with your community?
There are some experts out there that will tell you to make sure to hit all of the social media sites to promote your new post, Google+, twitter, Face Book, the works. I have also noticed that despite the thousands of followers they have, some of those sites have very few comments, it makes you wonder what’s up with that? Are they so busy building a empire of social media influence that they don’t have the time to interact with anyone?
They will tell you not to have two columns of sidebars, not to forget to put up your social media icons, not to use more then 3 colors in your design, and to make sure your posts are under 300 words, while others will say at least 1000 words. It can be exhausting to read, and process and I haven’t even written a blog post that day.
I personally can barely put out a project a month, much less one every day. But that’s me, there are amazingly some bloggers who can do it, and good on them. I used to blog every day, and while I agree it’s made me a better writer, and photographer, practice makes anyone better, all that blogging would improve anyone’s skills.
But I find that I need time to get out there with my camera, because as much as I love blogging, and I do love it, I love photography even more.
I will still continue to participate in my chosen areas of social media, I will still be posting on my Muddy Boot Dreams face book page, and I have a Google + page for MBD, but I will also be out there with my camera a lot more. It’s important to me to hone those skills, continue to develop my eye, and forge a new path for myself.
As I am mulling over tutorials, hints, and ideas that I come across on how to use social media, I am going to be reading about, and using only those ideas that I feel are really worth my time, and effort. Some are well worth it, but I am leaving it up to my inner blogger to decide which ones I believe in, isn’t blogging supposed to be about fun, and community, along with learning to do new things?
How many social media outlets do you regularly participate in? Does your blog have a FB page, a G+ page, are you on Pinterest. Do you follow fellow bloggers personal, and blogging social media sites?
Let’s continue the conversation in the comments, I’m curious about how many of you have expanded beyond the blog. This post was inspired by Brenda from a Cosy Little House, one of my favourite seasoned, and beloved bloggers who has written a great post at Brenda’s blog tips where she is sharing her opinion about blogging, virtual assistants, and linky parties…… click on over, it’s well worth reading.