(stop before you are done)

Some people despise the blogging about blogging meme which is understandable since there have been countless posts written on the subject. Since writers should be perilously aware of metal showing on the tires of any topic consider this fair warning to readers not interested in this subject to bail now. You’ll only have endured 50 more words.

A hopefully worthwhile and less worn perspective I can bring to this meme is the viewpoint of a writer who uses blogs as a tool of the trade. I was writing and publishing on the web before there were blogs in a diary format and good health withstanding I’m relatively certain I’ll be writing on the web after blogs lose their luster (and will be called something else). My ultimate goal through the use of this particular blog has been to improve my skills as a writer, communicator and sometimes (like during 6/6/6) an entertainer. I’d like the content here to be the best it can possibly be and of interest to as many interested readers as possible.

Hindsight 20/30
The cliche “hindsight is 20/20″ applies to almost everything in business and life, but I believe that’s not as ideal when applied to writing projects. For example, if one did change everything to what they believed would have been the perfect world scenario after learning from all their mistakes, would they have gone down totally different content paths?

Yes, I think so.

Unless your blog is purely audio, video or images we are dealing with words and the presentation of them on the page defines your voice. If your style is linking out more than linking in and something you read/learn indicates linking more within is better and you changed then how many others you linked out to would never have discovered your blog?

I believe if you change too much, alter too many different things with the words then you risk changing your soul and voice presented. Subtle changes are certainly possible and can in some cases greatly improve the quality and those are what I’m going to focus on in this piece. Things that if you changed them they wouldn’t necessarily violate the soul of your blog. It’s very important when revising and editing material that you don’t edit your blossoming voice.

You are working to establish your own voice, right?

Earlier this month, this blog passed the three year anniversary mark and currently has over 3,500 published posts, one million plus words and thousands of comments. Along the way it has garnered some attention and accolades, mostly within the last year and not the first two. I continue to wonder how many bloggers quit before their first two years of regular blogging are logged? It is for these folks primarily that I’ve prepared this post and secondarily because Darren is holding a group writing project on the subject that I feel I can add something worthwhile to the group.

Here is a list of what I would do differently with this blog if I could start over. And to follow this list, I’ll list some things I would absolutely do the same. Things that I’m proud of with this blog and believe have helped grow the interest, drive by readership and number of subscribers over time.

Wish I would have …

1. Used a different blog backend system. I wasted valuable time trying to support a lesser known, newer blog system and ultimately when the pain of staying was greater than the pain of leaving, I had to consider the impact of the existing content reorganized. There were no importer scripts available when I made the change to Wordpress and I needed to write my own from scratch. While I was able to redirect most of the old links successfully, if I had started with the blog system and format being used now, then I wouldn’t have had any old links broken. Changing blog systems is a disruptive process for not only the content organization but also the search engines which means it makes it harder for people to find what you’ve written, including yourself when you wish to reference or expand upon an earlier piece.
2. started with reBlog as primary RSS Reader. I’m not sure if reBlog was available back in 2003 when this blog was created, but reBlog has become the best RSS reading experience for bloggers that I’ve tried to date. And I’ve tried at least a dozen different systems including web-based, desktop and readers that integrate with mail programs. I’m able to pour through the maximum amount of RSS content in a very short amount of time using reBlog. On a busy news/RSS day, literally thousands of posts roll through my aggregator. My earlier RSS reading wasn’t nearly as efficient or organized and wasted time that could have been spent relaxing, doing other work and/or creating more posts. Get a system going with reading that maximizes your time.
3. never used the default category. I still need to properly categorize over 800 posts that have the totally useless ‘default’ category definition. What is ‘default’ or ‘uncategorized’ anyway? What does this mean to readers? Argh. Throw readers a bone, give them a thoughtful, relevant category so they know at least some of what to expect and where to find more if they like the post
4. added a humor category sooner. Sardonic wit can be a real killer for some readers and it’s difficult sometimes to know when somebody is serious and when they are kidding. To help readers out, I added a humor category and use for any post that I’m not entirely serious about. Wish I would have done that sooner so they knew when not to take some posts written too seriously. I think it is very important that writing has a lighter side. People like to laugh, so give them some humor at least once in awhile to break up a run of serious posts.
5. not done single link posts. While the overall number of these posts remains very small, in retrospect they weren’t very helpful to readers. I may go back and flesh out some of these posts with updates that add more dimension to them. There is a place for linkblogs, but I would recommend being very careful blending linkblogs into regular content.
6. started with a professionally designed template. This is something we did do later, but I wish we’d have done it sooner. Even if we had created our own custom logo/brand that would have been cool, but for the first year or so we had a really lousy design, although the layout was basically the same. The reason a design is so important is to help separate from the many, many other blogs out there. A design will capture initial attention and from there the writing and content better do the talking. A subpar or ‘me too’ design will have less chance of getting readers interested in the content. I still believe the vast majority of readers come to the website even though RSS has become so popular. I skim/scan/read 1,000+ posts every day and I still prefer to read the best of those posts at the website.

Things I’m glad we did, and would do again if could start over …

1. used full text RSS feeds from the beginning. If your content is good enough they’ll click over and at least leave a comment once in awhile. If they have their own blog they might write about something you’ve written and link to you. Don’t be so afraid that readers won’t help you in other ways than simply clicking on and buying from ads.
2. kept advertising to a minimum. Too many blogs start out with too much advertising and not enough quality content. You can always add advertising later, but it’s harder to get readers interested in — and other bloggers to link to — your blog if their first visit was a negative spam/splog-like experience.
3. kept comments open on older posts without requiring registration. Yes, this does invite more comment spam which is the major reason many bloggers don’t do this, but it also invites feedback from people in the know months and years later including useful updates on information. Sooner or later people from companies/sites/services you write about will realize you’ve written something about them and might want to start a conversation. Why silence their voice at your blog and make them do it elsewhere? Yeah, you might not get as many external links, but you will starve readers of hearing both sides of the story. Some good discussions have occured at this blog many months after the original posts and I’ve learned from this discussion. Also people bookmark the older posts and come back and remind me when something has changed which helps keep the information updated. Archives can be dynamic if you want them to be. Social website updating.
4. created a system for readers to be able to subscribe by any keyword(s) combination. This is a useful feature that every blog that covers a lot of different topics should have. I would subscribe to some types of posts from many blogs out there if this option was given, but most bloggers don’t give readers this option and force an all or nothing experience.
5. not published everything here. We still don’t, in fact. There are currently over 100 posts that were left in draft mode for the unpublished and probably another 5% of all posts created for this blog haven’t been published here. Not every post you write — even if it’s interesting and really well written — will fit your blog. That’s a good lesson. Learn to recognize this early and keep some percentage of posts in draft status. You can always publish it somewhere else or use later if a more appropriate place/time developes.
6. maintained realistic, attainable word count goals. This is one area I will expand on in much greater detail another day, but in general I believe the single most important skill writers need to work on is their activity. The world is full of would-be writers who spent their time dreaming instead of doing. Having word count goals — even if these goals produce substandard, largely unpublishable content — remain a tremendously helpful and important regular exercise. Even if the daily, weekly monthly, quarterly, yearly goals aren’t met and the goals have to be adjusted downward, it’s good to have and review word count goals periodically. It can also boost confidence and increase first draft writing quality which ultimately will lead to better post content over time.

While I could continue the list, there’s one important tip I’ll leave that started this post: stop before you are done.

Leave something for tomorrow, and the next day. And the next. Stop in the middle of a sentence or idea. Posts can always be picked up and improved upon later before publishing. And once you’ve published you can come back in updates or addendum posts to further flesh out earlier thoughts. I believe writer’s block is a curse with a simple cure: stop early.

If you always leave something unfinished from the last writing session, then you’ll always have at least one idea to start the next day. And the next. If you always publish all your thoughts and the cache is purged, then you’ll have to start anew with the dreaded blank page. Some days, especially when the weather is sweltering and there doesn’t seem to be a lot of interesting things happening, that can be harder than others to fill that blankness with something.

Try to look more forward than back
It’s too easy to criticize yourself for what did or didn’t happen yesterday, last week, last month and last year. Focus instead on what you can do over the next week, month, quarter and year(s). You’ll find that working toward something is easier than beating yourself up over what could have or should have been.

My long term goal for this blog is to reach two million worlds on/before July 4, 2009. I have other short and long term goals, but that’s my primary word goal for this blog. You can subscribe and cheer or jeer me on in a number of ways: either by keyword, category or the whole Hmm. I’m already excited by how much more challenging the second million feels than the first …

(stop before you are done)

Looking forward, what are your long term goals for your blog? Are they realistic, attainable? Are they too easy? Too hard? Do you even have any goals?

Did this post make you go hmm?

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