Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Days When the Dog Ate My Post

The other night I happened to read a post on the IZEA/SocialSpark blog about the quality blog content required to fall in true linky love:

"Is your blog something I can be proud to talk about on my blog? Do you feature original content that invites your readers' interest? Having a personal blog is a good way to chronicle your daily life for family and friends. Your mother wants to know how the weather looks outside your window and what you're wearing to work today. Most of the rest of us don't and won't become regular visitors if that's as good as your content gets. If you want to build your readership (and get some linky lovin') you have to give your readers a bit more of yourself. How many blogs have you seen that look something like this:

Day One:

  • Three-line weather report
  • Sponsored post
  • Short paragraph about the baby being cranky
  • Sponsored post
    Roast is in the oven. Out of lettuce - no salad

Day Two:

  • Sponsored post
  • Three-line weather report
  • Sponsored post
  • Baby still cranky
  • Sponsored post
and so on, ad infinitum, ad nauseam."

I'll frequently see a fellow blogger offering up advice on how to keep Entrecarders (or other visitors) coming back for more. I think we all know when we've written a post that is going to win every Battle of the Blogs by a wide margin, and when we've written "just enough to get paid." However, I'd like to say a word or two hundred in defense of my own "dog ate my post" days.

Before I ever started blogging, I kept a handwritten journal, and I still do. Way back when, before I met Rex and had a family to keep me busy, my most intriguing "posts" often came during a time of solitude and introspection, when I had plenty of time to create a dark, well-written Roxiticus Memoir because I didn't have a date or a fun weekend with my girlfriends to distract me. These days, I find that I don't write as much or as well as I could about my day-to-day adventures because I'm too busy living them. Not that I don't think about my loyal Roxiticus Desperate Housewives readers all the time, I do… to the point where it drives Rex nuts, and London and Maddie joke that "Mommy wouldn't have forgotten to [fill in the blanks] if she wasn't always blogging!"

While thoroughly enjoying Movin' Out at NJPAC last Thursday night, I thought about all the things I wanted to say about all the memories the show brought back and how I might post some Roxy flashbacks along with related Billy Joel lyrics, but I didn't take the time to write them down. The next day, I ended up writing what I thought was a half-decent post about Adega Grill, the Newark restaurant where we had dinner that night, but I had my investment banking work to attend to until we left for the beach and I never got back to Movin' Out because Father's Day Weekend got in the way (in a good way)!

All that being said, Rex and the girls and I had an absolutely glorious Father's Day Weekend at our beach house in Bay Head, New Jersey, and I'm going to try to do it justice with a post over on my Bay Head Blog.

12 comments:

Mariuca said...

Hiya Roxy! I love ur red journal, when can we see some of ur thoughts from way back then? :)

Oh I see ur Izea widget is working fine now, maybe I'll put up my badge again after all! :)

Mariuca said...

Hi Roxy, I'm back with MPG. Just had dinner and about to do some work. Have a good day at work! :)

LadyJava said...

Hi Roxy..
Just here dropping by LJL EC.. I used to keep a journal too though I don't know what to do them now..

BTW.. another paid to blog program around. Join me??

Matthew S. Urdan said...

YES! It's coming! at 11:59 pm tonight!

Anonymous said...

You know. I have tried to write content based on different things. I don't know how great my readership is because few people post comments on the blog. I have gotten a few people that will read it from time to time and make comments.

One thing that I have noticed is that if you stop blogging for even a day or so, you will suffer. People loose interest rather quickly. I'm not even sure that I will visit your blog again.

I run though entrecard about once a month or so and see what I can find out there. This post happened to peek my interest. This doesn't mean that I will ever be back, but more than likely I will.

Anonymous said...

Hi Roxy! Hope you make my list next time! I keep a journal too, but it's not as classy as yours. The drivers behind me get annoyed when I'm driving & writing & beeping the horn as I write!

Mariuca said...

Hi Roxy, sorry I'm late, got caught up in busy traffic LOL! Anyway, 5 more votes to go, good luck! :)

LadyJava said...

Hiya Roxy.. here to vote for you ya.. GL

Jose said...

Well hello Roxy. It certainly was a pleasant surprise to find out you visited me. To answer your question, the three computers I used caught viruses at about the same time (including the one at work) and the only common denominator was BlogExpolosion, so I decided to step back.

Last Monday was my second year anniversary. And I thought I was only going to last a month or two.

In reading your post, I agree with you on what you said. I do cater to my family a lot on the blog as it is mostly family oriented but over the last two years I have picked up a few good long lasting friends.

I rather have a few good friends than lots of meaningless hits. I do hope that you come back to visit more often, as I too enjoyed meeting you over at Blog Explosion.

I just came back from a two week vacation in Mexico, we visited the place where my parents were born. I had not been there in 40 years. The trip was fantastic and very memorable and I am kindda relating it on a day by day basis. I know... boring but hey as you said in your post, it's like a diary.

Hope to hear from you soon.

Jason said...

Thanks for the vote! I'm a practitioner of tit for tat voting. I've got a couple of tats and... well, let's just say you got my vote.

As for blog writing, while I used to write several posts a day (and tried to sandwich in a few sponsored posts in between), I've gotten to the point where I'll post every few days whenever something comes to me. If it's too long in between, I try to come up with something just to keep people coming back. It always drives me crazy when I lose a battle with what I think is a really great post, though the political nature of my blog probably loses me votes automatically either from folks on the other side of the fence or folks who just hate politics.

Bugz said...

nice post, I gave you more linky love!

Wally Banners said...

Hey Doll why no host a webcam on your pc on your party this weekend. You can let your guests know that in so so corner u have a webcam on if they would like to view and talk with your readers. Not to mention your readers could see your party :)