It seems that I’m constantly in a state of retooling my writing career, moving from one area to the next a bit like construction projects at a university campus. And every time that I start to retool something else, the blog gets neglected.
Well, it’s time to retool the blog.
A couple of months ago, I tried blogging every day to see how that would work out. Long story short: it didn’t. I found that I either need to focus a ton of energy on the blog, to build a consistent readership, monetize it efficiently, and turn it into its own thing, or else I need to downsize it into something that won’t drain too much energy or resources from all the other things that I’m doing.
I don’t want to get rid of it entirely. I’ve been blogging since 2007, and while I haven’t been consistent about it all through that time, I’m invested enough in it that I don’t want to take it down. The nice thing about blogs, though, is that they wait for you. They’re kind of like hobbies, in that regard.
That makes sense, though, because up to this point I’ve treated this blog as more of a hobby than an actual job. And I’ve never fully integrated the blog itself into my writing/publishing workflow, which is why I’m struggling to justify it now.
When I started the blog in 2007, it was mainly a vehicle to keep in touch with my writing friends (who all had their own blogs too) and encourage each other. Then, when I started publishing, it turned into a platform-building tool—a way to brand myself as an author. But it was never much good for promoting my books.
Later, as my politics began to change, I made the mistake of bringing those politics onto this blog. Then social media began to become really toxic for me, and I decided to pull back. I deleted my Facebook and Twitter, and consciously pared back what I posted to this blog. But politics was what I was interested at the time, so paring that back to avoid damaging my author brand meant that I neglected the blog even more.
In the last two years, I’ve focused a lot more on my email newsletter. At first, it was just a way to notify my readers of new releases. Then, I started doing free and 99¢ sales regularly, and it turned into a way to alert my readers of those. Now, it’s a full-on newsletter, complete with a featured book, a writing update, an author’s note with some personal thoughts and reflections, links to any group promotions I have books in, and a parting quote.
So what’s the point of sharing writing updates and personal reflections here, on the blog, when I’m already doing it on my newsletter? I suppose the blog has two advantages:
- It’s a public-facing, searchable platform.
- It allows for comments and discussion.
I was talking about this with Mrs. Vasicek today, and she asked if there was any reason why I couldn’t repost the content from my newsletter onto the blog as well. There doesn’t seem to be any harm in it. I don’t think my readers are signing up for exclusive content so much as to keep in touch with my books and my writing. Besides, some readers just don’t do email lists.
Other than that, I’m not sure what I’ll use this blog for. I need to put some thought into it. But if I’m going to downsize it, I need to turn it into a side feature of my online platform, not the main vehicle for that platform itself. That means I need to restructure this site, turning into an author site with a blog on the side, rather than a blog with some book pages on the side.
I’m not going away, though. I’m just retooling. The newsletter will be my main vehicle for sharing updates from now on, though I may do a long-form blog post from time to time. I may also experiment with blogging some of my books, or doing a blog series with the aim of turning it into a book later. If there’s anything else you think might work well, be sure to let me know.
Glad to see you back at it, I’ve missed your regular content!