SocialButterfly

5 Points I Learned About Blogging (while not blogging)

Sunday, May 18th, 2008 | Blog Talk, SocialButterfly | 2 Comments

Hello again friends, and I thank you for your patience as I took a much needed California vacation and attended my graduate school graduation from the Missouri School of Journalism. And, after all my hard work, especially the past couple of months, I had a moment where it all was captured in tears of joy….as I walked across the stage. Yes, I was that girl. haha

In the past week and a half I learned some things about blogging…while actually not blogging. For better and for worse, they are:

1. The Big Duh. If you are not daily checking in on the blogosphere and your online community, your growth and readership will be stunted. (duh right?) =) But, I realized this would happen, and am completely content with it, as I know I fully plan to continue blogging and developing this further in the future. But for the time being, I just needed a break.
2. Connect. Connecting with those you care about in real life, is just as important, and more important (sorry friends) than connecting with those online. While in Cali, I remembered more of the joys of living away from a computer, a phone, email, etc…and made a mental note to keep my online social life in check. On the other side, I thought of many a time to Twitter, especially for site/restaurant recommendations!
3. Don’t be bashful. Tell your family and friends about your blog…they too are interested. And this alone can spark and spread word of mouth, and provide instant feedback.
4. You will miss it and feel out of the loop when you return. Beth Dunn discusses this feeling in-depth when she took a hiatus from blogging for the first time in 5 years this past March.
5. Your body can only take so much. After going off of maybe 4-5 hours of sleep a night the past five months, conducting research, writing a thesis, traveling on vacation, moving to Washington D.C., commuting up to 3 hours a day, doing event marketing off-site for our MS Quest non-profit and other freelance work…I woke up the day after graduation with a sore throat, no voice, and $15 worth of cough drops and cold medicine. Love your readers, but remember to love yourself too.

Look forward to continuing the social marketing and social media conversation…as I’m back!

You all know what I have been up to lately…feel free to fill me in on what you’ve been up to in the comments or through email at socialbutterfly4change@gmail.com.

Photo Credit: bettisue (Flickr)

Tags: blogging, education, hiatus, learned, Missouri Journalism, missouri school of journalism, not blogging, traffic, twitter, vacation