I am back at it again with my blog “Spring Cleaning”(I like the name Mariana chose for this challenge that’s based on Problogger’s 31 Days to Build a Better Blog.) Today’s assignment is to email a blog reader. That is easy enough. I have started to do something similar in that I visit the blogs of those who leave me comments and read and leave comments on theirs as well. I have said before that comments mean so much to a blogger(especially a fairly new one like me). There is almost nothing more disappointing than to go to your blog and see that number “0” in the comment section. But it goes both ways. If you would like people to leave comments on your blog, you have to do the same. I can think of at least one person who I have left a few comments for and she has yet to leave me any. Although I don’t do it for what I want in return, this is kind of common courtesy, especially considering she is about as new as me. I don’t dwell on it, though. Sadly, I have just stopped leaving comments. That may sound childish, but there are so many other bloggers that leave me comments or others who would appreciate my comments and my time.
Enough about the fact that I have resolved to visit and leave more comments on other blogs. This challenge is about emailing a reader. This can be tricky for me because as I think I mentioned in my last post for the challenge, I really want to change my comment format because mine isn’t so interactive. It takes more of an effort to track down someone’s email. Some people do link to their own blogs, though, and that is helpful! If you really want to show appreciation to someone for their time, you will figure out how to contact them.(unless they leave an anonymous comment).
The beauty of this, which Problogger goes into more detail about is the fact that when you engage with your readers they will spread the word about you. They may be just one person to you, but you have no idea what the size of their network is, or the size of someone else’s network within that network, and so on.
So, be ready…..I am going to hunt you down find a couple of you to send an email in appreciation of your time spent on my blog!
The next part of this assignment is to take a half an hour to go through your email inbox. I’ll be honest, I am just recently starting to get to the point of having an inbox that I really have to organize. Many times I click on an email, give it a quick read, and say I will get back to it. In the meantime, it moves further down the page and I forget about it. I am going to start dealing with emails only once! When they come in, if I open them, I will either delete them immediately, respond right away, or put them into a folder. Hopefully, this will bring better organization and help me to focus more and be more productive.
I am having so much fun with this devotion to creating a better blog for myself and for the millions few readers that I have.
Thanks again Mariana for starting the spring cleaning challenge!
Leaving meaningful comments on blogs is great … we all love to be "noticed". I also really like the idea of emailing people … it seems to further show people that we are interested in them and not just going for "blog visibility". 🙂
Organizing the inbox is another great piece of advice. At one point I got so overwhelmed with email so I added folders and started sorting things out. Now I can better respond to people.
I love this 31 days to BABB ~ such great information! Thank you for sharing it with us! 🙂
Small Footprints
I love the idea of Spring Cleaning your blog – I just wrote a post about that on Blissfully Domestic – but think it is so fun you are going so far beyond.
Like everyone else, I love comments, and I TRY to visit the blogs of commenters – and I often reply within my comments (and I believe they go to the commenter 🙂 but like you mentioned the format isn't the most user-friendly format.
As for my inblox? *shudder* It is on my to-do list daily to respond and clean out – it is lower than it has been in months, but still….
At least I'm trying, right? 🙂
Thanks so much!! This has been a really fun and eye opening challenge. I am so glad that others are taking away something from it, too!
Dude, there is no way i could email blog readers all the time. I might as well pack it up and get divorced. Im so happy my visitors dont make me bend over for them to visit. I put out stupid dance videos..they forgive me for sucking at commenting back. ROFL
trisha
I have also stopped commenting on some blogs because they never seem to reciprocate. I don't think it's childish at all. I mean, just think about it in a "real life" sort of way – imagine if you tried to strike up a conversation with a mom at the bus stop every morning for a week, and then you see her at the grocery store and she just walks right by you without even saying hi. Okay, maybe that's not the right analogy, but you get it. It's disrespectful. Sometimes bloggers don't have their priorities straight. I may not respond to a comment right away, but it sits their in my inbox until I have time to do so.
Hope you got your email issue taken care of!
Oh, Trisha, you are too funny….I appreciate your visiting, at the very least! Thank you for that.
Mariana,
I completely get what you mean. I have made the comparison on Twitter, too. Ignoring someone like that when face-to-face would be so rude. Plus, I would just rather focus on the positives….like you and this awesome challenge. 🙂