Wisdom from the 31 Day Blogging Project

[Christine Martell]

I see another group is starting the challenge. It was a great experience for me, so I really want to encourage all of you to stick with it and share what you are learning. Reading others reflections was one of the biggest benefits and really deepened my learning. Sue Waters wrote a post encouraging those of us who did it earlier to post some reflections for you.

So here is a start. I want to write more later, but here are some of the posts I wrote at the time:



31 Days to a Better Blog- Days 1-4
31 Days Blogging Challenge- Days 2, 5 & 6
31 day blogging challenge: Days 7 - 10

31 days blogging challenge: Days 11- 14
31 Day Blogging Challenge Day 15-20
Learning about blogging on my bike
Catching up with the 31day challenge

Anyone else have wisdom for the new crew?

[Kate Olson]

Thanks much Michele! I'm really excited about this, I just wish it were my full-time job :-) Sometimes it's tough squeezing it in with everything else I have to do.........the reflection time is invaluable, though, so I'm dedicated to it.

[Michele Martin]

Hi Kate--I completely understand about the time crunch--we all struggle with it. But it IS so worth it. And after the 31 Days, I think you'll be even more into it! :-)

[Christine Martell]

Yes, you do want to direct us to your blogs. How about this....start a new discussion here in the forums with a title like---Reflections from 31days. When you write posts on your blogs, you can leave links there. Similar to what I have done above.

Some of this is dependent on your niche. Sue and Michele write about blogs and new media tools, so it worked really well for them. I write about images, so I was concerned about how many sort of 'off topic' posts I was writing. I would have found it helpful to do some of the more technical blog posts here on the betterblog blog.

[Kate Olson]

Thanks for the advice! I don't like to do too many posts just about MY blog, so I've been adding notes at the bottom of posts. I'll definitely be using this forum for my more technical questions/reflections.

[Sue Waters]

Hi Kate

How I looked at it was I combined my write up of several tasks into one post e.g. would put 7 days into one post. This was important because both my readers and other participants would read and provide extra tips - e.g. My comment that I struggle with managing comments on other people's post lead Cammy Bean to tell me that she does it using co-mment (this for me made a big impact on being able to interact with other people's posts).

Between these posts I would then write posts providing information of what I learnt, but would be of value to my readers. I took the attitude if I didn't know it, then mostly likely my readers didn't. I would use catchy titles and provide detailed images of how to do it. E.g. My post on Why does Technorati Mock me - very popular post. I gained the knowledge as a result of doing the project but it is an area that many of us want to know more about.

The key to blogging -- providing information to your readers that they need.

[Michele Martin]

You know, another potential option that wasn't available to us would be for you to use the blogs here to post what's going on with the challenge and then put the feed to those posts on your site in the sidebar or something. You could keep more detailed, daily track here and then maybe post some weekly summaries on your main blog. That would also be a good way to reflect on and synthesize your learning for the week. Just a thought. . .

[Kate Olson]

Michele -

Hmmm, I'll consider that!

[Christine Martell]

I had every intention of responding to this, then I got consumed by a big conference presentation. Sorry, didn't mean to abandon you!

Justine, I did this screencast about your site a few weeks ago. May or may not still be helpful depending on how much work you've done on it. http://www.screencast.com/t/ZobleilZf

I'll try to do some more soon. I actually did on for Michele also, but it seems to be corrupted. I'm still learning this screencasting stuff.

[Christine Martell]

I recovered Michele's.....but it too is a few weeks old.
http://www.screencast.com/t/QEXkR1w6x4r

[Eklavya]

My best wishes to all the new participants. The original project was a great experience and I learned a lot about blogging through that. I also made some very good friends during the challenge. Owing to lack of time, I am not blogging regularly. Yet whatever little I learned about blogging, it was though this challenge.

[Kate Olson]

Great tips about emailing readers, I'm trying to do that RIGHT now. It's a huge job and sometimes easy to overlook but I think it's extremely valuable. Link to your blog, please?

[Sue Waters]

Hi Everyone

Just thought I let you know that new blog I'm involved with, The Edublogger, is doing a series of posts designed at people starting out with blogging, and these posts may be of help to people doing the 31 Day Project.

Posts so far are:

• Getting More Out of Widgets!
• Tips For Doing A Blog Makeover - this will be a series of posts. We have just done a makeover of one of our community member's blog and the posts will go through the thought process behind the changes we have made to his blog plus provide tips on how we did it.