Se7en and Problogger’s 31-DBBB Part 4…

I have mentioned before that I was participating in the ProBlogger’s 31 DBBB.

Here is a list of what I have managed so far:

Here we go with the Problogger and the 31-DBBB Challenge:

Task 17: Watch a First Time Reader Use Your Blog

This is a great idea especially since there are a whole lot of things I am planning to do to the old blog during our upcoming holidays. And it would be good to have some sort of “novice” opinion! But this task quite clearly demonstrates that I need to meet some non-bloggers in the world! Because in the past week I haven’t had a visitor to our house who doesn’t read our blog. I can wait – we have another long weekend and a whole lot of visitors planned (we do that with long weekends!). So there we go – surely one of them will have never seen our blog before!

Task 18: Create a Sneeze Page for Your Blog.

This is first task that I thought “I couldn’t possibly do this” – I couldn’t believe that I could possibly make a “Sneeze Page” until I understood what a sneeze page was. These are pages that are intended to draw readers back into your blog or as I thought lists of posts grouped together so that they are easy to access for readers. I realize that I have sneeze pages already! All those pages prominently placed (!) on the right hand side of our blog under the heading: Features… I really need to get these pages-up-to-date, because when I post a party post or a celebrity chef post I don’t always remember to update the pages – aaah! I added a couple of new links but there is definitely more blog housework to be done around here.

Task 19: Write an Opinion Post on Your Blog.

Most of the opinion posts are in the category of Brilliant Babies and about the time of Task 19 I published the post: Se7en Reasons Why Children Don’t Play Anymore… and to my astonishment this post went wild and had the most comments ever on our blog! I had thought the only comments would be that I was bit mad not signing my kids up for a million “opportunities” only to pleasantly surprised that there are a lot of like minded moms in the blogosphere. Yeah! Lesson learnt, to grow your blog and meet a lot of lurking readers post an opinion post!!! I loved writing this post and can’t wait to write more of these!

Task 20: Leave Comments on Other Blogs.

I love commenting on other blogs and spend a good portion of my on-line time making comments on other blogs. I don’t find that comments build a lot of traffic, maybe because I am a novice or maybe its a reflection on my commenting style! Even when I add relevant links… which I did when I was a reckless new blogger, but I have gotten much more discerning and hardly ever do it now. I have lost the nerve and desire to be so cheeky. While I don’t think commenting builds miles of traffic they do build friendships and that has been valuable to me. There are indeed a handful of blogs that I comment on regularly and feel that I have built genuine friendships with, I love it – people I would never have met in my regular life!!!

That being said I love “commentluv” and I am determined to figure out how it works these holidays because I think it is a nice, but small reward for those who make the effort to comment on our blog.

Task 21: Breathe Life Into an Old Post.

I have a couple of resource posts that I need to add some fresh links into and I am thinking up a way to “sneeze” our resource pages, especially school resources, better. Since, people visit our blog to read our Tuesday Art Tasks and Monday Munchies I must organize these posts better because they are getting lost in the swash of time…

Task 22: Pay Special Attention to a Reader.

I try and keep a list of se7en of my favorites current on my blog, but I have a feeling no-one ever clicks on them and I don’t up-date them very often! I love promoting blogs, I love these kind of posts and they always generate quite a bit of traffic for me and hopefully some traffic for them! Here’s one on Se7en of the Best Craft Blogs… I like these kind of posts because I think everyone wins! I am planning to do one on Se7en of the Best Mom Blogs next week in time for mothers day. If I were to promote a mom-blog right here, right now I would send you to Stephanie and her vote for me post: at Adventures in Babywearing, not because she asked me to (!) but because she is worth it! Definitely in my list of “Se7en of the best Mom Blogs”

Task 23: Call Your Readers to ACTION.

I battle with directly calling readers to action: A perfect example would have been to ask at the end of our poetry resource post this week: “What’s your favorite poem right now?” But did I do that! Nope!!! I am so polite (hehe) I don’t want to impose on my readers… Which is a bit mad I know, since that sort of post takes hours of work – gathering all those links takes hours, and I should make more of those sort of posts!!! Needless to say I would love more feedback from readers and need to figure out a way to call them to ACTION, which I don’t find imposing on them. I am planning a whole lot more giveaways soon and hopefully that will get our readers to comment!!!

Task 24: How to Use a Magazine to Improve Your Blog.

This was by far the best task, I love the analytical-ness of this task, not to mention reading a magazine and calling it work!!! My sister gave me a magazine a couple of weeks ago – WEEKS – and I haven’t even glanced at it yet… but it’s our last day of school term today and as soon as we finish I am heading for the couch with some post-it notes… Everyone will be happier for it! I am not really looking for post ideas – my poor mind is riddled with those, if only there was a way to just brain-drop, but it takes time to get them all out… I am looking for funky new lay-out ideas and anything that sparks my attention since I think we need a bit of help… Our blog has evolved since it’s beginning, bits and bobs have just been added to the page and it is a little bit chaotic! I need a plan of action!!!

That’s it for now… I am actually disappointed this project is so near completion – I have loved looking at out blog as an “outsider” and I am so looking forward to making some tweaks and improvements during our week off school… In fact I have never been so eager for vacation time before!!! You can tell I just love blogging, given even a hint of free time and that’s what I want to be doing… after an afternoon on the couch with a magazine of course!!!

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