Blog Management

I was quite flattered to learn that my daughter’s friend Caroline reads my blog nearly every day. I learned that she was fascinated to think I got up early in the morning, wrote, and then posted my writing by 8 am.

But Kara explained that that wasn’t the case. She told her friend that’s not how my Mom does it. She writes and posts every day, but at all times there are at least 5 or 6 open word documents in the computer.

It is true. I have several blog posts waiting to be published at all times. Part of it is because I like to be more than well prepared. Having a week’s worth of posts is a kind of insurance---in case life gets in the way of my writing. But the other piece to my backlog is a type of marketing strategy. By having a bunch of saved documents, I can pick and choose when I feel the time is right to post them. Sometimes the decision is topic-based, sometimes it has to do with editing, and sometimes it is a time sensitivity issue.

For example in late June I wrote a rather scathing expose-like post about the Superintendent of schools. It is unpublished. I suspect it will rock his world when I chose to do so. And even though the piece was written to my personal satisfaction nearly two months ago, I will not post it until early September—when school is back in session. This is a post that deserves the opportunity for the broadest audience.

And it is rare for me to write something on one day and then post it the next. There is always a fair amount of tweaking involved in the writing process. Editing your own work is not always easy. So I only publish after a 24 hour period when the timing is key—as in my posts about the Superbowl or Serena Williams winning gold.

And sometimes a post will lay dormant for a while because it makes no sense to post several similar topics in a row. Because my thoughts sometimes come in binges—I will write one post about dogs (for example) and it will generate two others. It’s nonsensical to post successive topics.

But ultimately, in every post I write, I must weigh if my words are of significant value. I must decide if what I have written is thought inspiring -- and revise it if I deem it is not. I am my own quality control.     So even if all of this is not very interesting or provocative for many, it is most definitely for Caroline.

And that makes me smile.