Tips for bloggers to avoid Activity trap

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Take a bit of time away from computer and think about your recent blogging activities. The things you did related to your blogging , the time you spend on changing and tweaking themes , the hunt for the various widgets and plug-ins and testing them , hours you spend visiting other’s blogs etc etc . Finally , do also make a note of number of posts you made.

I bet , the results would throw light on a fact that most bloggers are caught in a web called activity trap.

Wiktionary defines Activity trap as

“The risk of becoming so busy with activity so as to forget and miss the aim of that activity”

Yes , most of the bloggers tend to become so busy with blogging related activities that we tend to forget the key point : Content is king.

Many bloggers spend much of the time tinkering and playing around with  blog themes, plug-ins and various widgets,visiting other people’s blogs and commenting (to leave footprints for return visits), promoting the blog in social networking sites and end up having less time to update the blogs with new topics and even if they do , many end up making a hurried post lacking a refinement and quality and doing injustice to their own blogging skills.

So lets pull our socks up and see what we can do to free ourselves from the activity trap :

Have A Strategic Plan for Blogging

If you are a serious blogger , you need  to have a strategic plan for your blog just like a business strategic plan. You need a clear road map and allocation of time for various blogging related activities. After all “The key is in not spending time, but in investing it ”

Ok so you have invested in time and ready to work on a blogging strategic plan . So what next ?

Schedule your time

Time is precious and remember time is money. So if you are dreaming money and fame out of blogging , you need to be wise with the time you spend on blogging. In short , you need effective time management.

Compartmentalize time

So you have figured out how much time you would be able to spend on blogging every day. Now the secret is to compartmentalize the time effectively.

On a broader scale , try to ration your time for :

• Research time.
• Writing time.
• Learning time.
• Tweaking time.
• Visiting time.
• Promotion time.

Research time for your topics

I strongly believe that “Content is king” . Only a good content can propel your blog for a longer,productive journey. So write on topics that interest you , that you are comfortable with and have fairly good knowledge about. Do spend time to research on your content to make it rich ,valuable and attractive.

The time you spend on research not only helps in enriching your blog but also yourself.

Writing time for new topics

Some take just 10-15 minutes , others take hours and a blogger I know takes almost a week to write a topic ! Lots of factors go into the time taken for writing a post – the content itself ,the time life of the content (you cannot take one week to write about a breaking news that would be forgotten after a week) ,the grip you have over the subject and also your general writing skill.

Learning time for your blog improvement

Lets understand a fact that not all bloggers are nerds. Most bloggers are non-techies. Self learning is an ongoing process for every bloggers. How do we learn ? Forums, tech blogs of reputed bloggers , Google or Bing for solutions, information to good old books. You will be astonished in spite of being a non-techie,if you are a passionate learner you would have enhanced your knowledge on various technologies ,terms and information unknowingly as you navigate through various sites and forums in due course of time. A value addition to your grey cells , thanks to blogging !

Tweaking time for your blog redesigning/ up gradation

A good blog needs a good makeup and treatment. So you need time to add new widgets,tweak codes,designs,plug-ins and any other magic addition you have stumbled upon or worked on. The hours you spend on learning are put into use. At times ,the learning time and tweaking time melts together ,when you learn a new technique or code and decide to implement right away.

Visiting time for other’s blogs

Nothing to be ashamed about it. Most of us visit other’s blogs in the initial days of blogging just to leave footprints in their blog and thereby encouraging return visits. While making such visits , we stumble upon blogs that match our thought process , our likings , really nice ones and eventually with whom we start building a relation by commenting and exchange of ideas,thoughts and debates. Its a common practice that many new bloggers visits other’s blog right after making a new posts there by expecting a return visit to their new topic and comments in the process. Be genuine while leaving your comments on a blog.

Make a meaningful comments. People would notice you and appreciate your insights and make a visit to your blog from the footprint you leave behind.

Also some people would leave their footprints on our blog that would be so compelling that we end up visiting them. Its all part of blogging process.

Promotion time for your blog

You visit many blogs and build a nice relations. Good , but you will realize soon it is not just enough to keep bringing new traffic , if you want to see great audience.

You have a great content. Very Good. Yet you cannot just leave it at the mercy of search engines to bring traffic to your dear site.

Still , there is an X factor that is needed to bring traffic to your blog. You need to be aggressive in promoting your blog. Different bloggers have their own blog promotion strategies. Some very technical , while few try whacky methods , few work on a cumbersome means while some stick to time tested strategies.. Everyone has their own promotion technique which would be a combination of various strategies. Find your own promotion style. Before that figure out various avenues of promotions . So back to your learning time.

So segmentize your blogging activity. Make ample time to update your blog with good content and enjoy the blogging experience !

And finally …

Do make sure you have ample time for your other activities of life. Fine balance between blogging life , work life ( most bloggers still juggle blogging and regular work ) and most importantly personal life. You don’t want your loved ones to be your first enemy of your blog right ? Also you definitely don’t want to wake up one fine morning just to realize how much you have missed out on life because of your non-stop blogging activities.