How Frequently Should You Blog?

I’ve been having an internal debate today after reading several blog posts about blogging frequency. What’s interesting is that there isn’t a very strong consensus. However, there are very strong arguments for both sides: less is better, or more is better.

Blogging Less

I think this is the bigger camp. There are good reasons for it. Blogging once or twice a week means high quality blog posts that people will want to read. It also allows the blogger to spend more time doing other things. In my case, it would allow me to spend more time writing my book. The blogger can also spend more time promoting the posts they have done, as well as visit other blogs and comment on them. Also, people will see the blogger as having better quality posts, rather than always making short daily posts that may not have as much quality.

Blogging Daily

There’s another group who advocates blogging daily. And there are good reasons here, too. First, it gives the blogger discipline. They do it, and they become good at maintaining a schedule. It also helps a person improve their writing. If they’re only blogging once a week, they may take more time to actually get into the mood. If you’ve maintained a daily blogging schedule for a long time, you’re always ready to post. You also find your voice. However, you can burn out, get bored, or find that you’re only blogging because you feel that you need to make that blog post.

What do I do?

I blog daily. Twice a day, in fact. I don’t feel tired of doing it. I enjoy it. I always have ideas, and I have plenty of things to say. I wouldn’t say it takes away from my book writing time, because I don’t write blog posts when I’m in the zone. I write them when people are around. I can shut them out for blogging, but not for writing books. Writing twice a day started as a challenge to see if I could do it. But you know what? I enjoy it! It makes me want to write.

But you see, I can’t go down to once a week. That would mean I’d probably only be doing Authors Answer. That’s not the focus of this blog. If I were to reduce my blogging, I’d go down to five times a week. Authors Answer would always be there. I’d also work on one or two other series, including Worldbuilding. And the rest of the time, I’d be blogging about various topics, mostly related to books, book reviews, science, and education. I guess the topics wouldn’t change much at all. I wonder what would happen.

In April, I was blogging mostly once a day. Traffic dropped dramatically, and I had far less interaction on my blog. I love the comments and conversations that go on. This month, I returned to twice a day, and the traffic is better than ever, and the comments are back up to normal. Interesting results.

In the future, things will probably change. As I get more into writing my book, as well as working, I may drop down to five posts a week. I expect a drop in views, but I plan on spending more time going to other blogs. But it’s a difficult decision to make. I enjoy blogging daily. But we’ll see what happens.

What do you think? Which camp are you in? Let me know in the comments below.

What Drives Traffic to My Blog?

I love stats. I’ve said this many times before, and it’s a reason I post monthly reviews of my blog stats. It’s interesting. This year has been big for traffic on my blog so far. With almost four months finished, I’ve been able to come to some conclusions about blogging and generating content that’s interesting for readers. Here are my brief thoughts.

The most obvious thing I’ve noticed are that February and April have been my slowest months this year. Why aren’t they getting as much traffic? What do they have in common? In February, I did a blog tour involving author interviews. This month, I’m doing the A to Z Challenge showing my own writing. Past experience has taught me that interviews perform poorly in terms of views. Also, showing my own fiction tends to not be that popular. I think that’s quite normal and I expected that.

There are things that people want to see, and interviews, flash fiction, and book reviews are not what generate a lot of traffic. Sure, people are interested in that kind of thing, but a lot of people are more interested in informational posts that provide advice and posts that invite discussion. My most popular posts tend to be about the writing process itself. But there are also hot topics, especially things that are trendy. My most popular post continues to be the analysis of my personality. I get a lot of INTJ people coming here.

What gets traffic are topics people search about. People want to know things. That’s where SEO comes in. I won’t go into it, though. I frankly don’t care about it, because I just want to write about what I like. And you know what? Even though my A to Z Challenge posts don’t generate a lot of traffic, I’m having a lot of fun with it. And that’s what matters. What I do get with it are the return readers who never fail to comment on them. My fans? Haha.

One final thing that I find drives traffic to my blog has nothing to do with what I post. It has to do with commenting. I notice that when I reply to comments promptly, I get more views. Not only that, when I comment more often on other blogs, I get more new readers and a higher number of views. In conclusion, interaction with other bloggers is probably one of the biggest ways to get readers. Support them and they’ll support you. It’s really simple.

What do you think?

Driving: Canada vs. Japan

Tomorrow, I’m renting a car.

As you may know, I live in Japan, though I’m from Canada.  I’ve been driving for 23 years, since I got my learner’s permit when I was 14.  Since 2005, I’ve been living in Japan, and I actually have a Japanese driver’s license.  It wasn’t difficult to switch from a Canadian license to a Japanese one, since there are agreements between the two countries allowing them to share driving safety records.  This means I can easily exchange my license and not take a test.  Americans aren’t so lucky.  They have to take the driving test.

So, as I said, I’m renting a car tomorrow.  I first drove in Japan in 2009, also a rental.  We occasionally rent a car to go shopping at Costco, which is what we’re doing tomorrow.  It’s just easier to transport everything by car, rather than by bus, train, and bus.

Are you wondering how easy it was to adjust to driving in Japan?  Some things were easy, some things I’m still not used to.  Let’s take a look.

The easy things.

• Switching from right side of the road to the left was quite easy.  I was surprised.  No problems at all.
• Switching from the left side of the car to the right was also easy to adjust to.
• Using my left hand to shift from park to drive and reverse was no problem.
• Traffic laws are very similar.  One major difference is that you can’t turn left on a red (like you can turn right on a red in Canada).
• Mirrors fold in to protect them from other cars while parking.
• Everything is in metric, which is what I’ve always used.

The difficult things.

• Red light runners.  Too many.
• Too many drivers are inexperienced, as they drive infrequently.
• So many people stop on the sides of major roads, blocking half of the traffic.  I find this dangerous.
• Too many people don’t signal when turning.
• The turn signal and windshield wipers are switched when compared to Canada.  I’ve accidentally wiped the windshield when I meant to signal.
• Parking.  People back into parking spaces.  Narrower parking spaces.  Ugh.
• Navigating the mazes that are the streets of Japan is a monumental task.  You really need a navigation system, unless you know the way.
• Pedestrians are frequently ignored.
• Narrow streets and many blind corners.

So, I have all of that to look forward to tomorrow.  It’s no wonder I don’t drive often in Japan.  I can’t wait to drive in Canada again.  So much easier.