Clarity: A new posting schedule for 2016
According to the interwebz, regular blog content is vital for keeping your readers interested. As for book bloggers, we are most likely to get our book requests granted when the publishers see there’s regular content on the blog, preferably with a sense of structure incorporated in it. Great, because I’m all for structure. Keeps the mind chaos at a minimum and lets your readers know what to expect.
I’ve also read on several sites that posting every day is a great strategy to get yourself ‘out there’. While I’m sure that can work great for others, it’s not something I’m planning on doing because A. I can’t read that fast, B. the posts would be meaningless mostly, being made in a rush due to C. I don’t have enough time for it, and, last but not least, D. I’m not getting paid enough (read: $0.00) to do so.
So after some experimenting this past month, I found the following schedule to be something I can work with for now:
Review Mondays – One new book review every week
Review Tuesdays – One new book review every week
Recipe Thursdays – This will definitely not become a weekly feature, but when I post a recipe, it will be on a Thursday. Hopefully on a bi-weekly basis.
Graphic Fridays – Now this is something I found at Magda’s Magic of Books. It means I will put up a mini review of a graphic novel each week.
Like Magda, I also purchased a shitload of comics through Humble Bundle, plus I keep buying physical copies as well because graphic novels are best when read in all its full coloured glory. All in all, this is a great way for me to get motivated to finally read them and for you to read something less long-winding than my usual book reviews.
As you can see, weekends are sort of off-limits for me. They’re meant for spending time with my husband, socializing and…reading. I might hustle around with the review days a little and spread them out a bit more, but as of now, Mondays and Tuesdays work best for me :). Also, I don’t know about you guys, but I generally can’t finish a 1200 paged book in one week, so when I’m reading one of those, there will probably only be one regular book review that week.
So, dear readers:
Inked Brownies 
🙂 nice one…
Me and structure aren’t on best-friend terms… Really.. 😀 I’m hopeless at schedules, because I know that if I make a schedule I stress myself out by trying to stick to it. Whether it’s something I have ready earlier- I want to get it out there straight away, or something I can’t finish on time because life/work get on the way… Both of those scenarios would kill me! 😀
But as for you, and from my personal view, as I mentioned 😉 I do follow you for your lovely reviews so I don’t mind whether your schedule was to post every day or once a month… I’d still read them and never get enough…
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I see your point all too clearly! If I finish something, I feel like it’s such a waste to schedule it. The times I already scheduled things in advance with the WordPress button, I woke up 10 times a night, frantically thinking if I hadn’t missed something. Or possibly included a personal nude picture or something…
I really like your posting frequency, I’ve added your blog to my RSS feeder and it really does feel like a nice surprise every time something pops up! 😀 Dude, womance for life! ❤
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Hahahaha, yeah, the paranoid mind keeps life interesting! 🙂
And thanks.. I never really thought about my posting frequency.. even though sometimes I feel like I’m doing it too often and people get pissed! Oh well… 🙂
And womance… crikey, it took me a few seconds to understand what you meant by that word… bromance.. womance… 😀 you teach me so much!
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Never a dull moment! 😀
Hells no! Anybody who gets annoyed there is a lunatic for sure :3.
😀 Yeah, it’s not a very well-known term yet I believe. Last girl I said it to thought I meant I wanted to get into her pants…sigh
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Great topic – how much structure do we need? Like you, I can’t possibly post every day, and I don’t want to make myself try. The blogs I like best post great content, not a little bit every day. I aim for 1-2 book reviews a week and at least one other non-review post. I have to do most of my writing and prep on the weekends though, and then I schedule the posts to run during the week. I am getting better at spreading my posts throughout the month, rather than posting in one clump and then falling off. I’m also trying to get better at the things you don’t see on the blog, like responding to review requests, posting on goodreads, and checking out new followers.
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Same here! It takes the fun out of posting by putting the pressure on that much. For me at least. Lots of respect for the bloggers who ARE able to pull it off! I think that’s some great scheduling you’re doing there without going haywire. I think if all book bloggers posted a review each day, I wouldn’t be able to leave my house anymore if I had to read all of them. Meaning other people will also start making a selection of those they like the most aka the best ones. You’re absolutely right that all other things besides the actual posts are time-consuming as well. Doing ALL of those things every day would feel like juggling way too many balls for me! (my juggling top record being 2 balls…)
Thank you for discussing along! 🙂
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I’d say, it depends on one’s committment to blogging. Fiction blogging (because I’m doing mainly short fiction) is somewhat different from other forms of blogging: You have to invest time by reading plus a bit of investigation (background of author, era, etc.) before it does make sense for me to write an entry. Contrast this to a blog where the author takes a snapshot from his hotel room and writes a bit about it.
I could schedule the latter one easily but I never know when I have enough time for my next part of fiction.
Sometimes, I have more time to read and I’d be an idiot to not push out reviews, then. Sometimes there is so much other work to do that it is even hard to read plus write something at weekends.
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I’m glad I’m not the only one who’s ‘struggling’ with this :). I agree that it depends on the type of blog you’re running. If it’s a lifestyle blog or social media blog, a little update every day is easily doable. But when it’s a book blog, there’s also the reading part indeed. It’s probably doable if it’s your full-time job or if you are an absolute pro at time management and absorbing information and throwing it back out there. It can take me hours to get my thoughts in order! I’ve got Mon- and Tuesdays off atm, so I’m hoping this schedule will work for me. However, like you, I still don’t know if I’ll have enough time in between to actually finish 2 books. It’s a hard knock life ;).
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However important ‘getting yourself out there’ is, Anne – and writers need to do that – as you quite rightly imply, one has to READ the book in order to write about it, and then to plan the review article so that – at the very least – it makes sense. I’d like to blog more because I enjoy it but I have other writing projects and there just isn’t enough time for a daily schedule. I fear I may be in the ‘no way José’ category.
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Exactly, if I start reading any faster than I am now, it means I’ll start skimming and, no doubtedly, not enjoying the reading experience anymore. Which is why we’re in this in the first place aren’t we? Our love for reading?
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Yes, writing and reading are a bit like love and marriage in the Sinatra song.
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I’m all for posting regular and having a schedule and sticking to it! But just because you need to be consistent, doesn’t mean you have to post every single day. The usual amount that many people see as good is about three times a week. So I have three posts going up – one of which is a book review, but the other two can be about anything or everything! Discussions, book hauls, just chatting and life updates. It doesn’t need to be you reading crazily to post every day!
My recent book haul post: http://olivia-savannah.blogspot.nl/2016/01/my-hoarding-catastrophe-it-wasnt-me.html
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I think 3 posts a week is my magic number as well, so that’s good to hear ;). My life updates are pretty boring, though. It’s my mum’s bday party in 2 days, yaaay! yawns But I see what you mean :). Damn girl, that’s one massive book haul! Where do you leave all those paperbacks?!
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