Grumpy Face by ellie.
I’m blogging all day. Most of the time at work I spend blogging. I write for four flagship blogs. Plus I have a private Tumblr blog as well. Two of the flagship blogs are about SEO, this one here and my own blog. The other two are client blogs covering two different topics. So basically I have to be up to date about at least three subjects, industries or niches. This is not an easy task although one person alone can handle up to 5 flagship blogs at the same if you ask me.
As I enjoy blogging very much I never experience the so called “writers block”. The contrary is the case, I’m often overwhelmed by the sheer amount of things I want to write about. I do basic research for 5 to 10 postings and write only one of them after deciding which one to write.
Of course there are times when I’m not inspired enough to blog. Recently I experienced such a phase of approx. one or two days. While at it I was seeking inspiration from my Twitter followers. I even got a great ideas by one of my followers, the person tweeting for our colleagues over at Sorbet Digital. She asked me to write about SEO project management and I politely declined.
I’m not a project manager or SEO manager, I’m not even doing SEO myself most of the time (after all I’m mostly blogging). So I bet there are other people who could cover that topic better than me, Kevin Gibbons of SEOptimise probably for instance.
Long story short I decided to write about my doubts as I haven’t written the SEO project management post and other postings as well.
The main question of this post is “when not to blog” though. I’ll tell you when.
When you’re angry, grumpy, tired, hungry.
I sometimes angry, more often grumpy and two of the main reasons for being angry or grumpy are being tired or hungry. Some people don’t notice either of these states but I bet their coworkers, families or other people around can sense it. Even if you’re completely alone at your desk you can find out by asking yourself the following question: Would you like to shout or sneer at somebody for writing something?
Flame wars are pretty common online because people get easiyl alienated on the Web. Take a break, go for lunch or a walk. Blogging doesn’t often work when angry. For me it sometimes works but often you don’t understand yourself afterwards. Blog later. You can get quick traffic with a rant but often people who were your peers, fans or potential clients might get ostracized.
When having a tunnel vision.
Another typical issue when working on the web is tunnel vision. You are so focused on getting things done fast that you just race like a rat. Again the solution here is pretty simple. Step outside and get some input from real life. Be it the coworkers, your family or even random strangers.
For instance I like to chat with the local shop owners around here. They are often Indian, Arabs or Turks and their different point of view can remove your tunnel vision quickly. I don’t talk about SEO with them I only ask them how their business is going. Just small talk. That’s often perfectly enough. Just by trying to imagine being in their footsteps you get open minded again. The tunnel vision vanishes.
For instance my favorite Indian restaurant around the corner is most often empty. The food is excellent and the prices are low but they are quite hidden and they are not of the cool restaurants. I often think how they could improve their business. This in itself inspires me.
Without having value to add.
When you are sure that you can’t add any value to a given news item or topic don’t do it. Just regurgitating news everybody else has written about is not only boring it also scares away your regular readers.
They won’t come back as often anymore or they might even quit returning when they sense that you too often publish low quality posts with no substance just for the sake of blogging. Wait until you find a unique angle or you collect a few more similar resources to compile a list. Or just drop the idea altogether and wait for another one.
When being not an expert on a topic.
This is the example I covered above. Project management is not my cup of tea so writing about it would be rather guess work and low quality. What you can do of course is research or actually testing some project management software.
I’ll probably do that beacuse I think I van improve my project management skills but I won’t teach you about it yet as long as I’m not skillful enough. You don’t have to be an expert to blog about something but you need a certain amount of time to prepare then or you invite an expert to speak about the topic.
When being in a hurry.
Blogging in a hurry is no-no as well. While we’re always in a hurry somehow, we want to finish a task, move on to the next one, catch up with someone or simply leave there are cases where there is just not enough time to write a blog post that makes sense, proof read it, add some links, find an image for it and share it on social media.
In this case you better don’t do it at all or just do par of it. write a draft today and add the rest tomorrow or even later. A quality post tomorrow is better than a quick and dirty post today IMHO.
There are probably more reasons not to blog for a certain reason but I don’t want to discourage you any further. blogging is fun and it makes money so we should blog all the time except the few cases cited above. So let’s go: but don’t blog around clock!
Make sure to blog when you’re fresh and inspired. I the morning is often a good time to blog. Don’t check your emails first in the morning. Write a blog post instead. Reading too many emails can make you angry, grumpy and result in tunnel vision. Afterwards you lose any sense of value you could add and need a brake.
Btw. do you want to know what other topics it were I decided not to write about this time? It was the intriguing popularity of black hat SEO on StumbleUpon and the actual Facebook search options and services. I might write about them next though.
Good points but also consider when you have a strong view on something and don’t want feedback a blog post is not going to always be the best platform for it. If you run a good blog and write good posts you should get some level of engagement and if you don’t want to listen to others views then don’t blog on it :)
Good idea to blog in the morning, i find i usually do most of my best work early in the morning but before going to sleep as you have mostly had all day to bounce the ideas around in your head and have had time to do some research in between emails/phone calls.
Hi Tad,
For me blogging is just another part of my life that I take every seriously. So it’s always an time for me to blog because I’m very passion about my subject and my readers.
So if there’s any time not to blog, I will say at hoildays, fammly gathers and a course at a funneral..that woundn’t be too respecfull.
Good Stuff Tad
“TrafficColeman “Signing Off”
I totally concur with the “not having any value to add bit”…. You can totally see right through blogs that just put something out there because they need to post on a daily basis…..
very good article – will be tweeted.
I especially agree with “when you’re tired” as it will lead to an unreadable post. one thing though, sometimes being angry could be pretty useful – I was recently involved into a “passionate” controversy and being angry enabled me to write my best post so far
I also agree. Blog something when you are on mood. Otherwise, you’re blog will be useless
Yes, sometimes strong emotions can lead to better blogposts, however, there are really times when you’re just not in the mood to write and I guess this is perfectly normal, it happens to everyone and what I do is to take this time to relax and unwind and after this, I feel like my battery has been recharged and I can go at it again.
i can attest to all these. yes.
I like your suggestion on tunnel vision – I’ve noticed stepping away from the topic sometimes helps me best and give me better perspective when I come back to it. If you write everyday however, I do suggest continuing that, regardless of your mood, purely because if you have people who are used to the schedule you deliver content, you may lose people when you show inconsistency. This was a great post though – definitely will share it! Cheers!
I have to agree, if you’re not in the mood, don’t write anything, else you’ll end up hours and hours writing getting nowhere.
Hi,
Great post, I’ve never really thought about when I should and shouldn’t post blogs… but now you’ve pointed out some ‘not to blog’ occasions I suppose I’ll be thinking about it more.
I also agree with the poin that you should only blog if you know what you’re talking about; too often we see countless posts that add no value! (unless its for personal reasons of course!)
Another great post, thanks
I disagree with this entire post, besides with the no value, because sometimes blogging when feeling … can create a really interesting blog.
Well for me, when not to blog isn’t really something I think about. As long as posts are well thought out, relevant and add some value, I say go with it. Quality is always better than quantity so keep that in mind and don’t just add something for the sake of adding.
Ha Ha… i believe than.. this blog is written when u r tired or hungry or angry.. just joking ..
Tad, very good and interesting blog..
You should never sacrifice quality with a blog article. If you do not know enough about a topic to write about it, you need to FUEL UP on information!