One of the most useful tool for me to get the word out about my blog is twitter. Every Friday is something labeled Friday Follow (in the dad blog world its Fatherhood Follow/Fatherhood Friday) in short its #FF [Link].
I post three lists: the dads, the moms, and the brands/groups/others. Theses are getting to be longer and longer as I’ve been starting to diageset more and more information from the twitter stream. When I started with 200 followings I found it a little tough I’m now following over 1,000 mom/dad twitters/bloggers. I’m reading as much content that I can and find it to be nearly as easy (or hard) as following 200 when I first started.
I’m usually put in a few lists and I do see ten plus new followers on Fridays but sometimes I gain more on a random Tuesday. So the question tonight is that is Friday Follow meaningless? Have we lost the meaning? Should there be a limit say one or two amazing people? Conan O’Brien followed his first person today after a few hours she had about seven thousand others, now that’s the power to direct traffic.
At web 2.0 expo there was a discussion about how people are just like animals that we move in herds or packs. There was a great video that showed people moving and acting like a herd. I now present to you the crazy guy dancing video…
Let me know your thoughts on friday follow, do you think its still plays a part in growing or directing the audience?
After reading this great article by Jennifer James – How Much Should Mom Bloggers Earn? [Link]. I figured I should put my two cents in and its fitting that its only two cents since thats what I found on the ground today, so I’ll count that as my blog earnings for today.
Chris Brogan announced that he makes $22,000.00 – wow – I could be debit free in less then two days. I could have paid for my sons college fund within 2 weeks. I could have paid for our dream apartment in less then 120 days. I could then pay for a second home by the beach in sag harbor in about 90 days after that.
SIGN ME UP! I have met Chris at Web 2.0 Submit in NY – truly a really nice guy (and a dad). I love how he’s parlayed his skills in to a revenue stream that makes me sick and I can only work towards this goal.
In the article by Jennifer its as if she takes a swipe at the Mom bloggers for working for free so long. While I’m sure there are people out there working for free many people I’ve meet or talk to have a true income stream coming from their blog.
Some would ask do I have an income stream, not yet. I’m just starting to get my brand out into the PR world and I have a very long way to go. It’s a start but my mission isn’t to make money first it’s to help others, without hurting my family (really my wife’s boundaries).
I have some goals this year… work on being a published author, being a popular dad blog, generate some income from the blog, become a speaker (I’ve done speaking engagements before and really enjoyed it, everything expect creating the powerpoint deck). What are your goals? What are your goals as a blogger?
I had this lengthy post about why there were no posts last week but for the time being lets leave it as personal reasons. Which brings me to writing this post right after I finished the details of those personal reasons. About the idea of juggling the balance of public verse private.
My wife and I have two different scales or values in this area – I’m a social media fan and I had to pull her into the pool kicking and screaming. Sure, she likes some of it the reconnecting with lost friends or catching up with friends via status/images posted because who really has time to talk on the phone when you have a screaming baby right next to you.
I’ve always been a big “sharer” maybe to a fault. I’m not always sure where that comes from… maybe because in the culture I grew up in it was always good to chat or kibitz about things or that I went to a therapist for years as a child after my parent split. No matter the cause I’ve grown very comfortable with putting my location, my task list, my thoughts out there for all to read. My wife on the other hand has a much harder time with that public information. I respect her wishes – which is sometimes hard for me as I’d like to keep my life out there and this leads to some little “discussions” but overall we get along great on most of the social networking topics.
How do you balance yourself verse your family? Where do you draw the line?
