BBAW Daily Topic: Blogging

The world of blogging is continually changing. Share 3 things you [think] are essential tried and true practices for every blogger and 1-3 new trends or tools you’ve adapted recently or would like to in the future.

I don’t have any *new trends* that I’ve recently adapted so I’m going to just list the things I think are essential tried and true practices for every blogger:

1. Twitter. It is the place to chat with fellow book bloggers and authors alike. I find out about interesting book news, books being made into movies, trailers (like Breaking Dawn – OMG have you seen the newest trailer for that movie? Is it November 18th yet?), contests, books reviews and of course, book recommendations. I’m on Twitter every day.
2. Tweetdeck. I mainly use Tweetdeck to schedule tweets. I love, love, LOVE being able to do this. I’m sure there are other Twitter programs out there that do the same thing, I just like Tweetdeck because I’m familiar with it and it’s easy for me to use.
3. Goodreads. I use this site religiously. I’m constantly updating my book inventory. I catalog every single book that comes into my house, whether it be a bound copy or a Kindle copy. I can look on Goodreads and see exactly how many books I’ve got in my TBR pile (currently at 373). I keep track of my progress for the reading challenges I’m currently participating in. I keep track of how many books I’ve read each year (so far I’m at 81 this year). I know which books I own and which ones are signed. I love the ‘notes’ sections. I usually enter where I obtained the book (bought, library, free Kindle read, NetGalley, etc.) and I sometimes use that field to write important information for books in a series.
4. Feedburner. It makes it super easy to have your post feeds automatically posted on Twitter and it does it as soon as the post goes up. It also gives your readers the opportunity to subscribe to your blog’s feed via email or their favorite reader.
5. Fairshare. It tells you when it finds content similar to yours around the web. It’s how I’ve (unfortunately) found people stealing parts of my reviews. Fairshare has definitely surpassed Google Alerts. I rarely get any Google Alerts these days.
6. Windows Live Writer. I’m not going to do into great detail about this but if you have a PC, then you should definitely check out this free blogging program. It takes a little bit to get used to this program but once you do, you’ll be asking yourself why you didn’t start using WLW sooner. I also highly recommend the Dynamic Template plug-in. It makes blogging even easier with templates. I have a template for my reviews, the memes I participate in, giveaways, winner announcements and more. I never use Blogger to post anymore (you know how temperamental Blogger can be).
7. Reading Challenges and Memes. I think participation in the book blogging community is key and what better way to do that than reading challenges and memes. Reading challenges get me to read books I have either been waiting to read for a while but just haven’t gotten around to it or they give me the opportunity to read something I wouldn’t have normally read before. Memes (like On My Wishlist, which I participate in almost every Saturday) introduce me to not only new upcoming titles but older books that might have escaped my attention. I love to go around and visit other people’s wishlists to see what they want to read. It’s a great way to interact with fellow book bloggers.
8. And most importantly, have fun! Once the fun runs out, it’ll start feeling like work and you’re going to get bored. For most of us, this is a hobby and hobbies are meant to be fun pastimes.