Busting the Newbie Blues!

Small Review is hosting an event called "Busting the Newbie Blues," to help new bloggers figure out the ropes and connect with other bloggers. She's inviting new and established bloggers to answer some questions about their experience, and I think it's a great idea so I've joined in! You can find all the details here.

I've been blogging for over 5 months now, so I chose the "established" blogger questionnaire, although really I am probably somewhere in between :)

1. When did you start your blog? Well, the first post is dated May of this year, but I really didn’t get going and become involved with the book blogging community until July.

2. Why did you start your blog? I’d happened upon several other book blogs and I was using them to get ideas of what books I should read, so I thought – hey, why don’t I start up my own? I love to read and I love to discuss books with others, so it totally made sense.

3. What has been the biggest challenge you’ve faced so far? Did you make any mistakes new bloggers can learn from?

One thing I found challenging was balancing blogging with the rest of my life. Don’t let it take over your life! If one of your posts doesn’t get any comments, don’t stress about it. If you don’t post any reviews one week, it’s okay. We all have lives and blogging is just one part of it!

4. What did you find most discouraging about being a new blogger? How did you deal with this?

As a new blogger it can be difficult to really get to know some of the other bloggers. Mostly this just takes time, but also I found that getting involved on Twitter was really helpful in making more connections (with both bloggers and authors!) Another great idea is getting involved in events going on in the book blogosphere – there is always something going on! And just generally, posting meaningful comments on other blogs helps – often when someone posts a thoughtful comment on my blog, I’ll hop over to theirs and comment back, and we get a bit of a conversation going.

The process of gaining followers might also sometimes seem discouraging – I would recommend not focusing on how many followers any other blogger has. If you’re new, it’s going to take time to get established, and if your reviews are good and you interact with the community, you will slowly but surely gain followers! The Book Blogger Hop is also a great way to spread the word.

5. What do you find most encouraging?

I really enjoy the sense of belonging in the book blogging community, it’s just so fabulous that there are so many other book-lovers out there (and even just the number of YA book blogs is amazing!) Also, I always find comments encouraging — sometimes a really thoughtful comment will make my day :)

6. What do you like best about the blogs you read? Have you tried to replicate this in your blog?

I like layouts that are not too cluttered and easy to read, and graphics that aren’t hard on the eyes, so I tried to incorporate that into my blog design. I really appreciate it when a blog has a menu for their reviews (otherwise it can be difficult to find them!) and they are ordered alphabetically, so I created that for mine soon after I started.

I also noticed that some bloggers did features or memes, so I started a couple of my own (my Forget-Me-Nots feature, and a seasonal “All I Want For Christmas” meme). That was actually pretty exciting!

In terms of reviews, I like quality content with decent grammar, punctuation and spelling (otherwise I will get distracted and not be able to focus on the review itself). I enjoy reading reviews that do a good job of explaining why they loved/liked/hated the book without giving too much away. Reading a spoiler in a review can be a downer, so I appreciate it when you must highlight the text to read the spoiler (or at the very least, a clear warning a spoiler is coming). I learned to avoid this once I figured out how to make white text in my posts, so now anything I consider spoilery you can’t read unless you highlight it!

And reviews that are really long are easier to read if they are broken down somehow. I am often guilty of long, in-depth reviews, but I do usually split it into sections so it isn’t one huge paragraph that the reader can get lost in.

7. What do you dislike about blogs you’ve read? Do you try to avoid this?

Pretty much the opposite of my answer for #6 :D

Clashing colours, white text on a black background, copious grammar/punctuation/spelling errors in reviews, and insufficient spoiler warnings are a few things that will frustrate me.

8. Do you have any advice for new bloggers?

Interact with other bloggers. That’s probably the number one piece of advice from me. A lot of the blogs I visit the most frequently are the ones where I feel I’ve made a connection with another blogger. Memes are a great way to do this (Top Ten Tuesday, In My Mailbox, Waiting on Wednesday, Book Blogger Hop, etc.), or even just commenting on reviews or other posts. Twitter is also helpful this way, because it’s quite casual.

Also, I’d recommend always reading some books that are purely for your enjoyment and not for review.  Once you do gain a fair number of followers you may start to feel some pressure to do things on your blog in a certain way (for instance, perhaps you find it intimidating that some bloggers post way more reviews than you do in a week). Try not to stress about any of that. Remember that it’s your blog and you can do exactly what you like with it. It should remain fun for you! :)

9. How did you bring your blog to the attention of so many people?

LOL, I’m not sure I’ve accomplished that yet! I think you can get exposure for your blog from a number of different things. If you’re really new, I’d suggest the Book Blogger Hop, as I found that really helpful starting out. Any participation in events around the blogosphere (memes, challenges, etc.) will help spread the word, though.

10. Is there anything else you’d like to share about your experience?

Just that I’ve been enjoying myself so far and hope the new bloggers do as well!