Wednesday Writerly Way ~ Spams-a Positive or a Negative?

This week I'm talking about spams, in case you haven't guessed. Back in November I talked about SEO and the importance of using keywords (HERE), this practice will also open you up for SPAM! But overall, it is a paltry nuisance compared to the attention you derive from using them.

I'm allergic to Spam both types. The pork variety because I'm allergic to pork and the internet variety because it wastes my time. I am allergic to anything that wastes my time. My time is valuable and limited as it is for most of us. I get violently ill with both and yet I refuse to put any "I am not a robot" devices such as Captcha on my blog.

Wouldn't it be easier just add a Captcha? For whom? Me...probably, but not necessarily for my readers. Ease for my readers is everything. Captcha are hard enough for me to decipher with all the skewed letters and obscure photos of numbers, I can think of no other reason not to post a comment. I think I'd comment more if it wasn't for them.

The prior approval is a good idea, if you monitor it properly. If you wait a week to
approve comments it doesn't work so well. I'm the sort of blog reader that makes comments (sometimes). If I take the time to comment, I believe the commenter is owed a response. I actually go back to check if there is a response or click the email when comment is made box.

I understand if you are someone like Alex J. Cavanaugh who gets 100 + comments per blog post not answering each and every one, but my blog doesn't get the response his does. If it did I might take his tact on the subject. But I digress.

Spams are either complaints (negative) or flattery (positive). I have yet to see any of the spammers show up on my feed burner, although they promise they are following my blog. Maybe they have it bookmarked as a site where they can post their spam. I dunno. But I am vigilant. I take as much care of my blog as I do my other writing. It is my baby, my child that I'm sending out into the cold, hard world. Am I too attached to my blog? Probably. It's something I'm proud to say is mine.

Either way all spams ruffle your tail feathers. On any given post, the spam filter which catches bogus links will catch or I will delete, about ten emails. That amount may be irritating but I tend to look at the positive. That's only 3% of my total comments or emails I receive as a result of this blog or my books.

That's 97% bonafide contact points which isn't bad. If my blog wasn't getting such a high number of hits each day...spammers wouldn't bother with my site. That's also a positive point.

Yes, spams are a part of doing business on the web. There's no fighting it. Look at it from the positive point of view.

Did you know that spammers now have a way around the Captcha? They'll enlist the help of third world nations. They hire people who sit at the computer all day long who do nothing but copy and paste the same spam, and type in the Captcha.

Thanks to analytic software they can pinpoint which sites get the most traffic. When I blogged once a month I got a few spams, but nothing like the first of the year when my hits spiked to almost 300+ page views a blog post. As you can see from the chart of all time page views a tremendous spike occurred when I started blogging more in August 2012.

For March of this year, I topped over 8,500 page views. No that's not cumulative but the figure for last month alone. Now if you take the 3%, that's a lot of spams in the month. To date, I've published 327 posts and received 325 comments. Yes, I've accounted for my replies to comments and subtracted them, and the spams in my spam folder are not counted. That's not too shoddy of a record. So if I have to go in a manually delete some spams from my blog...it's worth it.

So spammers beware. I will delete you within a couple days of you posting a spam. All of my readers are savvy enough not to click your links.

What am I talking about...they don't actually read the blogs they are spamming.

Anyhow, keep writing and loving the Lord.

Monday Mailbox~ Blogs

A couple weeks ago, I mentioned that there was a ghost in my machine about my posts. After performing an exorcism on my computer and heavy prayers for my blogspot blog, I hope it is corrected.

Now that the administrative stuff is out of the way, it's on to our regularly scheduled mailbox. This week I'm going to talk about blog... namely the way I set mine up here. I've used Blogger and all their editions for about ten years now. I know there are other blog type formats like Wordpress, Google+, and Reddit, but I'll stick with something I know and comfortable with.

These were comments and made here, in emails, and over in the Compuserve's Books and Writers forum so rather than list each question individually again, I'll post some of my answers here so everyone has access.

My blog replaces my website. With emails, where to find my books, chat to other writers, voice my opinions, and talk to readers and writers alike so it did everything my website did. I created this new blog to do all of that. A blog is a journal of sorts. A blog is anything you want it to be.

Things to remember if you want more readers/hits...

• Be consistent- When I first started blogging, months would go by between posts. Or maybe I'd blog every couple of weeks. Would you treat your friends that way?
• Give something useful- Whether it is information, a laugh, excerpts, reviews, ot whatever. Make someone glad they stopped by.
• A new view or take on something they might be interested in.
• Give a variety- my blog has themed weeks and different items for the days of the week, but yours doesn't.
• Your blog should be all about you. People getting to know you and your style.
• Learn what  you can do and can't do within your blog. All blogs on the web have bells and whistles. Use them to your advantage.
• Allow followers to add you to their blog roll or emails, or feeds.
• Use keywords

It sounds like a sales pitch, doesn't it? Well it is. As a writer, you have marketable talents and yes, you can put it on a resume too. From this site I sell my books, not directly, but I'm advertising them. Personally, I don't want the hassles of processing orders and shipping them except for book signing or events. With the latter, it's direct sales with no shipping. As an indie author, I choose the hats I wear for the most part. I prefer the subtle sale to hard sale tactics. I feel you cannot twist someone's arm to sell them something they do not want or folk over hard earned bucks for a "luxury" item.

Starting in 2013, I was well recovered or sort of from my stroke, I needed the practice in writing long passages to regain some of the writing skills I lost. Since June of 2012, I posted on my stroke recovery and frustrations usually only once a week. But since this blog was for writers and readers initially, I started blogging back for them on Wednesdays. Since the end of last year, I've added to the days I blog to include something for almost everyone like my mailbox, terms for indie authors, writer's, fun stuff, interviews, reviews, and my take on stroke recovery or just living after a stroke. It all helps me connect the dots in my brain.

Late 2012, I posted about the importance of using keywords because I noticed a dramatic increase in hits on my site. I'd forgotten one of the basic rules of marketing...they have to find you first. What distinguishes my blog from the fifty gazillion blogs/websites out there and how do readers find you. My blog on platform building for writers has hit over 2,000 page views as of this morning. That's a small number when compared with some other blogs out there, but the point is the number is growing. In January 2013, I had 2,016 hits for the month. By the end of February, the number of hits grew to 3, 458. See Statistical Analytics for more. I'm using more back links to other blogs I've written.

My blog has take-away value. Whether you're a stroke survivor or caregiver, a writer struggling with your manuscript or published author trying to promote your novel, or a reader, you are all reading, laughing, and being informed by my blog. How do I know this? The comments you make or the slew of emails I get every day about my posts. Even if my blog is how I am doing, I'm still getting responses.

So that's my response about blogs and the way mine works.

So why do you blog and why?

Keep writing and loving the Lord.

The Importance of Keywords

If you are like me and an indie author keywords are a whole different animal in marketing your book. Often, it is an under utilized sales tool.

How many of you use a search engine to find various things: Google, Bing, Yahoo? There are several dozens of sites on the web. Some are bigger than others but SEO (search engine optimization) is big business. It is often overlooked by the novice in indie publishing. It's how readers find your book based on what they are searching for. Sounds simple doesn't it? It is but it isn't.

This was one subject that wasn't offered in my marketing degree program, but waaaayyyy back then the internet was in its infancy. I did go back to college last year and took a course in it because of my Doh! moments. I didn't do this with Escape from Second Eden but have expanded the keywords on my other novels. I spent the last year in a trial and error phase of indie publishing.

How to find keywords as an author? Think about your book. What does it contain? Ask an author about their book and they will either tell you volumes on the plot lines, characters, or the setting or a sentence or two. I know I'm guilty of both. Of course, it depends on how much time you have. In an agent interview for standard publishing you have fifteen minutes on average, but you may lose them in  two.

Now I've seen keyword lists for a book at forty plus words. To me that's overkill. I mean really? That would have a link to your book in forty plus searches. That may sound like a good deal, but think...is over exposure better than under exposure? The phrase is KEYWORDS not Montezuma's revenge. Ten or twenty well placed words should be enough.

Okay, what do want to specify about your book?

• Author name? It is your brand name. That way all of your books come up in the same search.
• How about genre? Don't certain people read only Science Fiction, Thrillers, Horror, and Romance? I'm not one of those, but some people do.
• How about setting? Some people will search for books depending on where it's set, say Canada, India, or even Georgia in the USA.
• How about whether your book is fiction or nonfiction?
• How about murder, love, betrayal, jealousy, or any other emotion? The main plot line.
• e-book, paperback, hardback? How is it available?
• How about the age group it's meant for? This is especially helpful in the childrens book selection.

These are just a few in the general section. Then there are more specifics like:

• Spies, spy
• Candy
• Child abuse
• Survival
• Zombies
• Marriage
• Stroke, CVA

These are specific types. They narrow the searches to individual categories. You get the idea. Certain sites where you may publish your work at as an indie may limit the number of keywords you may use so think carefully on just how you want it represented. This is your book in one word increments. You want to hit your key market of readers.

You may have noticed that I am using more keywords when publishing this blog...now you know why. I've gotten thirty more followers than last year. Thirty more followers may not sound like a lot, but how about 10,027 more hits on my blog over the past six months? Now that's impressive for someone who writes on a little known blog out of millions on the web. I advertise my blog on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and SheWrites, but not always and that's it. The rest comes from random searches.

So how important are keywords? You tell me.

Keep writing and loving the Lord.