Monday Mailbox ~ Spams with a Point

Spams are just irritating. Does anyone with half a brain, like me, actually click on the links or buy their products?

In the 50s to 60s, it was door-to-door salesman from vacuum to insurance and everything in between. In the 70s thru the 80s, it was mass mailings where your mailbox may held two pieces of bonafide mail you wanted to read. Starting in 90s it was the age of telemarketers which continues today. Now with the internet being huge, it's spams.

I hit delete or spam on most of them. There is one exception. That's where my blog is concerned. I must sift through EIGHTY pieces of Spam a day. Why do I put myself through the this? Even though spams are regurgitated  mass e-mail to anyone who does not have a filter in place, some have points for thought. No, I don't take them all that seriously so you don't have to call those nice, young men wearing white coats.

They do have some key thinking points for me like...

• Blog header
• Is the title of my blog effective
• Content
• The overall look and feel of my blog

They spams keep me always questioning, "Can it be better?" and "How can I make it better?" I know I'll never reach perfection, but settle with what I'm happy with right now. Yearly I evaluate my blog/website performance overall with tweaks made during the year. It got just plain tiring to change everything every three or four months.

I've been spending time with Ali Cross, who I "met" during the Indierecon online conference developing a logo and tagline to better emphasize my blog. I've got the tagline for the newsletter set that perfectly describes what I write, Suspense with a Soul.

No, I'm not going to change the look or background of this blog because it works for me right now. The good Lord knows, and my readers, this blog format has gone through numerous changes over the last couple years

The logo and design are a bit trickier. I am too much! Literarally.

I have too many nterests! To narrow it down to two or thee elements is short changing who I am. While I dream of narrowing my creative talents, I ask myself, why should I? Personally I'm thinking of a juggler with items I do up in the air.  But I digress...

My blog header is Murphey Saga because < cue the soap opera music> my life is a bad soap opera.

My tag line about writing but life gets in the way, is true and something all writers face. I didn't only write about writing or strictly for my readers, but how life impacts everything we attempt to do. A real picture of the writing life, family, and about me. Isn't that what people want to know?

As far as titles of my blogs go, I'll admit sometimes they need a little help. I've seen the "7 Ways to Improve the Widget" type titles and may actually click on them. But mostly it is inane clicking and browse reading.

That's just not me. I like to chat and that's the way I approach my blog. I believe in the soft sell and relationships. Now don't get me wrong, I can do the hard sell. I was once described as being able to sell salt to man man in the middle of the Dead Sea. At times, that approach is necessary, but in a "Meet the author" type website? 

Yes, this blog is a sales tool. Over on the right, I have my books and where to get them, about the author, book trailers, and assorted other sales pitch things. If someone wants to take the time to read it. Yes, I mention certain books I've written and writing because that's what I do, I am a writer, but I am so much more.

Because I'm an eclectic, but focus individual. I write about everything. Be it my stroke, my writing, my family, or vent about injustices or food for thought. That's my content. I could focus all my attention on one aspect or other but then I would be writing thirty blogs instead of just two with bleed overs in both. Sometimes with some adjustments one blog written will have ramifications on the other one, and I'll cheat and publish it on both sites. Wherever life impacts me at any given moment, that's what I write about.

So do you look at spams any differently?

Keep writing and loving the Lord