Writability: blogging

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Discussion: Your Favorite Posts

Photo credit: morag.riddell on Flickr

Short post today! So as I've recently hit the 1,000 blog post milestone (for which a giveaway is still running, by the way), I thought now was as good a time as ever to take stock of what you guys have enjoyed and would like to see more of.

My blog posts generally fall into one of many categories: book reviews, how to, writing life, writing tips, character development, social media, editing, publishing, and miscellaneous. Both because I'm curious and because I'd like to gear future posts toward what you guys would like to see most, I'd like to know: what blog posts have been your favorite (or what types of blog posts have been your favorite)? And what would you like to see more of?

Similarly, if there are any topics or questions you'd like me to cover, let me know in the comments and I'll add them to my list of possibilities. :)

Thanks!

Twitter-sized bite:

Have a publishing or writing question you'd like answered? Author @Ava_Jae is taking blog post suggestions. (Click to tweet)

Discussion: What Would You Like to See More Of?

Photo credit: manoftaste.de on Flickr

So as of this moment, including this post, Writability has 832 posts (and they are all organized in the directory). From writing tips, to social media, to publishing, editing, the writing life, character development and more, this blog has had a LOT of posts. A lot a lot. Like, assuming each post is roughly 400 words, that's over 300,000 words worth of posts.

And so, as the year is ending and we're looking toward 2016, I'm curious about what topics you guys have found the most useful. What would you like to see more of? Are there any topics I've neglected that you have questions about? Anything you'd like some clarification on, or a different spin on an existing post you'd like to see? Do you have a writing/publishing/blogging-related question that I haven't answered? Now's the time to let me know!

My ears are open. Let me know what you'd like to see more of, and I will do my best to accommodate. :)

So today I'm putting the spotlight on you: what should I write more about going forward?

Twitter-sized bite:

Have a writing, publishing, or book-related question? @Ava_Jae is taking blog topic suggestions! (Click to tweet)

How to Build an Online Platform: Blogging

Photo credit: Magnet 4 Marketing dot Net on Flickr

So way back in July I started this how to build an online platform series (focusing on Twitter) then sort of left you guys hanging? My bad. The series is back!

Today’s focus is the blog! Because I just hit a special milestone (*EHEM* so maybe check out Writability next week? JUST SAYING). So yay!

Blogger birthday: May 2011 (3.5 years, as of this writing).

Followers/subscribers: Roughly 1.1k (according to feedburner, as of this writing).

Total pageviews: +1,000,000!!! *squee*

Time spent weekly: Roughly 3-4 hours ish.

Tips:

Post consistently. So in three and a half years, I’ve yet to miss a post. I’m not saying this to be braggy, I’m saying this because posting consistently? It’s important if you want to build a blog following.

I’ve already written a whole post about why posting consistently is so important, so I’m not going to get into the nitty gritty again. But the main benefit to bloggers is by posting consistently, you’re allowing your readers to get into the habit of checking/visiting your blog on a regular basis. Whether that’s weekly, bi-weekly, several times a week or monthly is up to you, but no matter what, consistency is key.

Figure out what you want your blog to be about early on and stay within that realm. While having a blog where you post about anything and everything under the sun can be fun, it's much harder to find an audience if you don't pinpoint a particular interest to target.

Ask a question after your posts to encourage discussion. Case in point: 95% of my blog posts. :)

Answer your comments. You won’t always get comments. In fact, there will often be long stretches where you barely get any comments at all. (FWIW, this is something that STILL happens to me, three and a half years later). But when you do get comments, I think it’s really important for bloggers to make a point of answering them. Yes, all of them. (Or nearly all of them, at least).

Why? To me, it’s common courtesy—your readers have taken the time to read your post and respond in some way, and by answering their comments, you’re telling them you appreciate their time and reciprocated with their own. I also don’t think it’s a coincidence that on the posts where I answer comments quickly, I tend to get more comments—readers like to see that the blogger is taking the time to interact with the community.

As an added bonus, I’ve had some really awesome discussions happen in the comments of my posts—and those would’nt have happened if I hadn’t answered the comments to begin with.

Share your posts elsewhere. I habitually share every one of my blog posts on Twitter, tumblr and Facebook, because that’s where I’m most active. Pinterest is another good one, but I’m not very consistent with Pinterest so I tend to let other awesome people pin my stuff for me. (People are nice).

But basically, if you’re on a social media site that allows for link or text sharing, then I highly recommend you take the time to share your posts. Just don’t get spammy about it (as in, posting about it twelve times in the same day).

Make it easy for others to share. As in those lovely Twitter-sized bites below (directions on how to create those here). Or the sharing buttons below that. But the point is, the easier you make it for people to share, the more likely they are to do it.

Comment on other people’s blogs (especially at first). This is something, that sadly, I haven’t had very much time for as of late. But at the beginning, one of the number one ways I found new blogs, connected with other bloggers, and found new readers was by commenting on blogs with topics similar to mine. This is especially helpful at first when you don’t have a lot of readers and you want to find people with similar interests, but one caveat: do NOT include a link to your blog at the bottom of your comment. That’s considered spammy and kind of rude. Instead, people will find your blog by clicking your name (because you usually have to include a link to your website (aka: your blog) in order to leave a comment).

It’s okay to stop. Thankfully, this isn’t something I’ve had to (or wanted to) do. I love running Writability, and even though it’s time consuming, it’s something that I intend to continue to do for as long as I can.

But that being said, if you’re a blogger and you find that you’re no longer enjoying it, or it’s taking way too much time and becoming a burden, then it’s okay to stop. Really. The last thing you want is to dread writing your posts, because then it’ll become an emotional drain and quite frankly, your readers will likely notice.

Do you run a blog? What tips do you have for new (or even established!) bloggers?

Twitter-sized bites:

Looking to build a blogging platform? @Ava_Jae shares her experience and a few tips. (Click to tweet)

"Consistency is key," and other blogger platform building tips from @Ava_Jae. (Click to tweet)

How to Create Twitter-sized Bites

Photo credit: Jason A. Howie on Flickr

I get this question a lot, so it seemed only natural that I should write a post about it.

A little while ago I started including fun and easy share options for Twitter, which I like to call “Twitter-sized bites.” They make it easy for people to share my posts, and I’ve noticed a definite increase in shares since adding them. So yay!

Making them is actually relatively easy to do, and since a lot of people have asked me how I create them, I’ve written up some easy steps. Enjoy!

Write the line that will appear on Twitter. Generally, you want this to be a short message because you need to leave room for attribution and the URL. Sometimes I’ll do a question, or a quote from the post, or a summarizing line. Experiment and see what works for you.

Make sure you included attribution. I’ll either include it in the message (i.e.: “Writer @Ava_Jae…”) or I’ll add it at the end (i.e.: via @Ava_Jae). There isn’t a right or wrong way to do it, but don’t forget this step!

Find your permalink. In Blogger, this is under “Post settings” beneath the Scheduling option when you’re drafting your post. If it's not showing the link, just click the box that says "Permalink" and it'll show up. Copy it and move on to the next step. UPDATE: If you have Wordpress, check Margarita Morris's comment below for directions on this and the next step.

Go to bit.ly and shorten the permalink URL to a bitlink. Paste your permalink into the section at the top of the page that says “Paste a long URL here to shorten.” Once you do, a pop-up should appear with your new, shortened URL. Yay! Copy that and move on to the next step.

Go to clicktotweet.com and choose “Basic Link.” You CAN sign in and make an account if you want to, but I don’t want to. “Basic Link” is in the top header next to “Downloads” and it’s all you need for making tweetable links.

Paste your bitlink and the message. If your message is too long, this is where you’ll see it. Edit it if you need to, make sure you have all three components (The message, the bit link and the attribution), then hit “Generate New Link.”

COPY the ctt link it gives you. Clicking on the link they give you will NOT give you what you need—it’ll show you a preview of the tweet, which is fine, but not what you’re going to embed. Instead, highlight the link they provide you with and copy it.

Go back to your post and make the section you want readers to click. For me, I stuck with a simple “Click to tweet” message in parenthesis. Highlight whatever text you want to use, then hyperlink it.

Paste your ctt link into the hyperlink settings and check “Open this link in a new window.” After you’ve done so, click done and you’re ready! Yay! Enjoy your new clickable tweets.

That’s it! Pretty easy, right? Now go enjoy your very own Twitter-sized bites! :)

Twitter-sized bites:

Wondering how to create clickable tweets for your blog posts? @Ava_Jae breaks it down here. (Click to tweet)

Blogger @Ava_Jae shares 9 easy steps to creating clickable tweets for your blog posts. (Click to tweet)

Why Tumblr is Useful for Bloggers

Photo credit: Julia Roy on Flickr

Way back, I wrote a post about tumblr for writers, so if you don’t know what a tumblr is or why it maybe useful for writers, that’s where you want to go. This is related, but more blogger-centric.

When I first created a tumblr blog several years ago, I signed up thinking it might be good for inspiration and a little social media fun. I definitely didn’t think it’d one day become the fifth largest traffic source for Writability. But after many years and more than a couple posts becoming way more popular on tumblr than I ever expected, I’ve come to realize tumblr can be a fantastic way for bloggers to share their posts.

As a rule, I generally share every post I publish on blogger in full on tumblr. When I first started experimenting with this, I initially just shared a couple paragraphs then included a “read more” link, but I found that people usually didn’t click to read more and they often didn’t share because the post was incomplete. So I tried sharing the posts in their entirety instead, including a link to the original post on the blogger blog, by sharing it as a link post rather than a text post.

Much to my surprise, that worked about a thousand times better. Sometimes literally.

Because of this happy success, I thought I’d share with you a couple steps to maximizing your tumblr reach:

As mentioned above, share your posts as a LINK post. See the screenie up there? That’s the button you want to press. The reason this works better is it allows you to share the URL of the original post, so if people are interested they can click back to your blog and check it out. As proven by my traffic, people do click.

Make sure you title your link post. I’ve often seen posts shared that were just a URL. Those tend to get less shares, because they look messy and aren’t as clear as those that are titled. Titling your post is easy—just type in whatever the title of your blog post is in the box that says “Title.” Pretty self-explanatory.

Use tags. I read somewhere that tumblr only pays attention to the first five tags that you include, so make sure you choose your tags carefully. These are important, because oftentimes people will search certain keywords for a post they’re looking for, and if you tagged your post with that keyword, they’ll come across your post even if they’re not following you. It’s an easy way to get a little extra exposure.

Follow blogs that are similar to yours. As I run a writing blog, I follow other blogs that often share posts about writing, like The Writers Helpers, It’s a Writer Thing, The Writing Cafe and How to Fight Write, all of which are excellent blogs that you should definitely be following if you’re a writer on tumblr.

The reason this helps you with exposure is because oftentimes, bloggers will notice when a certain follower often shares their posts, which can lead to said bloggers checking out your blog, which can lead to them following your blog, which can lead to them eventually sharing some of your posts. The tumblr community is pretty awesome like that. :)

The great thing about tumblr is your posts have a shelf life of basically forever. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen a post suddenly get tons of reblogs (or shares) months after I originally posted. It happens, and it happens pretty frequently.

So if you’re a blogger whose been considering starting a tumblr blog, I definitely recommend it. It’s been a wonderful experience thus far, and one I intend to continue for a long time.

Do you use tumblr? Why or why not?

Twitter-sized bites:

Blogger @Ava_Jae shares how tumblr unexpectedly became her 5th largest traffic source. #bloggingtips (Click to tweet)

Bloggers, do you share your posts on tumblr? Writer @Ava_Jae talks how and why you may want to consider it. (Click to tweet)

Why tumblr is useful for bloggers and how to maximize your shares there. (Click to tweet)

End of Year Countdown: 5 Top Fives of 2013

Photo credit: life is good (pete) on Flickr

It’s the last post of the 2013! Which means it’s time to share Writability’s annual five top fives of the year. Yay!

So here we are! A summary of 2013’s awesomeness in terms of writerly goodness.

Top 5 Most Active Commenters

As explained two years ago, I use Disqus’s handy widget on my sidebar to keep track of how many comments every commenter makes. The system isn’t perfect and only keeps track of accounts, so if you comment on multiple accounts, it thinks you’re more than one person, but at any rate, these five awesome readers are the most active commenters of the Writability community—thank you!

Note: Those with asterisks were on the top five list last year, too. Double thank you!

Top 5 Favorite Tumblr Blogs of the Year

I’ve really grown to love tumblr. And if you love tumblr too, or give tumblr a try this year, make sure you’re following these five wonderful tumblr blogs:

Jealous of Jetpacks (Beth Revis’s tumblr blog)
YA Highway
The Writing Café
It’s a Writer Thing
New Leaf Literary & Media, Inc.’s tumblr blog

Top 5 Favorite Writing Blogs of the Year

If you’re here, I already know you like reading writing blogs, so I think you’ll like these too. Because these are my favorite writing blogs of the year:

Writers Helping Writers
The Write Practice
Chasingthecrazies (Amy Trueblood’s blog)
Miss Snark’s First Victim
YA Highway

Top 5 Favorite Favorite Twitter Accounts

Twitter is basically my favorite thing ever. And these Twitter accounts are awesome:

Brenda Drake

Brenda is wonderful not only because she’s a genuinely nice person, but because she frequently runs contests and pitchfests for writers. If you want to keep up to date with contests for writers going on, definitely follow her.

Janice Hardy and Elizabeth S. Craig
Janice and Elizabeth consistently share great posts for writers. Definitely recommended for a daily dose of insightful posts.

Pub(lishing) Crawl

Another great Twitter for writers! They tweet and retweet posts, tweets and information for writers from all around the Twittersphere.

Professor Snape

And this one has nothing to do with writers at all, but if you’re a Harry Potter fan, you’ll love Snape’s joyful tweets. Like this one:

This week feels longer than Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.
— Professor Snape (@_Snape_) November 14, 2013
Tahereh Mafi

Simply because she’s hysterical, writes awesome books and is yet another genuinely super nice person.

So those are my top fives of 2013—do you have any favorites of the year you'd like to share?

Hope everyone has a wonderful New Year!

Twitter-sized bite:

Writer @Ava_Jae shares her top fives of 2013—what are some of your favorite writing resources of the year? (Click to tweet)

Simple HTML Tips for Bloggers

Photo credit: f-l-e-x on Flickr

When I first started blogging, I was well aware that it would entail writing consistently every week. What I didn’t really consider, however, was just how useful my limited HTML knowledge would be.

You see, the large majority of blogging is getting the words to screen, but before you publish a post, you have to check the formatting, and depending on the blog host you use, the formatting might not always play nice. Which is when you have to dig into the code in order to avoid serious formatting frustration.

When formatting my posts, these are the most common HTML tags that I use:

NOTE: You’ll notice that most of the tags actually come in pairs—that’s because in HTML there are opening tags and closing tags. The opening tag indicates where a certain feature or style should begin (for example: italics begin HERE) and the closing tag indicates where the feature/style should end. Closing tags are always indicated with a backslash (/) before the abbreviated code within the brackets.

<body></body> : I don’t actually touch these tags, and for simple blogging, you won’t need to either. All you need to know is that the next within these tags is what makes up your post.

<br /> : This is a paragraph break. I often have to insert these manually when doing bulleted or numbered lists so that there are spaces between the bullets or spaces within a bullet for a multiple paragraph bullet. These don’t need an opening and closing tag–just place <br /> wherever you’d like your paragraph break.

<ol></ol> : This is an ordered list tag, to be used to create numbered lists. You place the opening tag at the very beginning of the list, and the closing tag at the end, with list item tags (<li></li>) to differentiate every point within the list. So, for example, a simple 1-4 numbered list in HTML would look like:

<ol>
<li>One</li>
<li>Two</li>
<li>Three</li>
<li>Four</li>
</ol>

NOTE: You don’t need to indent in order for the HTML to work—I just did that to make it a little easier to read.

<ul></ul> : This is an unordered list tag, to be used to created bulleted lists. You use this the exact same way as an ordered list tag, except you use “ul” instead of “ol.” You can easily convert an ordered list to an unordered list or vice versa by simply going into the code and changing a single letter in the opening and closing tags of the list.

<i></i> : This indicates italics. You don’t usually need to type this manually because I’ve rarely had the italics button glitch out on me, but it’s useful to know so you can recognize it while looking at the HTML. To put a word or phrase in italics, you insert the word(s) between the opening and closing tags, like so:

<i>I want this to be in italics.</i>

<b></b> : This indicates bold text. It’s used the exact same way as the italics tags.

<u></u> : This indicates underlined text. It works just like bold and italics.

<blockquote></blockquote> : I'll bet you can guess what these do (hint: I use them for my Twitter-sized bites and/or any quotes). Like italics, bold and underline, these are tags that I rarely have to adjust manually, but it's helpful to know what it does.

<h1></h1> : These are heading tags. There are actually six different heading tags, varying from <h1> to <h6>. The <h1> tags are the largest and <h6> are the smallest. Like the last couple tags, the text between them is what is affected.

<a href=“[website address]”> [link text] </a> : And this, my friends, is what an embedded link looks like in HTML. Allow me to break it down a little:

The <a href=“[web address]”> is all part of the opening tag. Within the quotations, you place the web address you want the link to go to (without the brackets). So if you were awesome and linking to my blog, the opening tag would look like this:

<a href=“www.avajae.blogspot.com”>

Next is the link text. This is the visible text that people see and click on, so, for example, it might look like this:

<a href=“www.avajae.blogspot.com”>Check out this awesome writing blog.

Finally, you need the closing tag, or the link won’t work at all. This is the easiest part—you just add </a> at the end. So your full embedded link would look like this:

<a href=“www.avajae.blogspot.com”>Check out this awesome writing blog.</a>

The nice part is these tags are all universal and can be used on any server that allows for HTML editing and in any browser.

I hope this helps your HTML-editing needs. If you have any questions, feel free to give me a shout below. :)

Have you edited HTML before? What tags do you most commonly use?

Twitter-sized bites:

Are you a blogger struggling to understand HTML? @Ava_Jae shares some easy tips to demystify your blog's code. (Click to tweet)

Do you struggle with your blog's HTML? Here are some simple tips to make editing HTML easy. (Click to tweet)

How to Find Blog Photos Using Flickr

Photo credit: Andy Woo on Flickr

So I received another question! And it's one that I've been meaning to answer, anyway.

As many bloggers are aware, including blog photos is a great way to add a little extra engagement to the page and make the post look more interesting visually. But with copyright laws and the possibility of lawsuits if photos are used incorrectly, it can sometimes be a little scary to start using photos.

The key is to find photos under a Creative Commons license, and I find all of mine through Flickr.

Flickr is a free site that you can log into with a Google, Facebook or Yahoo! account where photographers (amateur and otherwise) around the world upload and share their photos. And my favorite part about it is that you can search through copyright-free photos for free use in posts.

The steps are pretty simple:

The search. Once you've logged into Flickr, you go up to the search bar in the top right corner and type in whatever key word you want to use to filter through photos. I usually choose something related to the post, so for instance, for this post, I searched "photos" "pictures" and "photography."

The Creative Commons filter. After you get your results, click “Advanced Search" to bring up the advanced search menu. From there, choose “Only search within Creative Commons-licensed content” at the bottom and it “Search” again to filter your results with only pictures that are copyright-free.

Choose your photos. Generally, I open up any photo I find interesting in a new tab, then mark my favorites with the star-shaped favorite button. This allows me to save any photos I like for future use and to also remind myself a) not to reuse them and b) to go back later on and let the person know I've used their photo (which is optional, and I am majorly behind on).

Copy the URL. Once you've picked your photo and checked the Creative Commons settings to see the rules (which is done by clicking the hyperlinked “Some rights reserved”…usually it's to add attribution, which you should always do anyway, but it’s good practice to check), right click the photo and select the size you want. I usually choose “Medium 500.” It will then bring you to a new page with just the photo. Right click the picture again and choose “Copy Image URL." From there you can use that URL to upload the picture into your post.

So that’s it! Don’t forget to add attribution (I usually like to link back to the artist’s Flickr page) and you now have a photo for your blog post. Enjoy!

If you blog, where do you get your blog post photos?

Twitter-sized bites:

Not sure where to find blog post photos? Blogger @Ava_Jae shares four easy steps to finding copyright-free photos. (Click to tweet)

Don't break copyright law for a blog post photo—here are four steps to finding copyright-free images. (Click to tweet)

How Social Media Has Made Me a Better Writer

Photo credit: Yon Garin on Flickr

Two and a half years ago this blog didn’t exist, I barely knew what a tumblr was and I associated Twitter with cat pictures. I’d written six manuscripts, been through the query trenches four times and regularly read all of one blog (albeit, a particularly informative blog, but one blog nonetheless).

Two and a half years ago I had two friends who enjoyed writing, but didn’t really show much interest in pursuing it professionally. I had a couple people who read my work and gave me feedback, but writing wasn’t their craft, so while their feedback was helpful, it didn’t really help me to grow as a writer.

Two and a half years ago, when I entered the query wars, I kept it mostly to myself, with exception of my immediate family and closest friends. And they were supportive of course—and still are—but as they hadn’t experienced it themselves, they didn’t fully understand how the process worked or what it was like.

I’m not exaggerating when I say that when I created a Twitter account in April of 2011, my life changed.

Suddenly I was pushing myself to try new things. I created a blog and realized I loved it. I wrote more than ever before—both on posts three times a week and on new manuscripts. I realized just how much there was to read out there and more than doubled my yearly reading count.

And, most importantly, I connected to the online writing community.

I can’t even begin to tell you how much easier it is to handle pre-querying nerves, and rejection, and shelving manuscripts, and first draft woes, and editing gnashing of teeth with a community of thousands of people who know exactly what you’re experiencing. Not to mention that my wonderful CPs, who have pushed me to make my work so much better than it was, were all found through various forms of internet wonder.

I don’t think I’m a better writer since diving into the world of social media—I know I am.

Has social media made you a better writer? How?

Twitter-sized bites:

How social media has changed one writer's life for the better. (Click to tweet)

"I don't think I'm a better writer since diving into the world of social media—I know I am." (Click to tweet)

Has social media made you a better writer? Share your experience at @Ava_Jae's blog. (Click to tweet)

The Truth About Writing Advice

Photo credit: vancouverfilmschool on Flickr

The truth about writing advice is that everything is subjective. Everything. (Except maybe this).

I’ve now written well over 350 posts, most of which involve some kind of tips or thoughts on writing, the process of novel-writing and the publishing world. And sometimes, as is bound to happen when you write about any particular topic over the course of two years, I look back at old posts and think, that’s interesting. I do x differently now.

Writing is so subjective that sometimes I don’t even adhere to the same tips I gave two years ago. And that’s fine—it doesn’t make them less helpful, it’s just because I’ve learned to do things a little differently.

I suppose the point I’m trying to make is that nothing is set in stone. Just because I (or any other writing blogger out there) has a particular technique, or opinion, or idea that works really well for them, doesn’t mean that if it doesn’t work for you, you’re somehow less off. Just about every writing rule or trend out there has an exception, even several exceptions. Take everything you read with a grain of salt.

For every wonderful program, application or technique that fifty writers rave about, there are fifty writers who find it doesn’t quite work for them.

For every opinion or tip I share, I know there are some out there that disagree or find the tip useless, and that is completely ok.

Writing is subjective, and writers all work differently. There isn’t a right or wrong path and there isn’t a magical process that will guarantee success.

There are just writers like me figuring things out as we go, and sharing what we learn along the way. And if it helps, wonderful, and if it doesn’t, that’s completely fine, too. Just keep doing what you’re doing and above all: write.

I’m curious: where do you get your writing advice? Favorite blogs/websites/books/etc.?

Twitter-sized bites:

"Just about every writing rule or trend out there has an exception." (Click to tweet)

"The truth about writing advice is that everything is subjective." (Click to tweet)

Half a Million Page View Giveaway

Photo credit: Selbe B on Flickr

Those of you who follow me on Twitter or like me on Facebook probably have heard that Writability passed a major milestone over the weekend. That’s right—500,000 page views.

Whaaaaaat?

Even though I’d been watching the numbers climb steadily to the big half-mil mark, it still felt pretty surreal to break the 500,000-view milestone. I am humbled and truly thankful for each and every one of my wonderful supporters.

Yes, that means you. Reading the post right now. Thank you.

Rather than go on for a few hundred words about how amazing you guys are (which hopefully you already know) and how grateful I am (which I am), I’d like to show you my gratitude by giving a little something back. And thus, the giveaway.

I like critiquing. I’ve done a pretty decent share of it, from full-length works to samples, to queries and pitches, and I like to think that my feedback is at least somewhat helpful. Every pair of eyes helps, right?

As the large majority of you lovely people are writers, I’ve decided to offer a critique of the first ten pages of your WIP. It doesn’t have to be polished, or even from a finished manuscript—the only requirements are that the first ten pages are complete and there isn’t any erotic material in those first ten pages because that’s not my thing.

The last thing I’ll say is that I will actually critique your work. I’ve had friends and family ask me to edit something for them, then look horrified when I hand it back dripping in red ink, so if you enter the giveaway, please make sure you’re actually ready to receive a critique. There’s no harm in holding off if you’re not sure you’re at a stage prepared for that.

This giveaway will be open for seven days and will close at midnight on August 1st. Good luck to all who enter (via the rafflecopter below), and thanks again for being awesome!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

How (Not) to Write a Blog Post

Photo credit: Mikael Miettinen on Flickr

Open up a Pages/Word/TextPad/Whatever document.
Stare at the screen for a minimum of thirty minutes.
Scroll through your Twitter stream to look for “inspiration.” *wink wink*
Check your e-mail. And tumblr. And Facebook.
Open up that blank document again.
Realize you’re hungry and eat breakfast.

Watch the newest episode of Project Runway while eating breakfast.
Get totally distracted and watch the full hour-long episode instead of just fifteen minutes like you planned.

Stare at that blank document for another fifteen minutes while internally brainstorming some blog post ideas.
Start daydreaming about the ending of that Project Runway episode, instead.
Remember that reading is awesome inspiration and pick up a book.
Read ten chapters before realizing that you still haven’t written that post.
Read one more chapter.
Just one more.
Okay, THIS is the last one, I swear.
Wait. The author KILLED OFF YOUR FAVORITE CHARACTER? Throw the book aside and sit down in front of that blog post again.
Stare for another ten minutes.
Remember you haven’t done laundry in too long and get that done.
Oh, and you really should do those dishes while you’re at it.
Is that a spot on the counter? Maybe you should clean that, too.
Sit down at your computer and actually start brainstorming for that blog post.
Oh look! Your CP sent you another chapter. Time for reading!
You’re hungry again. You can’t really be expected to write a decent blog post on an empty stomach, can you? Eat lunch.
Realize that a new episode of Vikings is on Hulu, too. Watch that as you eat.
This episode is ridiculously good and there’s only another half hour left. What’s another half hour? Finish the episode.
Rage about the end of the episode as you sit down to write that post again.
Your phone is ringing. You should get that.
Talk to your grandma for five minutes. Act surprised when those five minutes turns into an hour.
Open up that document and put it in fullscreen mode. You’re getting serious now. It’s time to actually write this darned post.
Stare.
Stare.
Stare.
Stare.
Get frustrated and write a post about how not to write a blog post.

...Wait.

How to Think of Blog Post Ideas

Photo credit: Cayusa on Flickr

For roughly a year and a half now, I’ve written blog posts three times a week. I haven’t made any changes to the blogging schedule because I believe it’s important as a writer and a blogger to post consistently, and as of yet, I’ve never missed a day. I’ve also never run out of ideas.

Well.

That last part is a little misleading. Saying that I’ve never run out of ideas makes it sound like over the course of the last year and a half, I’ve never had a day where I wasn’t sure what I was going to post about, which is nowhere near the truth. I have, in fact, often had days where I stared at the screen, wondering how in the world I was going to come up with and write a post over the course of the next twenty-four hours.

But being the stubborn, stick-to-the-schedule person I am, I’ve always managed to wring a topic out of the air, one way or another.

The truth is, there’s nothing mystical about thinking up blog post ideas. While some days I’m lucky and the idea will just make itself known to me with little effort on my part, most days I have to go looking for ideas. Lucky for me, I have plenty of sources of inspiration all around me. Such as…

The blog archives. For those of you who run a blog, I highly recommend keeping a blog archive list. The funny thing about blog archives, is that while I originally created mine to make it easy for readers to dig through my old posts, I soon realized it was just as useful for me as it was for my readers.

You see, when your posts start reaching triple digits (and even before that), it can start to become a little tricky to keep track of what you’ve written about and what you’ve missed. When I’m searching for blog post inspiration, I nearly always start by scrolling through my archives: not only does it keep me from unintentionally rewriting an old post, but it gives me a general idea as to what areas I could explore more in, and what areas are already well-saturated with posts.

The brainstorming list. I’ve written in the past about how helpful it is to keep a running list of ideas (both for writing and blogging), and this is a large part of the reason why. When I’m low on ideas and searching the archives isn’t helping, I often turn to my brainstorming list and either spend some time thinking up new ideas, or choose one that I’ve already thought of but haven’t written about yet.

Life. You’d be surprised how many ideas you can generate just from your everyday life. I’ll often turn to a problem I’ve recently encountered in my WIP, or a stage of writing I’m in, or a book I’ve recently read to try to think up of some blog post ideas. Another great life source is current events: whether in publishing or just a topic that’s trending online (that’s related to whatever you post about, of course), writing about current events or topics is a great way to tap into a collective discussion online.

These are just a couple examples of places I find blog post inspiration from—now I want to hear from you. Where do you find blog post or writing inspiration?

The Heart of Social Media

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Social media is a funny thing. When offline, people tend to talk about it in terms of promotional use—how many people they can get to see the ad about their book or business, how many followers they can get on Twitter or likes on Facebook and how many people in turn buy their product.

And I’m not going to pretend that social media isn’t great for that—just about every business knows that social media is key to getting exposure and ultimately getting clients or buyers. But the thing is, social media isn’t just about the numbers—if it was, it wouldn’t work because all we’d do is spam each other with Follow me!s and Buy my book!s and Hire me now!s and God knows that’s not what social media is about.

The heart of social media is something that I didn’t really discover until I was neck-deep in Twitter and tumblr and Facebook. I went in expecting it to be very much about the numbers, but I quickly realized it was about something else entirely: it was about the people. The relationships. The connections. It’s about helping and encouraging each other and celebrating victories as a community and mourning tragedies together.

The heart of social media is the community. It’s you and me. Your first Twitter follower and your last Facebook like and everyone in between. And that’s something that we should all be thankful for.

I’ve found that the writing community is especially wonderful—you see, the nice thing about us is that we can be genuinely happy for every new writer that gets signed or book that gets published, because the beauty of it is that we aren’t really each other’s competition. Many products rely on the fact that a buyer will only choose one product—one iPad or Surface or Android tablet. Writers, however, don’t live in that kind of cutthroat competitive environment—readers can and will buy multiple books, so when a new author is signed or a new book is published, we don’t have to feel threatened. We can be genuinely happy and help each other.

When used correctly, social media is truly a fantastic asset and using it is a joy. It enables us to be kind and lend a helping hand with minimal cost or effort, and it gives us opportunities to make new connections and relationships that would have been impossible otherwise. We are the heart of social media.

As an example of this, I’d like to give a shout-out to one of my favorite authors Beth Revis (Across the Universe), who is currently running a very cool contest with authors Marie Lu (Legend), Marissa Meyer (Cinder), Victoria Schwab (The Near Witch) and Megan Shepherd (The Madman's Daughter) called Bringing YA to You.

In short, these five authors will be taking a book tour trip to any city in the continental US or Canada that gets the most votes, so if you’ve ever wanted a YA book tour to take a trip to your hometown, now’s your chance to speak up and let them know. All you have to do to enter is fill out this form and you get extra votes for spreading the word about the contest. It seems like a really fun way to get readers involved and gives everyone a unique opportunity to have a say in where the book tour will go, so I wanted to share it with you guys. As a bonus, if you share the word about the contest, you could qualify to win ten signed books from the authors. Pretty cool, right?

The thing is, contests, giveaways and opportunities like these to really get readers involved would be impossible without social media. And if you ask me, there’s something really special about that.

So let’s make a point to remember to keep social media special and support each other this year, and it can start right here: what blog or social media account would you like to give a shout-out to?

Why Write Blog Posts Consistently?

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Before I began blogging, I went through a research phase. I scoured Google and my favorite blogs in search of advice for new bloggers like me. I hunted for tips that could help me start a successful blog, and the advice I saw most often kind of surprised me. It wasn't about bringing in mass amounts of traffic, or SEO, or a stellar commenting system, it was this simple tip: write posts consistently.

What surprised me even more was this: it didn't really matter if you posted every day, a couple times a week, or a couple times a month as long as you posted consistently.

Now naturally, blogs with more frequent posts tend to receive more traffic than blogs that post once a month, as new content brings in new page views, but in this case the goal isn't necessarily to bring in hoards of traffic, it's to get your readers used to coming to your blog. It's to create a posting schedule people who follow your blog can remember, so that they know when to expect your next post.

It's simple, and it works.

But there's an added bonus to writing consistent blog posts that many of those articles I encountered didn't mention, namely, the way it affects you, the writer.

Writing consistent blog posts has many benefits for the writer:

It teaches you discipline. Consistency requires discipline. Whether it's three posts a week or four posts a month, it takes discipline to have your blog posts written by the posting date, which brings me to...

It teaches you how to meet deadlines. Most fields require you to meet deadlines, and if you'd like to be a professional writer (indie or traditionally published), you'll definitely have to learn to meet deadlines. These posting deadlines are self-imposed, and they're great practice.

It shows you that you are capable of writing under pressure. Being able to write under pressure is an essential skill for the writer. If you're an indie, you need to be able to write the sequel to your book while knowing that readers are waiting for the next update, and if you're traditionally published, you need to be able to write with many looming deadlines and agents/editors/publishers waiting for your work as well as your readers.

It proves that writing well while uninspired is possible. Once you begin writing consistently for any project, blog or otherwise, it won't be long before you realize that every day is not equal in the eyes of the writer. Some days the writing comes easily and other days it'd be easier to withstand hours of coffin torture than write a single word. But when you have to write consistently you learn something else, too—you don't need to be inspired to write well. You just have to write.

What do you think? If you have a blog, do you write consistently? Why or why not?

Twitter-sized bites:

.@Ava_Jae says it doesn't matter how often you post as long as you post consistently. What do you think? (Click to tweet)

How does consistently writing blog posts help writers? @Ava_Jae shares four main benefits. (Click to tweet)

How (Not) to Be a Successful Blogger

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While the Great Blogging Bubble is a thing of the past, as every single one of you reading this can testament, blogging is still very much a thing that is alive and well. New writers take up the call to online journaling every day, while others jump ship, leaving their blogs to gather virtual dust online (or, alternatively, obliterating them altogether).

So it is little surprise that many surf the interwebz to try to glean insight as to what makes a blog popular, how to gather more traffic for their new online venture and how, ultimately, to be a successful blogger.

Well, my fellow web-surfer. You have come to the right blog.

From the mysterious blast of ingenious insight that brought you the likes of How to Write a Masterpiece and How (Not) to Write the Perfect Query Letter, I bring you ten secrets to being a successful blogger:

10 Golden Rules to Blogging Success*:

Write ridiculously long sentences and paragraphs and actually it’s best if the post is one hugenormously long paragraph (no shorter than 1000 words because really, who wants to waste their time reading a tiny post?) because everyone knows that the more words you fit into a sentence the better the sentence is and also, no one wastes their precious time skipping from one paragraph to the next anymore so you might as well fit whatever you can into one single large paragraph (or title, if you’re that skilled). The heading basically says it all, I think.

LIGHT COLORS ON A DARK BACKGROUND—OOH IT’S SO PURDY. Without pretty, eye-popping colors to give your readers the migraine of a lifetime, your little blog will never be remembered.

ALSO EVERYONE LOVES CAPS LOCK. WHAT’S THE POINT OF EVEN TURNING CAPS LOCK OFF ANYWAY HUH? PLUS IT’S COOL BECAUSE SUDDENLY YOUR READERS WILL READ WITH AN EXTRA-LOUD VOICE IN THEIR MINDS SO IT’S KIND OF LIKE YOU’RE EMPHASIZING YOUR POINT WITH YOUR LOUDNESS. READERS LOVE LOUDNESS.

Comment on other people’s blogs about your blog. There’s little point in commenting if you don’t leave a link to your blog, anyway.

Ignore your blog comments. It’s not like your readers actually appreciate when you take the time to answer their comments, so why bother?

Change up your blog topics. Everyone knows your readers will get bored if you start doing that thing where you consistently write about one topic.

Only post once or twice a year. Too much more and you might clog up your subscribers’ feeds, which in turn could scare them away.

Proper grammar and spelling is conforming. aND ur nawt a cuhnformisst R U?

Only post about your one-eyed gerbil, Alfredo. Because, as I’m sure you already know, the one-eyed gerbil is the international mascot of the blogging world, so no one really wants to hear about anything else, anyway.

Don’t put any thought into the design of your blog. No one cares about the design; they just want to know about Alfredo.

And just like that, the secrets to gaining a raving horde of fans for your blog are yours. Use them wisely.

* = Please don't actually do any of this. Please?

What blogging secrets would you add to the list?

Yet Another Reason You Should Blog

Photo credit: cambodia4kidsorg

I read a little while ago on Michael Hyatt's blog that he found he sometimes didn't know how he felt about a particular topic until he blogged about it (unfortunately I can't find the specific post...sorry!). I thought that was interesting and it raised some questions in my mind.

Questions like: do we blog because we know about something or do we blog because we want to know about something?

Questions like: do we blog to teach others or do we blog to teach ourselves?

After some thought, I like to think that I came up with an answer because for me at least, the answer is both.

Truth is, I've learned just as much from blogging as I hope you have from reading my posts. Writing blog posts—from creating better villains to the usefulness of tumblr for writers—forces me to sit down and think about the topic until I can think about it clearly enough to share with you—my amazing readers.

In essence, I've come to realize that blogging is just as educational for the blogger as it is for the reader.

But I have a feeling I'm not the only one who's come to this conclusion, and I want to hear from you guys.

DISCUSSION: For those of you who blog, would you say that you’ve learned from your blogging experience? For those of you who don’t, would you say you’ve learned from reading blogs?

End of Year Countdown: 5 Top Fives

Photo credit: Rampant. Gaffer

With 2011 nearly over and 2012 around the corner, this is a time when many people pause to reflect on the last 365 days. I thought for a while about how I wanted to reflect without rehashing everything I said in my Celebrating 100 Posts post, and I think I’ve come up with a fun way of doing it.

The end of the year is a great time to share things that made this year special, and in terms of blogging I’d like to share with you five top five lists that basically sums up my blogging, writing and reading experience of 2011.

So! Here we go!

Top 5 Most Popular Posts (on Writability)

As determined by pageviews, these are my most popular posts of the year:

1. Why Writers Must Read

2. Klout: Why I Stopped Caring About My Score

3. 5 Reasons You Should Be Blogging

4. 10 Writing Truths (Part 1)

5. How to Write Quickly

Top 5 Most Active Commenters

I actually have a little widget on the side of the blog that keeps track of my most active commenters on Writability, and these amazing people are my top five of the year. I’m relatively sure you have to have a Disqus account in order for the commenting system to keep track of how many comments you’ve made (so for those of you who comment and don't have a Disqus account, you rock too, so thank you), but nevertheless these five people have consistently contributed to the community and for that they deserve a little recognition. Thank you!

1. Daniel Swensen

2. Jennifer Bennett

3. Susan Sipal

4. Dasia

5. Tina Moss

Top 5 Favorite Blogs This Year (in no particular order)

This is purely subjective of course, but over the last twelve months I’ve found these blogs to be incredibly useful, inspirational and timely. If you haven’t checked them out before, I highly recommend them (and it’s not a bad idea to stalk them on Twitter, as well).

1. Jeff Goins, Writer

I think what attracted me to Jeff’s blog is his constant positivity. His blog is upbeat, inspirational and has some really fantastic tips with consistently great posts.

2. Tahereh Mafi’s Blog

I’ve mentioned before why I love Tahereh’s blog so much, but I think her writing was best described by Lisa Gail Green in the comments not too long ago—honest.

3. Michael Hyatt’s Blog

As the Chairman of Thomas Nelson Publishers and a motivational speaker, it’s not surprising that his posts are insightful and inspirational. Similar to Jeff Goins’ blog, I really love the constant positive message in his posts and the fantastic community he’s built there.

4. Nathan Bransford’s Blog

Nathan Bransford’s blog has been a source of fantastic insight for years and this year was no different. Even though he’s no longer an agent, his take on the publishing industry is insightful and interesting.

5. Write for Your Life

Iain Broome’s blog is yet another fantastic resource for writers. He provides both links to great posts he comes across around the web and original posts that make you pause and think. A great addition to anyone’s morning blog read.

Top 5 Favorite Books I Read This Year (in no particular order)

So I’ll admit I haven’t read a huge amount of books this year, however that doesn’t diminish how awesome these five books are. I highly recommend each and every one of them and hope you’ll check them out (links lead to my reviews).

1. Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

2. Across the Universe by Beth Revis

3. Divergent by Veronica Roth

4. The Priest’s Graveyard by Ted Dekker

5. The Fire in Fiction by Donald Maass

Top 5 Favorite Posts I Read (or Watched) This Year (in no particular order)

1. Ira Glass on Storytelling

So I know this technically isn’t a post, per say, but it’s still a fantastic video nonetheless and I’m sure most of you have seen. But just in case you haven’t seen it, you should definitely watch it. It’s a fantastically inspirational video for writers.

2. ON BEING A REAL WRITER by Tahereh Mafi

This post is so beautiful, I don’t even know what to say. Every time I re-read it, it brings a smile to my face. It’s honest, inspirational and a prime example of why I love Tahereh’s blog so much.

3. DON’T BE AFRAID TO WRITE A BAD BOOK by Tahereh Mafi

So maybe it’s cheating to include two posts from the same blog in my countdown but really guys, I just love the posts that much. And I think her message here is really important for writers.

4. We Just Decided to Go by Amanda Hocking

Short post with a great message spurred by a wonderful quote. A nice inspirational read.

5. Writing Worksheets and Other Tools by Elizabeth S. Craig

Elizabeth always gives fantastic resources and this is no different. The worksheets she links to are really fantastic, particularly the Novel Notebook. Definitely check them out.

So those are my five top five! Hope everyone has a wonderful new year!

What were your favorite five posts, blogs or books this year?

5 Reasons You Should Be Blogging

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This is my 99th blog post.

I don't know exactly how many words I've written for this blog, but figuring that I average about 500 words a post, we can probably guestimate that around 50,000 words have gone into this blog.

50,000 words. That's longer than some of my WIPs.

That's a lot of time that's gone into blogging— and that doesn't even count the time I spent designing Writability and laying out the widgets and fixing buttons and promoting my posts, and it's certainly a lot of writing.

Which brings me to my point: blogging— that is, serious, consistent blogging— isn't easy. It's time-consuming work that takes discipline and creativity and a certain amount of organization to do it correctly.

Blogging is hard work. So why bother?

Looking back at the my first eight months in the blog world, at 32 weeks of writing post after post, I've come to realize that I don't regret a thing. In fact, starting a blog was probably one of the best decisions I made this year.

Why bother blogging?

Blogging teaches you discipline. This mostly applies if you blog consistently. Blogging with a deadline or quota of a certain number of posts per week not only teaches you how to be a disciplined writer—but it teaches you that you have the ability to write under pressure.

Blogging cultivates creativity. Coming up with new blog post ideas every week isn't easy. There are times when you'll be fresh out of ideas, but according to your blogging schedule you have a post due tomorrow anyway. That's when you have to start getting creative with your ideas. That's when you learn just how valuable creativity is after all.

Blogging forces you to think. As a writer, blogging about writing has been a hugely valuable experience for me. I know conventional blogging wisdom out there tells writers not to write about writing, but for me, blogging about writing has been as much of a learning experience as it has a chance to share my thoughts.

what makes a character beautiful

Blogging creates relationships. Some of my most loyal Twitter friends found me through this blog. Guest posting, commenting on each others' blogs and sharing post content all helps cultivate great online relationships. I've met some fantastic writers both through my blog and other blogs and I don't doubt that this trend will continue.

Blogging is fun. Just because something is a lot of work, doesn't mean it can't be fun, right? Right. In all seriousness, I'll continue to blog because I love it. Because the experience is valuable and it keeps me writing and call me crazy, but I think it's fun to come up with posts three times a week and interact with you guys and write and write and write.

So those are the reasons I will continue to blog. Do you blog? What would you add to the list?

Are You Waiting for Good Ideas?

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So the other day I was surfing the Twittersphere, trying to figure out what today’s post would be about, when one of my lovely followers asked me an interesting question.

“I was wondering if you always knew what to write about on your blog. I post only when I have something to talk about. But you need to post three times a week. Seems hard to me.”

Well, lovely anonymous follower, to the first part of your question—no, I don’t always know what to write about. In fact, I often don’t figure out what my post will be about until the day I write it (like ehem, now).

To the second part, here’s a secret: it is hard. And it’s also easy. Allow me to explain.

I suppose I could wait for a blog post idea to come to me—I’m not going to pretend it never happens, it does. Sometimes when I’m driving or working on my WIP or just daydreaming in general, I’ll come up with a good idea for a post. Then I celebrate a little and write down the idea.

But ideas don’t just come to me three times a week right in time for my Monday, Wednesday, Friday blogging schedule (that’d be too easy). So if the day before I’m supposed to post comes and I still don’t have any posting ideas, I sit in front of the computer and stare at the blank screen and flip through my blog archives and refuse to leave the computer until I’ve started writing a post. No exceptions.

Because yes, I could wait for an idea to come to me, but like most things in life, blog post ideas don’t often fall from the sky and land on your lap—sometimes you have to get up and go find them. And some days it’s hard—some days I sit at the computer and stare at the screen for what feels like years and the schedule-loving part of me whispers you need to write this post today so you have something to post tomorrow. You’ve never missed a day, Ava. Don’t start now. And I stare and stare and stare and it feels like I’ll never figure out what to write about.

Except I don’t give myself an option. I don’t allow myself not to write a post when I have one due. If I’m supposed to post tomorrow, then I’ll come up with a blog post idea if it kills me (and I’m still here, so the strategy seems to be working pretty well).

And some days it’s easy—some days I write a post and it spawns two or three other post ideas, so I add it to my list of running blog topic possibilities and then I do something else and sometimes more ideas rain down on me like wonderful gifts from the heavens. Some days I whip a blog post draft out in ten or fifteen minutes and I dance around in little circles in my mind because I feel accomplished and now I have all this extra time to do other things.

Yes, those are the easy days—but it’s certainly not every day, or even every other day. In fact, most days fall under the first category and the truth is, I don’t mind it.

Because blogging has taught me something important—that sometimes the best ideas don’t just fall in your lap, sometimes you have to chase them down and wrestle them onto the page. And it’s not just blog post ideas—it’s any sort of idea or inspiration that you need to keep writing.

Because yes, you can wait for the ideas to come, but why wait when you can go get them yourself?

I know it’s not as easy as it sounds, so I ask you—do you wait for blog post ideas to come to you or do you generate them yourself? Where do you get your posting ideas from?

Top 5 Most Popular Posts (On Writability)

Top 5 Most Active Commenters

Top 5 Favorite Tumblr Blogs of the Year

Top 5 Favorite Writing Blogs of the Year

Top 5 Favorite Favorite Twitter Accounts