In Which I Have a Lightbulb Moment and Understand How to Sort My Social Media

First things first. Blog party next weekend, and thanks to Suzie for the early invite. The blogger hosting the party is doing it to roll out a rebrand of his music blog. You can find him on Twitter at @SteveSays2014 and cast a vote to help him pick his new brand here.

This has nothing to do with Steve’s blog. I am just hoisting the flag today, is all!

I’ve updated the About Page. The writing theme is completely gone because I ran out of useful writing advice months ago. If you enjoy writing blogs and are looking for help there, try Write On! Sisters. They are far better at it than me. The about page revision is a transitional thing to get us through to fall. I plan to shut down the social media for a weekend in October and revamp the pages and categories here. For now, what I have must suffice.

I’ve been trying to figure out what to do with this blog, its Facebook page, and the @justgeneo Twitter account for awhile. The only thing I can do here consistently is the #WeekendCoffeeShare post and link to social blogging opportunities like Steve’s blog party when I can find them, because Sourcerer keeps me busy.

The coffee posts don’t work for Sourcerer. They also don’t work as guest posts, because they are too personal. And I need this blog to build link archives for projects that span multiple blogs. I need it to host the #1000Speak linkup, to publish feminist posts, to display my Blog Blitz badge and my personal gravatar.

The Facebook page and the Twitter account have been sleeping for months now. I’ve thought about shutting them down. Decided this weekend to not. Here’s what I am doing instead. This will take a while to get rolling, but I can set the thing up and manage it.

I’m doing the A to Z Challenge Road Trip. That’s an activity where you keep visiting the A to Z list and meeting new bloggers after the challenge itself is over. Details to come at the A to Z blog May 13.

https://twitter.com/hmgardner/status/596728723702874112

• Since I am doing nothing right now with the Facebook page, nor the Twitter account.
• Since I can use Buffer to schedule 100 updates at a time for each.
• Since 4 complete A to Z Challenges gives me 104 links to work with, and since I have WAY MORE than four friends who have collected all of this year’s posts in single posts or on pages  . . .

. . . I’m in the process of collecting A to Z index posts, which I will then use to set up a low-frequency posting schedule for the page and the Twitter account. Three shares a day is a sight better than none. 100 queued posts at a rate of three a day covers the page and the Twitter account for 33.333 days.

The latest participant badge. Not on my sidebar, because I did not do A to Z here this year. Did it another way.

My plan is to load the queues to full. Let them run down for a few days, then start adding the road trip discoveries into the mix once that gets rolling. Eventually, I’m running through two proven A to Z Challenges per day in order at the same time each day, and in the middle, there is a new find. I answer the notifications as I am able. Enough to demonstrate that I am not a bot and enjoy meeting new people.

Clever, non?

There is also a Facebook collaboration/support group just for bloggers run by me coming at some point. I’m not far enough along to set it up yet. But I’ve been studying Facebook groups for a while now. I know what I want, and what my friends like in a Facebook group. We’ll get there.

This is quite enough for one day.

#SundayBlogShare will be busy and wild today, if I have anything to say about it!

Related articles

• Blog Traffic and Engagement: Zemanta
• Roundup: #Friendly #Bloggers
• TwitterBlog: The Importance of Monday Blogs

Weekend Coffee Share: A to Z Eve Edition

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you my grandson got his standardized test results back this week, and he did super-good in math. Better, in fact, than I ever did with math in school. He’s also moved up two reading levels in the last few weeks. I am so proud 🙂

Getty stock image.

And I I’d tell you it’s been a busy week at work, and an equally busy week in the blogosphere. I’ve spent most of my time this week in the WordPress dashboard finalizing Sourcerer’s posts for the Blogging A to Z in April Challenge. I’ve done well.

We’ve got 16 of our A to Z posts finalized – we only lack two posts to be completely scheduled for the first two weeks. I have also managed to load a Sunday morning Weekend Music feature for every week in April and get started on the Tuesday and Wednesday photo features. That hasn’t left a lot of time to do anything else except answer my own threads.

Speaking of answering my own threads . . .

Thanks to everyone who commented on my coffee post last week. I wasn’t able to get back to that thread in good time, so I finally just posted a final comment there and liked everything. I appreciate the support, truly, and I will not often allow a thread that good to slip through the cracks unanswered.

I’d tell you I did my first ever blogger interview this week. Chouett.com was kind enough to interview me and feature Sourcerer on the sidebar for the week. That was a lot of fun, and I appreciate the opportunity. (Give Chouett a look!)

And, just to be sure there’s no post-April lull in my blogging life, I’ve signed up for the Beach Party Blogathon in June. It’s sponsored by the awesome film blogs Speakeasy and Silver Screenings. I’ve been following their blogathons and wanting to join in for awhile. I’ll be writing about Captain Blood for this event, and my post will run at Sourcerer.

I’d tell you, too, that 1000 Voices Speaking for Compassion is going monthly. The next linkup day is April 20. The topic is “Nurturing.”

I’ve not had much time to keep up with the group this week, but I am still checking in as I have time and trying to help them build a Twitter following. I’m still planning to keep hosting the linkups, whether I am able to write a post for 1000 Speak or not; the linkup post on April 20 will likely be the only post other than these coffee posts I publish here next month.

And that’s about all I’d have to say, because April is almost here, and I still have a lot to get squared away before Wednesday. Now I’m away to have coffee with an online friend I’ve known for a year, and have never met offline until today, then spending a big part of the afternoon out with the grandson, so I won’t be around much today.

Happy weekend, and keep blogging!

New Order of Business

An aside to let you know what to expect here during April and beyond.

First, thanks to Chouett.com for giving me my first blogger interview and featuring Sourcerer on the sidebar for a week. You can’t buy promotion that good at any price, and the interview was a blast. If any of you want to do me a favor, take a look at the interview, comment on it, and poke around a bit at Chouett. That is an up-and-coming blog if I ever saw one.

I’m not doing the Friday 56 here for the next few weeks because I don’t have time to do visits or answer the threads, and I don’t want to become known as the guy who joins the linkup and doesn’t visit. Post-April, I’m planning to move that feature to Sourcerer and shift the weekend music to Saturdays until Melissa finishes up with Arrow.

The only things I’m doing at this blog until May, once I publish this, are #WeekendCoffeeShare posts. This is the transitional month for Just Gene’O. Once April is done, the only thing you’ll see in this space are the coffee post on Saturdays, promotions for projects & social blogging events, and series I’m testing like I did with the Friday 56 here for the last month. That’s what this blog has evolved into. All these things are a necessary part of my game, and they’re all I have time to do on a personal blog.

The about page obviously needs to change to reflect this transition, but I doubt I’ll have time to do that before May.

If you are a friend or a regular reader, and you are doing the A to Z Challenge, drop a front page link on the thread of the directory post if you are not already listed. I’ll update that list between now and the end of the month, then copy it and run it at Sourcerer the Tuesday before A to Z starts. I’ll truncate the post Tuesday night and stick the list to the front page. Once April 1 arrives, no more updates to that list.

I’m also loading five weekend music/open threads for Sundays in April at Sourcerer so anyone who’d like to can stop by, share their own favorite posts or best finds from the previous week, and chatter on the thread.

Best wishes to everyone with the A to Z Challenge! Most of my time during April will be spent answering Sourcerer’s threads and visiting new blogs from the A to Z list, so you will not see me around much unless you happen to be visiting the same blogs as me or commenting on my threads. Sourcerer is #93 on the list as of now. I’m starting with #94 and doing my best to visit five from the list every single evening in April.

I’ll be back up to my usual tricks in May.

(Note the absence of tags. I am also not publicizing the post outside WordPress. This is one of those moments where I minimize the audience and see who’s paying attention.)