Don’t you find that keeping up with blogs and blogging goes out the window when things are busy?
I finally have a few minutes to catch up after a “drop everything and do this NOW” project this week that I just completed. This was something I had to quote on, and when I gave a range of what it might cost, the customer checked “If X then you will charge Y?” and jumped on the lower rate. Of course, that makes me think I quoted too low, but the customer will never say so.
Other random thoughts that went through my brain this week:
It bothers me when people write “a couple” and leave out the “of”, as in “X is looking for a couple bloggers.”
I ran across a cute term (but can’t remember where): word of mouse, about referrals through online connections.
If you have a blog, sometimes you will start to relate a story to someone, and he or she will say, “Oh yes, you blogged about that.” So you never really know who is reading your posts. As friend and fellow writer Gloria Hildebrandt referred to the people reading her novel in blog form, it’s a “secret society” of readers!
I like the term “word of mouse!” Pretty witty.
Yes, having people reveal that they’re reading your blog is an odd experience. Odder than writing for traditional forms of publication, where you accept that people might read and comment on your work. Blogging is a form of publishing, of course, with the potential for a vast readership. When you don’t instantly get hordes of comments, you tend to think few, perhaps no, people are reading you, so when you learn of those who are, it’s a bit disconcerting. I guess we’re not operating in quite the vacuum it sometimes seems!
Sue, how about this experience: in May I had two separate get-togethers with friends (first, dinner with an ex-pat communications friend on a fly-in visit to Toronto; second, lunch with a marketing pal who works not too far awau). Both of them started off by saying, “I made sure I visited your blog and caught up on all of your postings before meeting you.”
I asked both of them, “Why on earth would you feel the need to study up in advance?” Geez, Louise, I don’t expect friends to feel *obligated” to read the blog, particularly if /when public relations isn’t their discipline.
Equally weird was discovering that a work (comms) colleague had been reading the blog almost from the beginning; he heard about it from a colleague/friend in Hamilton.
The online world is small and fast.
Judy, that’s a new one — studying up on your posts before getting together! Whatever happened to talking about what’s been going on in your lives? The online world is indeed small and fast, and we may not even realize to what extent. As Gloria has found out, there are many lurkers out there, and I am often one of them, following but not commenting on quite a few blogs.