Here are a few situations where it might make sense for you to launch more than a single blog.

Multiple Blogs Make Sense If…

1. You’re blogging for pleasure and you have multiple distinct interests you want to talk about. “All-encompassing” blogs can actually be more difficult to build a following for and more difficult to rank well in search engines due to lack of targeted branding.
2. You’re blogging as a part of running your business and you need to target multiple unique target audiences. For example, one market of mine is other freelance writers because I sell products for you. Another would be small businesses interested in hiring a business writer. I have different blogs that appeal to those different groups.
3. You write under multiple names. If you use a pen name for some work (or more than one), you might want to consider a separate blog for that other “brand.” For example, I’m working on my first mystery novel which will be published under the pen name Aria Klein. I’m currently developing a new professional site and blog for that name both for branding and because fiction is a topic I don’t discuss much on my other sites. You might do the same if you’re a content writer who uses different names to write about different specialty areas.
4. You have the time to dedicate to multiple blogs. This is a big one. Blogging takes time — a lot of it if you want it to rank well and build a significant following. I’ve been at this for years and I still find it sometimes overwhelming when you factor in the admin, updates, back-ups, writing, editing, etc. — not even to mention working with other contributors and creating non-post content like a new podcast series we’ll be launching this week. I meet a lot of freelance writers who question whether or not they have the time to devote to one blog. If you’re struggling with one, you might want to wait on your new blog idea. If you can find ways to blog more efficiently on your current site and you have an interest in a new blog, you might be a good candidate for managing more than one.

For me, blogging habits vary quite a bit between different sites. I have several new ones in various stages of development right now and others that are active almost daily (like this blog) to ones updated once a week. One is actually updated by a contributor weekly and I rarely post there myself anymore, although that may change in the near future. Here are some of the main blogs I manage:

1. All Freelance Writing – the blog attached to this site
2. All Indie Publishing – my indie publishing blog
3. Jenn Mattern – my personal blog
4. BizAmmo – my small business blog
5. Social Realist – my social media blog (coming back tomorrow after a recent break while I decided on a new direction for it)
6. Climb Your Family Tree – my genealogy / family history blog
7. Pro Business Writer – my business writing blog attached to my business site (updated occasionally to keep the site fresh, but not as active as most of them)

I have others that are sitting around waiting on me to decide what to do with them, like one featuring free online courses from respected schools and organizations which I’m considering new branding for. And then there are several in development, mostly tied to the new fiction writing side of my business, including AriaKlein.com, MurderScripts.com (the site for the upcoming mystery book series and related ancillary products), and QuickMystery.com (a blog where I’ll publish short mystery stories to help me build my fiction platform before releasing the first book).

It sounds like a lot, but when you’re highly organized you can make it work in the long run. Tomorrow I’ll share some tips and simple organization tools I use to keep things straight, help me map out plans and goals for each site, and keep them updated as often as possible.

How many blogs do you run? Would you like to start another one, or do you feel it would require too much of a time commitment? Do you think you could streamline the process to make multiple blogs a more realistic option for you? Leave a comment below to share your thoughts.

Did the warning above sound kinda circular in its logic when you first read it? Okay, good—it should. If you make your rounds in the freelance blogging community, chances are you’ve seen the words: Elitist, Hater, Negative and Angry come up time and time again on blog posts and in blog comments. They generally come up in two instances:

1. One blogger said something that another blogger or reader does not agree with.

2. Oh, wait, that’s the only time these words seem to come up. Huh. Interesting.

The Problem

So what is the real problem here? Is it the fact that everyone in the freelance writing community doesn’t agree with each other all the time like we live in a freakin’ hippie commune or the fact that it’s difficult for some people to just stand by their convictions using logic and reason alone and not resort to disparaging labels that make them feel safer?

The Example

In my experience, if a blogger thinks that—

• writing for content mills full time is a lousy career choice for a writer,
• working for a residual income by using Associated Content or Hubpages is a fool’s errand,
• print writing is more “legitimate” than web writing,
• the marketing tactics of some content mills are shameful,
• writing for pennies is not sustainable and is unnecessary,
• self-publishing is worthless,
• writing on spec is a huge mistake

—then suddenly they are a negative hater or an angry elitist.

How in the world could someone come to that conclusion? If I absolutely despise the thought of eating ham and you like it—does that make either of us elitists, haters, negative or angry? If I love cats and don’t like dogs and you love dogs and don’t like cats, does that make either of us elitists, haters, negative or angry? Of course not.

And guess what? If a blogger writes a general post that happens to disparage the way you decide to run your career, before you tweet about how negative they are or write a comment or email about how they’re such a negative hater who must be angry, you should stop to consider the fact that the post is not about you. It’s about the author and their opinion. You make it about you when you get all weepy and defensive while reading it.

The Solution

So go forth writers and remember—disagreeing with someone, voicing a negative opinion about a gig or process, and standing up for freelancers in whatever way you see fit does not make you negative, hate-filled, angry or elitist—no matter how often you do it or who agrees with you.

And readers, you don’t have to like any of the things that bloggers “say” to you with their posts—but you should remember that if you take it personally or have a strong emotional reaction to it, it’s no one’s fault but your own. Own your feelings and either move on or do your cause or belief a favor and construct a vehement argument that doesn’t attempt to debase the blogger you disagree with because when you do, you’re the one who is a negative and angry hater.

The Disclaimer

Oh, and before you read this post and think it was about you, let me tell you that it wasn’t. Now, I’m not going to go all Carly Simon on you and never tell you who this post was about–well, actually, I am–because it’s not about any one blogger. These words are everywhere. The straw that broke the camel’s back, however, was this.

Hopefully, you realize that the same is true about many of the freelance writing, marketing, and social networking blogs out there. But which ones are full of it and which ones aren’t? In fact, how do you even know that I am a real freelance writer with what you would consider a successful career versus someone who’s just a poser? Would you want my advice if my career sucked? I hope not and sheesh, to some of you my career probably does, so maybe you should stop reading… but then you don’t really know what camp you fall in, do you? Don’t you owe it to yourself to try to get to know your bloggers before you start taking their advice?

3 Easy Ways to Do Due Diligence Before Taking a Blogger’s Advice (hahaha, I said doo-doo)

1. Check out your advising bloggers’ portfolio sites, client lists and by-lined articles. Are they good? Are they professional? Do they have evidence of a career that you would like to emulate within your own specialty? For me, I want to take career advice from people whose careers are on par with mine or who are doing better. I did community theater for years. Do you think that means Sir Ian McKellen wants to read my acting advice blog post? Yeah, probably not, but someone new to community theater might.
2. Look for bloggers who give examples with their advice. Do your favorite bloggers include personal anecdotes with their advice so you can see how they found out their advice worked or why they give it—or are they just parroting the same old tired advice given by everyone else? Personally, I want bloggers who talk from experience, not from reading other people’s blog posts. I want to know why something did or didn’t work for them so I can get a better feel about how it will work for me. I’m a different person–maybe it will work better. Or, maybe I see enough similarities that I recognize how it won’t work.
3. Are they keeping it real? A “real” blogger is going to have ups and downs. Someone who is trying to be honest and not just paint a rosy picture is going to share their ups and downs with you—maybe not in specific detail but it will come out in their posts. Bloggers who are trying too hard to present a certain one-dimensional image are not being honest with you at least on a personality level, so what else are they not being honest about?  I always wonder if these bloggers are coming from a place of insecurity. If they are, I totally get it, but maybe I don’t want to take my career advice from them. And if they are doing it so they can promote their product, well, then I certainly don’t want their bias limiting my career.

So take a few minutes and think about all the traits you want in a blogger and then do some due diligence to make sure your favorite bloggers measure up. Or don’t. Oh crap, I’m being wishy-washy… the number one trait I don’t want in bloggers I get advice from.

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1. People already know what you said. One of the worst reasons you could delete a blog post is regretting your words after you publish. First of all, if you’re going to bother with regret, after publishing is too late. Think before you post. Once it’s out there in feed readers, email inboxes, etc., there’s no going back. People have seen what you’ve said anyway, and you do nothing but make yourself look like either a hypocrite or someone with something to hide. If you’ve changed your mind, edit the post and say so (strikethrough the previous information for example, but don’t hide things). If you realize you screwed up, then edit the post and own up to it. Apologize if it’s necessary, and just move on. It’s far more respectable.
2. Nothing on the Web is ever completely deleted. It doesn’t matter that you deleted the post from your blog. It’s still probably cached in search engines. It was probably in feed readers. It might be in the Internet Archive for all you know. It’s very likely in the email box of some subscribers (anyone can subscribe to your feed via email and have a permanent record of your post, whether or not you personally enable email subscriptions). Again, you just look like you have something to hide, and you never know when it could come back and bite you on the ass (all it takes is for one reader to call you out on it for a simple deletion to turn into major drama for you — not worth it).
3. Your blog posts show your progression. It’s okay to change your mind over time. We all learn new things and have new experiences that might influence our opinions on an issue. That doesn’t mean you should go back and delete old posts sharing old opinions because you’re afraid you look hypocritical. Instead take it as an opportunity to connect with your readers. Let them get to know you better by sharing your thought process. What made you change your mind? You’ll have more positive influence by justifying what you’re telling readers than by simply flip-flopping. Don’t understimate people’s memories. Just because you delete a post, it doesn’t mean your readers don’t remember the views you shared.

There are certainly exceptions to the rule. While I’ve very rarely deleted anything from my blogs, here are a few cases where I did, and why:

1. When I merged two writing blogs, there were some overlapping posts. They were literally copy / paste — things I’d cross-published (like a product launch announcement). So I would delete one while leaving the other. Basically I was just keeping one copy of a post rather than having two copies in the archives.
2. When SixFigureWriters.com (a group blog) became AllFreelanceWriting.com (a solo blog at the time), I removed posts from the other writers if they wanted me to. I wasn’t going to move on and profit from their posts, and some had their own writing blogs where they could put the content to use. Because it was a team effort for a jointly-run blog rather than my blog where I was hiring writers (like now), it came down to respecting author rights. That said, I don’t expect that I’d be a part of that kind of model again (not that it wasn’t a lot of fun at the time — it was).
3. There was one post on my PR blog that had to be removed because it attracted an insane amount of “undesirable” traffic. I don’t mean attracting people who disagreed with me or anything — I don’t mind that in the slightest. I mean the porn variety. For some reason links to this particular article were all over adult sites, I was getting tons of inappropriate comments to moderate, and plenty of spam to boot. It was at the point where the administrative time needed to manage issues with that one post exceeded administrative time for the rest of the blog as a whole. The post wasn’t important in any way — pretty generic for that blog as it was — so I opted to kill the piece rather than devote the time to something that was pretty much invisible to my actual readers anyway.

In most cases there are other ways to deal with things you wish you hadn’t posted. For example, if you reviewed a product positively and it was updated (and you think it’s awful), it’s okay to go back and edit your original review with a new opening or an end note saying this is an archived review of an older version and your feelings have changed. If you don’t want to do anything to promote a certain person anymore, go through your post and delete or nofollow their links instead of deleting the posts. If you simply have a “Whoops!” moment and you realize you were unintentionally offensive, just edit the post and add a quick apology and / or disclaimer to clarify what you meant.

What about you? Have you seen your favorite bloggers deleting posts? What crosses your mind when you see it happen? What would it take for you to be able to justify deleting your own posts from your blog? When does deleting blog posts cross a line?

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Oh but then you couldn’t get enough, could you? It turns out that Xanga was just a gateway blog for you. You started thinking about increasing your SEO. You started updating your meta description before you even wrote your posts. You imported your blog from a nice free service to your own self-hosted domain. And–dare I even say it?–you got a Sociable plug-in. Do you even recognize yourself in the mirror?

I’m sorry. I got a little accusatory. This is an intervention. I am doing this because I love you. I …worry. I think you may have become a blogwhore. Don’t believe me? Here are five signs that you’ve become a total blogwhore:

1. You now read more than ten blogs per day and leave a daily comment on each one. You have never once actually contributed to the conversation beyond something chirpy like, “Wow! Great article! I never thought of it that way!” Even if the article is about tying your shoes. This is the blog equivalent of telling someone to have a great summer in their yearbook back in high school. I also hate it when you do this because I am awfully witty, and that just means you ignored my totally rad comments. Sorry, again, this is not about me.
2. I follow you on Twitter, and I don’t think you have once tweeted about anything but your blog. Not only that, but you often retweet yourself. That is like clapping for yourself at an award ceremony. It’s one level below getting drunk and humiliating Taylor Swift.
3. You use bit.ly and su.pr, so when you update your blog, I’m always tricked into clicking on it. You always post links to your own writing like they’re a complete and total surprise to you. “Wow! Look at what I found!” you tweet. I know you’re not surprised by your own writing, not unless you’re part guppy. Is there something you’re not telling me?
4. You post status updates on Facebook AND you hooked up your RSS feed to Facebook notes. Not only that but you’ve also linked your updates to Tumblr and Twitter so for any given update to your blog, I end up seeing that you just wrote an update four times. The next logical step is for you to call me, leave me a voicemail, text me, email me, fax me, send me snail mail, and physically come to my house and announce via megaphone that you updated. If you want, I even know a guy who can do skywriting. He’s not cheap, but people need to know that you JUST NOW at THIS VERY MOMENT updated, so spare no expense.
5. The last time I sent you an email, you asked me if I wouldn’t mind submitting your response to Digg.

We need you to stop before you end up, cold and shaking, outside the New Media Expo, asking people if they’d be willing to give you a linkback if you add them to your blogroll. Do you recognize yourself?

In addition to Clint Osterholz and Yolander Prinzel who will be taking on the freelance writing jobs and blogging jobs, we’ve also added Jenn Escalona and LaToya Irby to the group. I’m thrilled to have them on board!

Jenn Escalona will be publishing a monthly column on the first of each month offering a DIY project tailored to freelance writers. I asked her to come on in this capacity after her excellent idea on her own blog a while back regarding making your own white boards (because those babies can get expensive if you like a lot of writing space!). Find out more about hiring Jenn at JennEscalona.com or follow her on Twitter @jennescalona.

LaToya Irby will be running a bi-weekly Freelance Finance column offering money and finance-related tips for freelancers. You can find out more about LaToya’s business and finance writing at Irblance.com or follow her on Twitter @aboutcredit.

We will be adding a fifth new blogger to the team shortly. I put the offer out to someone and am waiting to hear back. One way or the other, we’ll be bringing someone in to publish another bi-weekly column – a “how to write” series which will offer tips and advice on tackling specific types of writing projects (SEO articles, feature articles, press releases, sales letters, etc.). More on that once we’ve confirmed who our final new blogger (for now) will be.

I have some other exciting (and some not-so-exciting) announcements coming up soon. New products, new freebies, a contest, and more. We’re going to be seriously stepping things up here between now and the end of the year, so I hope everyone’s ready for the ride!

I stumbled across a comment on Deb’s blog last night, where the reader (in short) said that blog posts should be objective and not based on opinions. I found that odd. After all, opinions are what make blogs blogs. Remember they were originally started as more of a journal than an educational tool. The content has morphed from personal blogs to a wider variety or topics including business and niche blogs. Let’s look at niche blogs specifically, since that’s the type of blog the comment was left on.

Here’s why you may be expecting too much from your favorite bloggers if you expect what they say to be objective all the time:

1. Blog posts are often controversial (and conversational). When you post about controversial topics, you should have an opinion (even if you try to present both sides, it should be somewhat clear to readers where you stand). That’s basic transparency. The controversial nature of blog posts is a good thing — a very, very good thing. What makes blogs different than other online media is the open interaction. If you lay out absolutely everything, there’s really little left for people to comment on. Where’s the conversation?
2. Blogs can’t cover everything. It just isn’t possible. Therefore every single post is, in some way, influenced by the blogger’s (or blog owner’s) opinions. For example, even how-to topics are chosen. I would be much more likely to write a how-to on article marketing that focused on the PR elements of more limited runs. I wouldn’t likely write a how-to post on article marketing through spammy article directories. Even if the article itself doesn’t spout opinions, the choice to publish it did. The same is true when the blogger chooses how to write that how-to (the steps, tools, etc.). If there is more than one way to do something, then opinion played a role in that post.
3. Blogs rely on personality. Make that “successful blogs rely on personality.” A blogger’s personality can’t really shine through their posts if they never share opinions. It’s a fundamental aspect of readers being able to connect with them.

If you expect bloggers to always be completely objective and not focus on their own opinions, I’d say you’re expecting too much (and the completely unnatural). That’s not to say that opinions should be influenced by things like sponsors, but that bloggers should always be able to share their opinions on their own blog. If you don’t like it, start your own. That’s the beauty of it. Everyone can have a platform.

What do you think? Should bloggers refrain from sharing their opinions and stick to completely objective educational posts?

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