Well, I did it. I’ve given up my BootsnAll family travel blog, the first one I ever started (way back in February 2006.)
With my daughter starting college this fall, more speaking engagements coming up, all the things that we’re doing at Tourism Currents plus wanting to write a book about entrepreneurship….something had to go.
Although I’m still one of the Perceptive Travel blog contributors, and sometimes do guest posts on other people’s blogs, I’d like to have someplace to put travel content that doesn’t fit elsewhere.
One of the “rules” of blogging is that you don’t confuse readers by mixing up topics – if they come to read your thoughts on, say, gardening, don’t suddenly start adding posts about classic Mustangs. Go start a separate Mustang blog, says the conventional wisdom.
Since I’m not interested in launching yet another new blog, I’ve decided that there is a way around this “rule” – actually my blogging mentor Liz Strauss gave me this suggestion – so I’ll start writing a few straight travel posts on this blog, but only run them on Fridays.
That way, people who come here to read about tourism and social media/tech can skip those days if they want to, and I’m not muddying the content waters too much (plus I’m announcing it ahead of time and not just springing some random post about Amsterdam on you.)
I don’t usually cover general travel news or do product reviews; these will be posts about places I visit and my personal experiences. Here are my thoughts on pitching and freebies disclosure, just so you’ll know how I operate.
Let’s talk (a little) about travel!
(If you like this post, please consider subscribing to the blog via RSS feed or by email – the email signup box is on the right sidebar near the Search box. Thanks!)
Congrats on cutting back. I am sure you will find success with your new focus – and how exciting about the book deal! Congrats!
Happy 2011 my friend.
Hi Andy, and Happy New Year!
Thanks as always for the stalwart support. Must confess re: the “book deal” though….I do plan to write one but haven’t decided yet how I’ll publish it. Have now registered for an Agents and Editors conference June 2011 here in Austin, where I’ll ponder my options. Looking into Seth Godin’s Domino Project with amazon, too (http://www.thedominoproject.com/about .)
I think giving people a slot to rely on works well, Sheila, and no-one will be confused. And who knows, some of your travel regulars might enjoy reading other posts too!
I did something similar a while back…adding occasional “Where I live” posts at Midwest Guest to cover more local (Detroit-area and usually time-dated) topics when another online market where I’d been writing such articles dried up on me. I often run “Where I live” posts on Wednesdays (although not always-this week was an exception as I had two events I wanted to fit in), while still sticking to my usual more evergreen posts about the wider Midwest region on most Tuesdays and Thursdays.
I definitely seemed to get a bit of a bump in traffic when I started the WIL posts…drawing hits more quickly over a shorter time period among a little more regular and local audience. Meanwhile, most of my evergreen topics have a longer tail and draw more traffic from search engines over time.
I also was able to make some more inroads with local org PR reps and get on their press lists after posting WIL posts more often.
Don’t see a problem with adding in a regular or semi-regular category in a topic that may be a bit different, but still closely related to the mail focus of your blog. Seemed to work just fine for me 🙂
I meant to say “main focus of your blog” in the last graph 😆
Thanks Dominique and Sharon – so far, so good!