I realize it’s no big surprise that I’ve struggled a bit lately with the blog. But just because I haven’t been posting, doesn’t mean I haven’t been thinking a lot about this blog. And my thoughts have run the gamut from “I’m just gonna pull the plug on this thing” to “I need a completely new focus” and everything else in between.
I like to write and posting on a blog has been very enjoyable to me. When I first started, I posted mostly for pleasure with no desire to amass a big following. My posts were on television shows, movies and music that I enjoyed and rants about things I did not enjoy.
When I began to use the blog for Flourish-related things, I changed the tone a bit and had a more structured list of topics. I worked on getting readers to further promote and explain Flourish events and activities. I was a bit more conservative with what I posted for several reasons. Those who don’t know me well often don’t “get” my somewhat sarcastic sense of humor and it didn’t always work on the blog. And also, I felt that since I had the link to the blog posted on the Flourish site, I should keep the topics to things that would interest and edify the women who would happen upon my blog and read it to learn more about the ministry.
I’ve recently been able to track the stats on the blog and have been watching things closely over the past six months. And I’ve mostly been discouraged. Blogging takes a lot of time each week, even if I keep the posts short, and it seems most of them aren’t being read. Since I’ve changed over to the “read more” option, awhile back, some posts have never been read. And while I’m still getting a small, but steady amount of people visiting the blog, the vast marjority of them do not click on a single article to read it in it’s entirety.
This tells me the sad truth that what I’m posting isn’t interesting to my readers. And on some level, I knew this, but have little idea how to fix it. I tried a survey a while back to see what people wanted to read or enjoyed reading. Twelve people participated and the highest rated post topics are some of the very same post topics that is read by one (or fewer, at times) person! So I’m wondering if the survey was just taken by one person twelve times.
I’m not going through all this detail to whine and complain. I honestly don’t care if I have a bunch of readers or none at all. It’s just that I think the time I spend on it shouldn’t be so disproportionate. It takes me several hours a week to blog, read the comments, and reply. (And then clear out the spam, update the software, and other behind-the-scenes housekeeping tasks!) My numbers tell me that in a week that I post seven to ten new entries, less than five minutes is spent on the blog by all my readers combined. That says a lot! Maybe it’s time to pull the plug.
Now comes the difficult part – because there are a lot of options to pulling the plug.
1. I can just stop blogging. Shut down the blog, and stop writing online completely.
2. I can tweak the idea of the Flourish blog, posting once every week or every other week to have far less posts more regularly. For example, new book and music reviews, articles and information could all be posted on Friday mornings. I would turn comments off so that I did not have to track them or delete all the spam they engender on my servers. Then I could spend far less time on the blog each week.
3. I can start a new blog of purely personal stuff. It’d take the link off the Flourish page, and mostly keep Flourish-related business off the blog. (Other than my own personal view of something, like sharing how much fun I had at an event, etc.) I’d blog more from my personal life and experiences. I certainly wouldn’t hide the blog and all my current readers could come on over. But it would get me back to the blogging I did for fun a long time ago. I’d blog when I had something to say, and I would probably find it easier to keep up with, knowing I was back to writing for myself.
So there’s what I’ve been thinking of, and why the blog has been empty. I have about half decided on one of the above options, but I’m still thinking things through so I don’t want to speculate yet on which one. I am going to keep up with the simple compassion stuff in some form, possibly putting it on a webpage and adding to it that way each week. Whether the blog goes on or not, that will continue until the end of the year in some format.
I want to stress that while I’m discouraged on one level, I’m not at all upset about this or trying to get more readers by writing all this out. I just wanted to explain that some changes are coming. While I’m not sure yet what path I’m taking, I feel I must make a change. I have too many things I want to do with my time that I’m not getting to do. The effort to keep the blog going as it is now, is not worth the return on that investment of time.
I’ll keep you posted. If I shut the blog down, I’ll send out an email to let everyone know where the Simple Compassion stuff will be moved to. If I go to once-a-week posting, I’ll also send out an e-mail to let everyone know the date they can expect new information.
If I decide to start a new, personal blog, I’ll post the new address here on this blog at the top of the page. I will likely purchase a new domain name for the blog and move it from the flourishministry.com address completely. I’ll probably also send out an email telling everyone that the Flourish blog is gone.
If you have thoughts on this, feel free to tell me what you think. I want to do the right thing here and am still unsure what that is.
Jess,
It’s sounds like you’ve made a reasonable assessment. I would do what you want to do, with the time you do have, concerning blogging. I know it’s in your heart to write, but write about things you’re passionate about. Write as a process you do for yourself. You’ve determined that there is not a need for it as a ministry. I’m not sure how much our congregation is on their computers.
Whatever you choose, I know that you will keep writing!
I think you should do what you like best with the blog – writing about what you want to write about!! I was really enjoying the Simple Compassion posts, but then I got behind
. I know – you are wondering how you can get behind on just reading a few pages a week?!?? Well, I did.
I wholeheartedly agree with your assessment, and I know, I too am guilty about not keeping up with the discussion from Simple Compassion, even though I had lots of thoughts to add. I enjoy hearing what your have to say, but if its taking too much time, then I’d only post something every now and then (once a week). You’ve tried and tried and tried to get people from SS to join in, but I think it’s mostly a matter of the time factor. And, people feel that they can’t write, so they don’t try. I’m sure you’ll make a wise decision
I took notes to comment on DWTS 
ha ha.