Wednesday, January 26, 2011

To Follow or Not To Follow

I've been doing this blogging thing for a while now and the last couple of weeks I have faced the same question that many of you have faced . . . to follow or not to follow.

I started this blog as a way for me to vent, discuss my sweet family, and to document our memories.  Over time, though, I have realized that I could pick up a few dollars here and there just by putting all of my thoughts out there.  To make money or to get chosen to write review and such you have to generate traffic.  To generate traffic you do blog hops.  To really generate traffic, you follow people in hopes that they will follow you back. 

This is where I am in a quandry.

I think that everyone out there has something interesting to say.  A story to tell.  My problem is that I do actually read every single blog that I follow.  I try to make comments and really be engaged in the lives of the people I follow.  I feel like if I just follow to follow then this bloggy world that I have come to love will lose its flair for me.  I will open up the Dashboard and be inundated with things that really don't interest me that much.

How do you guys deal with this?  For those of you who are making good money or just any extra money, how did you deal with this problem?  I know some of the people I follow have 1,000+ followers.  I think to myself if those people follow back all of their followers, how do they keep up with everyone.

What do you guys do?


3 comments:

  1. Oh I hear ya. I try to look at each new post and I would love to comment...but here is the problem- this is NOT a full time job for me. this is supposed to be fun but if I step away from my computer, my google reader explodes...and I get super overwhelmed. I honestly don't know how to balance it. If you have a solution....please send it my way too. Because I honestly have no idea how some people do it.

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  2. I'm with you! I really read those that I follow too, and find that after awhile, if I'm not commenting, I must not find them interesting and I stop following. I work 8-5 M-F so I just do not have time to read hundreds of blogs, I only have 32 followers, and I try so hard to read all of their blogs. Plus some that I really just enjoy that I know they will never follow me back. It takes a lot of time, and recently work has been overwhelming so I haven't been able to read at work any. I don't know how to solve the problem, but if you get any good recommendations, pass them along to me!! :)

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  3. I have a similar post in draft! haha. I actually don't follow a blog a won't read. My problem is since getting involved with FTLOB I have found too many awesome blogs! I want to read them all but when I open my google reader and see 300 posts I want to pass out. I'm confused and overwhelmed and my own blog is suffering while I am out trying to comment on everyone elses. I hope you get some good advice here, I could use it too!

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