How Automatic would you make you blog?

[orion_joel]

Hi All,

Real quick question, How automatic would you make your blog?

For example if you had enough content to schedule posts for 3 months, would you do this? Or would you tend towards scheduling maybe only 2 or 3 in advance?

[vangogh]

Depends on how quickly you could write more. I see no reason why you can't schedule three months of posts in advance, but on the other hand it's not like you couldn't schedule to weeks of posts to go live and then sometime during those next two weeks schedule the next batch.

One advantage to not leaving things on autopilot is you can cash in on trends and news. Maybe something will come up three weeks from now and you have a post written about it, but you've scheduled it for three months out instead of three weeks. By the time your post goes live people have moved on to another topic and no one is interested. Had you published your post when the news broke you probably could have pulled more traffic and attracted more readers to your blog.

[orion_joel]

That is actually quite a valid point you make Vangogh, and actually the one downfall i had been thinking was potentially there. However i think the angle that i was looking at it more was, if i was to write a post on one topic, and a comment on that post lead directly to another topic, as in answering a question, i would miss that potential to answer the question in reference to the comment, thus maybe creating more of a link with readers.

[vangogh]

That's another good reason for not leaving things on autopilot for so long. I see no reason why you can't schedule several posts to publish. It's commonly done, but I think it's still a good idea to be more involved in your blog. You could schedule posts and then as comments come up write a new post in response. You could always have an extra post one week or change the date on a scheduled post to substitute your new response.

You can always schedule posts several months out and make changes as necessary. I think the main thing is not leaving the blog on autopilot, but keeping track of what's going to be published each week and adjust as necessary.

[KristineS]

I think it depends somewhat on the blog. For personal blogs where people come to read because of a particular personality, I don't think you could leave things on autopilot too long. If it's an informative blog, than you could probably get away with it a bit longer.

Vangogh is right though, you need to be topical.

[billbenson]

Take a site that has the recipe of the day for example. You could do that for a year. I know someone with a Joomla site that did just that.

Take something like a Brittney Spears site. You could probably find a RSS feed somewhere that has Brittney news of the day (dunno, didn't check). Assuming there is one, you could access the Brittney news of the day and stick it in the database automatically. It would probably take some programming, but almost certainly is feasible.

The above would allow you to have a completely automatic up to date blog. Might need to be careful on copyright violations though.

Things like the above are the power of databases. If you think out of the box a bit, you can do some incredible stuff. There are probably duplicate content issues with the above as well. I was just using it as an example of what can be done.

[seolman]

I guess if I was a better writer I could automate part of my posts...but just getting off my backside and writing a post take a Herculean effort these days :p

[billbenson]

I guess if I was a better writer I could automate part of my posts...but just getting off my backside and writing a post take a Herculean effort these days :p

Soelman: Take a laptop to the beach on a weekend and you are done for a year :)

Of course who am I to talk, I've never done it - done annual price list changes though. Kind of the same thing. Editing a several thousand line excel sheet isn't my idea of a good time. Better at the beach though!!

[seolman]

Man...if I can just find that beach with wireless I've got it made!

[billbenson]

Just find a hotel and act like a businessman.

Wife was in a training class a few years ago that was an hour away. I had to drive her. I parked myself in a business hotel with a laptop for a week. Nobody ever said anything,

[orion_joel]

Seolman, i find that doing things like writing away from home, works really well for me as well. I spend 1-2 hours every day sitting in a coffee shop about 10 minutes from home. I have sometimes written anything up to 5 or 6 articles in one sitting before. It is sometimes amazing the amount of writing that you can get done if you are in a different surrounding.

Also Bill that sounds like a really good example of what i mean for my No Fixed Office Blog, just getting the laptop and going out somewhere the beach a hotel wherever and just writing or doing something for your business.

[seolman]

I do that once in a while. I go to the local coffee shop with wireless - write and gain a few pounds. It does work. You are right about that. I haven't gotten away for my Latte for quite a while now...:)

[vangogh]

I've never gotten into going to a coffee shop to work, but I probably should give it more of a try if just to change my environment very once in awhile.

[seolman]

Just watch out for the chocolate cakes...throws you off your focus

[vangogh]

mmm...chocolate.

I think for me there would be too many distractions to be able to work. Oddly I can focus well with the stereo or tv on, but if two people are whispering across the room I end up focusing on them instead of whatever I was doing. When there are too many people around me my attention goes to them instead of the work at hand.

[KristineS]

I tend not to go somewhere else when I work. When I go somewhere I'm going for a purpose. Just sitting around in a coffee shop writing doesn't appeal to me. Of course coffee shops in general don't normally appeal to me so that might be part of the reason I don't use them for work.

[seolman]

Vangogh I have an idea - we put our minds together and build an automated blogging system that will sniff out goodies from Sphinn and other blog resources - it will do all the work for the site owner. We'll call it "Wordpress-o-matic" - make millions!

[vangogh]

Will it write our posts too?

[orion_joel]

I find a coffee shop to be quite good, once i have the idea of the article in my mind, i can actually write even with the distractions. Touch typing can be a real benefit, i can be watching someone walk past and still be typing away. Then like yesterday i was sitting with a window beside me and next thing i realize someone is watching over my shoulder not closely, but i was still looking when i was fully looking to my side at them. Maybe that is what they were watching the fact that i could still type while trying to see why they were watching me.

[seolman]

This is me touch typing..
akdhakcnsuiHCskdncLSCKJOS SANCSCNccnzkxjc z

[orion_joel]

This is me touch typing, i think i have worked out that the best that i can do is about 80 words a minute when i am typing my thoughts directly, and there is still some spelling that i have to fix up, so adjusted it probably more like 50 words a minute .

[vangogh]

Clear as day. Have you ever thought of getting a job as an administrative assistant?

[orion_joel]

No Because i type that fast and still manage to hit backspace about 20 times a minute. So if i was to go and do the test to certify that speed it would be much lower.

Also i think that i would get completely bored doing that sort of job. Not to mention it does not pay that great. Funny enough though the job i have at the moment, comes under a Clerical Award. Even though there is little if anything to do with admin or clerical duties in it.

[billbenson]

I took typing in high school back in the early 70's when it wasn't really a macho thing to do. Class full of girls so it worked out well. It wasn't until after college that the Apple II came out and I started to need to type. Who was to know that it would end up being an important skill.

[orion_joel]

I think being able to type well, as well as quickly, is very important not even just for admin type jobs. If i was not able to type as well as i do, i do not think that i would spend as much time on forums, replying and also would probably not have gained much interest in blogging as i would have to spend a lot more time writing, and would probably spend more of that time trying to remember the different points that i want to convey.

The funny thing is that one of my previous coworkers, believed that guys should not be able to type above the skill of just using two fingers and pointing at the keys you want to type, in fact quiet a slow way. The one thing that i have found is that while in highschool we were told always return to the home row and over the asdf jkl; keys i am more prone to just hover my hands of the keyboard and just from so much practice 98% of the time hit the right mark.

[billbenson]

My wife types with just a couple of fingers - certainly not the way I was taught and she's really fast. But she reads incredibly fast as well. Maybe they are related.

[vangogh]

Joel the admin job was meant more as a joke for Dave (seolman) after his wonderful display of his touch typing skills.

I took a typing class my senior year of high school, but I still touch type. I do know where all the keys are so I don't have to look down while I type, but I know I could be faster. I can probably type around 40 -50 words a minute, which isn't too fast, but still faster than many.

[KristineS]

I took typing in high school, but don't remember much about it. The teacher was the coach of the basketball team or football team or something like that, and we didn't learn much.

I've taken clerical typing tests and I score pretty high, but I think most of my typing speed is attributable to the fact I type so much. I don't think I could write anything of any length longhand anymore. I'm so used to typing now.

[orion_joel]

Ahh sorry Vangogh, did not think of it that way.

[vangogh]

I think we were posting at the same time. When I started I was right after Dave's comment. It was easy to think I meant you once your post showed up.

[orion_joel]

Oh well cannot help bad luck, it seems to happen often to me that i am posting something and then when i hit submit another one appears between the one i was responding to and mine. Sometimes similar response, sometimes different.

[seolman]

Joel the admin job was meant more as a joke for Dave (seolman) after his wonderful display of his touch typing skills.

I can type 80 words a minute as long as nobody cares if it's readable...

kljaslebcOXfgalrsnkjchnskz :D

[vangogh]

There you go again, putting all of us to shame with your mad typing skills.

[seolman]

It's in the blood Steve it's in the blood...

[orion_joel]

Now i understand the secret, i need your blood to complete me as a typing super human.

[vangogh]

I sense a new transfusion business about to open.

[seolman]

Sorry - no transfusions - only confusions...and plenty of that.

[orion_joel]

Oh what a relief, it is so much easier to provide confusions then it is to provide transfusions. For a confusion all you got to do is say "Understand what the government is doing"