10 things you can do to your blog on a weekend
Every weekend,(this may sound bizzare), i pay an evening visit to my office, just to make sure that my weekend tasks are all completed and i have no left overs.This may be on the way to the club or after my weekend shopping spree.
Well, i know it sounds bizarre, and some of you may already be thinking what a jerk I am. Well, i must admit that i am some kind of a jerk to do that, but i find it very helpful.One thing is that every Friday evening, i’m extremely busy with completing reports and taks that i dont get time to pay attention to all my scheduling tasks.So Saturday evenings to me are about scheduling my week ahead before i leave to the club/movie.
Okay, now what’s all this rubbish got to do with blogging?
Well, it’s a similar case with blogging too.On weekends, i don’t post any articles, but i manage to do certain other helpful things.Let’s see.
1 - Tweak my template.
I do a bit of tweaking on the template.Change the footer text or add a few links or change the header image, or simply re arrange the blog roll. Well, the idea is to bring something new.I make sure that it is something easureable(that i get a result out of it) at the same time, not very disturbing to the user experience.
2 - Advertisement statistics.
Rather than on a daily basis(though im tempted to) i prefer to check my ad stats on a weekly basis, this helps me in many ways.
- There would definitely be a significant change in the figures which would make me happy.
- Helps me to analyse the currently running ads better, since it deals with a larger amount of time rather than just a day.
3 - Feedbacks from reader’s comments.
No, I’m not talking about replying to reader’s comments but something else.Reader’s comments gives you lot of valuable feedback on your site.One way to improve your blog is finding out the best suggestions from the comments. The best and genuine ones will be the ones that are repeated by different commenters.So read through all of those comments and pick the ones that are repeated.It may be as silly as - “Dude, change the colour of the font!”, Alright, implement it if more than one guy says it.
4 - Finding new sponsors and ads.
There are lot of “earn money with us” programs out there.It’s impossible to use all of them on your site.So,go research about them, on other blogs and resources, get others opinion and select the one which you think will sit your blog.And if there are none, I normally tweak the ad spaces on my blog.Try out a new ad space, that old style 468×60 banner on your posts.You know with a change comes results.There is no harm in trying as many as possible and weekends are best for it.
5 - Some link building.
Oh SEO, you see is about building links.So find out those edu blogs and top bloggers, and start commenting and getting links.If you don’t do it on weekends, you are not writing the best comments.Because on weekends you are relaxed and has a lot of time, you will enjoy commenting believe me!
Okay so these are the top 5 things that i do on my weekends, so that everything is in place.Now, you may ask the question -why weekends? You can do all these stuff on weekdays too? Fair enough. It’s just that i believe in doing things in a structured fashion rather than then.. now.. and whenever fashion.
You know it helps you a lot, because you can measure things this way, find metrics and weigh results this way.Try it this weekend and see what it gives you.
All the best! 
(Part 2 to follow)
Kevin | June 23rd, 2007 at 6:28 am #
good post mani. i dont think your crazy for doing this - i like to get everything done before i go out etc. i mean it would annoy me if i went out and there was something i really should have looked at before going out. when youve done your work you can relax - work hard, play hard
i think its good to continue to tweak your blog from time to time - have you considered changing the comments on your blog to stay on the main page - ie. at the moment they appear as a pop up. i think youd get a lot more comments if people could see them by simply scrolling down.
Mani Karthik (Post Author) | June 23rd, 2007 at 7:13 am #
Hi Kev,
Yes i had tried it indeed the day you suggested it.
But since i’m on the blogger platform as of now, there is no way to sort it(in my knowledge).
Im using a haloscan commenting system. It is all very manageable and friendly but this thing about pop up beats me.
Michelle | June 23rd, 2007 at 1:45 pm #
I’ve seen some folks attempt to put every affiliate program out there on their blogs. It usually crashes my computer. Good post. I suppose I’m implementing number five now.