Team blogging

Space Ghost: Okay Zorak, we’re all a team now…And there’s no “I” in team.

Zorak: But there is an “A.” In team.

Space Ghost: …Right, which means, probably, partially, whatever you do should…be okay.

If you’ve ever co-authored a blog, you know it can be tough. You’ve got to maintain the right balance between authors, cooperate on site maintenance and appearance, communicate regularly and more.

Here are a few suggestions on how to team-blog without wanting to kill your team.

Read the site
Stay current on what your fellow bloggers are doing. This will allow you to elaborate on their posts where appropriate. It will also help you avoid repetitive posting. (Wait, has someone already written this here?)

Communicate
Stay in touch with your team, whether through a forum, email, online chat or meeting in person. Frequent communication will help you identify any problem areas, and will ensure the site moves in a direction you’re all happy with.

Pull your weight
Don’t join a group of daily posters if you know you’ve only got time to post once a month. Or if that is the case, be sure you let your colleagues know up front that you won’t be contributing as often. Maybe you can compensate by writing longer or more detailed posts.

Assign responsibility
Who’s in charge of maintaining the site (i.e. fixing things when they break, updating the look, etc.)? Make sure to assign these roles to group members who have the skills and free time required to keep the site running.

Cashing in
“Everybody wants money. That’s why they call it ‘money.’” –Heist

If there are costs associated with the site, such as hosting fees, split them at the beginning rather than letting one person pay and then spend the next six months trying to get the rest of you to cough up your shares. Likewise, if you anticipate getting revenue from the site, decide early on when and how you’re going to split it.

Relax, already
Remember: there’s no “I” in team, but there is a “gin” in team blogging. Do whatever you need to do to ensure you’re having a good time with this project — otherwise, what’s the point?

Do you have other suggestions for people planning to start a blog with multiple authors? Success stories? Horror stories? What have you found to be the biggest problems and rewards related to team blogging?