Top Ten Tuesday: Tips for New Bloggers

This is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.  Every week there is a different top ten topic.  You can find the list of topics here, both past and upcoming.  This week is:

Top Ten Tips for New Bloggers

Okay, being a new blogger, can I just say thank you?  Every one had a lot of really good tips, and also helped me not be as discouraged about not having very much traffic, being turned down for requested books/galleys to review, etc.  My top ten in going to be a list of tips from me as well as the ones I've found most helpful.

1. Be yourself.  Be honest in your reviews.  Review the books you want to read, especially if you're like me and new.  You get to pick your books to review, so make sure its ones you're interested in.  Don't necessarily read a book because everyone else is reading it if you know that's something you're not interested in.

2. Comment!  If there aren't a lot of comments on my blog, that means I'm not being a part of the community and commenting on other blogs.  If someone I'm following on Twitter or GFC posts on their blog, I try to comment.  Even if its just a quick "awesome review!"  When you do comment, if its blogger or you don't have the option of doing an auto link to your latest post, its in no way bad to post a link to your blog in the comment.  I particularly like it when people do that, especially in a meme post.  I'm working on this, and there is something that makes it easier:

3. Remove word verification.  I didn't realize that I even had word verification on until I was reading through some of these lists... I hate it when I got to comment on someone's post on my phone and word verification pops up, because it makes it SO much harder.  Most of the time when I see that I sigh and close the browser on my phone.  Because, yes, most of the time I have for commenting is on the go via my iPhone.

4. If you can, prep your posts before you are going to post.  If you know you're going to read a book, get together the information that you always have and save it.  I wish I would have had the time to get a month's worth of posts prepped before I'd really started blogging... eh, well, there's still time, right? Right??

5. Don't expect to get books/ARCs/galleys right away.  I've only been chosen for one galley out of the entire time I've been blogging.  Anything else was something I won through Goodreads giveaways by pure luck.  This kind of stems from reading what you want.  No, you won't get it before its released, but libraries are getting books pretty fast {especially if you have an eReader, because you can borrow those much faster than an actual hard copy}.

6. Get a Twitter.  Seriously, I love tweeting.  And you don't just have to tweet about books, posts, events, etc.  I tweet about that, but also about my everyday life.  Twitter is awesome: 160 character blogs.

7. Less is more.  I know I have some stuff on my sidebars, but I don't think it takes to long to open my blog.  I don't have GIFs or videos, but there are a few things... does it distract you with what I have on my blog's sidebars?  Please let me know if you feel I could neaten up my space.  Also: if it takes too long to load your blog page, I will be closing that browser before I see the post, much less read and comment.

Ones I want to do more of:

8. Get involved with the blogging community.  Find a blogger friend {or two or three...}.  I am in serious want of a good blogger friend...

9. Go out into the world!  Ha ha, so that one sounds funny, but I've honestly never been to a book event.  It seems nothing really ever happens in WA, and when it does I'm working or out of town.  I actually was going to trek out to Tumwater to go to an event for Kiki Hamilton, but turns out I'll be in Portland then.

Okay, so that's only 9, but pretty decent since I'm a brand spanking new book blogger, right?  And just because I'm putting these as my tips does not mean I'm great at it, nor do I think I am.  I'm new.  I have a lot to learn =)

Also, I'm trying out this new thing: you follow me, I follow you.  I usually check out the blogs of people who comment on mine, and most the time end up following some sort or another.