Write it out

I was recently challenged to write about one thing that is stressing me out in order to think about it more clearly.

Oddly enough, it's come down to the book blog. I love it and it has become part of my livelihood these days. I'm amazed at the success I'm experiencing with it in a year's time. However, with success comes even more responsibility. I have lots of books to review and have yet to pick up my non-chick lit novels, unless they're for my local book club. My blogging partner seems to think that Jodi Picoult writes chick lit, so maybe I could get away with reviewing one of her more recent books for my blog. :) In any case, there are a lot of things to do for running a book blog:

1. Setting up blog posts. If someone could show me how to transfer my entire blog over to a different account so that I could allow other people to help with editing, that would be amazing. It's currently attached to my personal account and author permissions don't allow for much editing. I don't want to risk losing anything in any type of transition.

2. Reading and writing reviews. I have taken on book review associates, but I still feel like I'm drowning in books. I even multitask by reading two to three at a time, but still manage to slow down the process in that respect. Then I'll get three or four reviews out the door at once.

3. Running interviews. Coming up with lots of questions for authors and trying to keep things fresh. I've decided to do some theme months for the last quarter of the year to have something new and exciting and also to have a set framework of questions to ask each author.

4. Keeping up with e-mails. I can't. They just keep piling up. Then I fall behind on personal e-mails. My inbox runneth over...literally!

5. Staying motivated. Although I love doing this, I reach a low motivation point from time to time. This has become a second job for me...unpaid at that. I do get free books, which saves me money over time, and affiliate commissions from Amazon to cover the costs of books or giveaway prizes I mail out. It still is a LOT of work though.

6. Running giveaways. Since I do a lot of the back end work for running the giveaways, it's more than just finding a way to pick the winner. I have to tally up how many entries there are per person, put each person's name into an excel spreadsheet and then let the random picking take over. I also set up a blog post to announce the winners. I sent out a survey to the group recently to see if there's a way to make giveaways run more smoothly. I hope that will help in some ways. We shall see...


Recently, I decided to take on a promotional associate. That is going really well and she is amazing and always on top of things. However, I wish she had more access to the blog itself, as that would make things easier too. That brings me back to point number one though. I'm hoping I can find a way to slow things down while still keeping them exciting. Maybe less interviews and giveaways a week? Taking on the runner up review associate to lighten the book load even more? Giving everyone a format for setting up their reviews so I can just pop them into blogger and post them? Lots to think about! In any case, I am thankful for the overall success of the blog, for the authors I'm able to meet, for the friends I've made, the books I may not have had the chance to read otherwise, etc. I guess when it rains, it pours. I just need to figure out when to use my umbrella or when to just run around in the rain carefree.

If you ever decide to run a blog of your own, for anything, this is definitely something for you to think about.