Today is the last day of BEA, and let me say I'll miss it! Really, it was a blast and I'm so glad I participated in the many events from this past week. I met and found some great bloggers, had a blast at the tweetparties, and won some great prizes. Hopefully, I'll still be here blogging away for next years events, because I'm in.
The last days events have to do with asking the experts questions that you may have about blogging.
So today, I'm asking all my visitors a few questions that I have about blogging. Everyone can answer and you DO NOT have to be a memeber of BEA to participate.
Thank you for your answers!!
Question Time: Answer 1 question or all, whatever you have time for.
1) When visiting blogs, what makes you come back to a particular site and revisit?
2) How do you keep your blog fresh and exciting?
3) How many meme's do you participate in, and which one's do you feel are the best?
4) What advice would you give me about my blog ie: layout, coloring, header, etc.... is there something that needs updating or changing?
5) What would you like to see more of from a blog, in general ie:
reviews, freebies, news about books/authors, helpful hints, memes, etc....
6) When writing reviews, If you really disliked a book and DNF would you still put up a review on your blog w/ a DNF, and an explanation as to why?
Thanks again, for visiting and have a great day!! ~Lisa -Silverlight :)
Hi hi!
ReplyDelete1) Layout is a big one for me, I'm a bit of a graphic, artistic perfectionist and some blog layouts really irritate me and put me off. If I love it, I'll look around the blog more. But aside from that, content and personality keeps me coming back normally. I like to connect and if I feel have the similar tastes as someone then I'll return! :-)
2) Keeping it current is good - I don't mean newly released reviews because I firmly believe even older books still need more publicity - but commenting on current topics is usually good. When everyone was ranting about THG or Insurgent - why not join in? It's clearly worth participating. But to keep my stuff fresh, I brainstorm, a lot. I want to talk about things that will grab people's interest, you know? :D
3) I participate in four memes, Letterbox Love, Blogspiration, WoW and Behind the Blog. Personally my favourite is a cross between Blogspiration and Behind the Blog. I love Blogspiration because it's inspiring reading other people's posts and I also find myself keeping an eye out for inspiring quotes or graphics more myself which in turn gives me inspiration! And I am bias on Behind the Blog because it is co-hosted by ME. But I love getting to know more about the bloggers who participate in it! XD
4) In all honesty, I'm not fond of your banner. I LOVE the picture but with it only filling up half the space at the top with the rest just being colour just doesn't appeal to much. As I said before, graphics are a perfectionism for me but I feel that your blog is a lot like a book - it shouldn't be judge a book by its cover, but most of the time it just is. Obviously not everyone has good graphics programmes at their fingertips, but there are some GREAT forums where you can request graphics out there. Feel free to ask me about some if you want.
Aside from that, your blog looks really good. Nice easy layout on the eyes, and I like how all the bits in the sidebars are bordered. I would say try to avoid images going over the borders but aside from that, it looks great!
5) Umm, I like reviews but I really like discussion posts, topics on current events, interviews and a few memes! :D
6) I have never had this happen to me yet (luckily) but yes, I would still review. If you want to prove that you're being honest, that means you should be honest, right? A show of positive and negative reviews just shows that you're being honest and not just avoiding things. But of course, always be respectful in your negative reviews, there is no need to slam authors.
Hope these were okay answers and not too harsh - I'm trying to help, I promise :-)
If you want some more tips, feel free to stop over to my post here
Faye
When I say "your blog", I mean every blog. Not specifically yours! <3
Delete3) I like some memes, like Waiting on Wednesday (good way to find new books) and It's Monday! What Are You Reading? (another good way to find new books)
ReplyDelete6) I would. Not every book is meant for every reader. I think it helps to see what a blogger's book taste is like. I wouldn't be rude or bash the author, though. No "THIS BOOK SUXORS." I'd respectfully explain why it wasn't to my liking.
It's not very often I wrote reviews on my blog, but I do put them on goodreads. If I haven't been able to finish a book, I will generally give it a review and say why I didn't finish it.
ReplyDeleteI've given a few low rated reviews in my time, but I do always try and say one positive thing about the book. I read one set of books that I gave low star ratings to all of them (I only got the three thanks to a recommendation and was determined to finsih them), because the grammar and spelling asnd general storytelling was just so awful. However, the story idea was great, so I focused on that whilst still explaining what the problems were.
Chelle
HI! I am also participating in ArmchairBEA!
ReplyDeleteI always enjoy blogs with many thoughtful reviews! I participate in a about 5 memes. My favorite will always be Blogspiration hosted by Saz101 and GrowingUpYA. It always inspires me and I love writing inspiring posts based on my favorite quotes and songs.
If you want to do a DNF review do it but be careful to be considerate. As long as you have good reasons, I won't blame you and hopefully no one else would.
I usually revisit blogs that leave meaningful comments on mind, have great content and are easy to read.
Rachel
New follower!
The spirit! :) The design is important to me :) and the way the write their post - I don't like to read formal posts :P I like them explosive and full of feelings, so I know the person is passionate about it! :) About fresh and exciting, well, I really don't know :P I write a lot about Psychology on my blog too. Or funny things that happens to me in life that I want to share with my readers :)
ReplyDeleteFor the memes - well, Top10 Tuesday is my favourite one! Becuase I love lists and it makes easier to the readers to see which kind of books do you like :P And me about them too. And it's cool, because you always have at least one thing to say (usually there are more :P), so commenting is totally awesome! My book boyfriend is just pure awesomeness - I do this meme for the delight of my soul <3 :P Book haul/IMM are also cool :) And Wow - I haven't done it the last couple of months, dunno why. I guess when May came around I was just so excited for all the awesome books that came out that I somehow forgot about the others :P
Advice. ok. Your blog is too large :P I would reccomend you to resize your width. So it will fit in the page :P and maybe your header it's a bit too big, I would resize the height of the header, so when I open your blog page I see also the pages and maybe the title of the first post, instead of just your header :P But this is my opinion!! I like it like that, too :P ;) And the most important thing is that you like it, like it is!
Enjoy Lisa!! And I completely agree! This week was fantastic and I am so happy and grateful that I participated in this awesome event! :) ;) xoxo
1—I come back because I like the books that are being reviewed on there and I find something in common between me and the other blogger. Also the blog must be easy to read and not too cluttered or hurt my eyes.
ReplyDelete2—I don’t know that my blog is fresh and exciting. I hope it is and the best I can say is that I try to update regularly. But I know there’s definitely room for improvement.
3—Right now I only participate in 2 memes regularly (Top Ten Tuesday and Booking Through Thursday), but sometimes dabble in other ones. I did take a break from TTT when I just didn’t have anything to contribute so I’d say don’t force it. Only participate if you have something to say that will enhance the conversation or benefit your readers.
4—My only advice is that it’s a little difficult to read with the dark background. Usually a light background with dark text is the easiest on the eyes. And your header is a bit big so I have to scroll down a bit to get to the actual blog content. I do like that you’ve clearly defined your blog so I know exactly what I’m getting and don’t have to scroll around to find out what you’re all about.
5—In general I like reviews, I love reading lists, and memes are fun for discussion. I do like freebies but don’t often find books that I’d really want to win. For some reason I skip over author interviews because I don’t know the author or their book, but I can see how they could be interesting.
6—If I don’t like a book, I still review it, just in a constructive way. If I don’t finish a book, I don’t post a review per so, just a synopsis of what I did read and why I didn’t finish it.
I really like blogs that have interesting content/reviews, but honestly, I tend to fall in love with the ones that comment me back when I comment them (as I do the same thing every time) and it's just a cool way to get to know the person behind the blog, and I find myself WANTING to see what they have to say.
ReplyDeleteAs for bad reviews...I usually don't HATE a book, so I just try and share what I did and did not like in the nicest way possible. :)
-Lauren
I don't review DNF, but I know a lot of people that do and I enjoy their posts.
ReplyDelete1) When visiting blogs, what makes you come back to a particular site and revisit?
ReplyDeleteIf the blog reviews books I'm interested in. What will make me OT come back is a slow loading blog. I can't stand it. I'm impatient! haha.
2) How do you keep your blog fresh and exciting?
A lot of work and dedication. :)
3) How many meme's do you participate in, and which one's do you feel are the best?
Only WoW and StS. I also do a new release post which some consider a "meme" Those are my favs to visit as well.
4) What advice would you give me about my blog ie: layout, coloring, header, etc.... is there something that needs updating or changing?
Your blog is lovely! A lot of people mention how they have a hard time reading white text on black though that's the only thing I can point out really. And do you have Captcha turned on? If so remove that shit!! haha
5) What would you like to see more of from a blog, in general ie:
reviews, freebies, news about books/authors, helpful hints, memes, etc....
Reviews are what I enjoy the most!
6) When writing reviews, If you really disliked a book and DNF would you still put up a review on your blog w/ a DNF, and an explanation as to why?
Nah I only post my reviews for DNFing it on Goodreads. I think you can post a review or not, I just don't want o waste time writing a full out review when I disliked a book that much. I rather spend the time reading :)
Thanks chicky!! U always know how to put a smile on people's faces! :} #4!
DeleteThanks for the great feedback ladies and maybe gents! :) It's all appreciated!!!
ReplyDelete