Taking a Break from Blogging
From time to time you’re going to find yourself with a bit more work than you can handle. That or you’re going to find that you have a special project that’s been sitting on your desk for days (or weeks, or months) that you somehow haven’t made the time to finish. Sometimes these projects take backseat to money-making ventures and other times they could BE money makers if you’d just take the time to work them out.
So what happens when you’re too busy to get your work done? You may need to find areas in your business in which you need to cut back for a while. Some people, for example, find it necessary to put their personal blogs on hold. Others will stop taking on new clients - only finishing what they have on their plates currently and then focusing on their old projects for a specified period of time.
Sounds detrimental? It’s really not. I’ve had several blogs go “oh hold” while I finished other projects. If I hadn’t put my last blog on hold, for example, I never would have been able to make the jump to full-time freelancing. There just weren’t enough hours in the day for my full-time job(s), paid writing gigs, and blogging all at the same time.
The key, however, is to make sure you communicate with your readers and clients. If you’re going to take a hiatus from your blog to get things done you should do one of two things:
- Postdate blog entries for the time you’ll be away so that your readers don’t miss you ( you could also ask for guest posts for this time); or
- Post an entry letting your readers know when you’ll be gone and when you’ll be back.
If your readers KNOW why you’re gone they’ll be less likely to unsubscribe in your absence. You’ll have an eager audience waiting for your return and you can pick up where you left off. Let them know if your schedule is going to change for some reason, too.
Blogging is one of the best ways to enhance your freelance writing career, but it can be time consuming. Don’t be afraid to put your blog on the backburner if you need to focus on other goals. In the end the break will prove to be nothing but beneficial!