and do you ever suffer from writer's block? Some of us use G+ as a blogging tool with posts for which we do some research and were we actually ponder over the words. Others use their blogs and post a teaser here.
I noticed that I get frustrated if I can't finish a post within an hour. That's a double nuisance as not only am I annoyed, I usually enter into writer's block and have to drop the whole idea.
The reason I get so annoyed is that I don't allow myself to spend so much time on an unpaid activity. Ridiculous as I often 'waste' more time on commenting on my own and other's posts, but the feeling is real. The result is that I get writers' block and have wasted even more time not publishing a post.
This night I finished a post in half an hour including analysis, assembling the facts etc., picking an image (which often takes at least ten minutes) which hugely satisfied me as that's the way it should be. Apparently I have some secret yard stick telling me how much time I'm allowed to consciously spend on blogging/social media where all time spent reading and commenting is 'free'.
Now I'm 'wasting' another fifteen minutes asking you what your limit (if any) on post / blog writing is and if a limit is important #SocMed
An hour, if it doesn't flow I don't force it, but I can't let it take away time from actual productivity. Now, as you say, if I got paid I'm sure my calculus would change. ..
probably more than most.
quantify +Marc-Anthony Guzman, quantify 😉
Two hours and counting on mine today…
I actually differentiate between my G+ posts and my blog posts, +Max Huijgen. Blog posts can take many, many hours to get them where I want. For my G+ posts, it's usually a max of 30 minutes or so – for original stuff. That said, I'm sitting on one right now that I'll probably wait to send out tomorrow morning after I review it again because it's a bit more sensitive. Great question though. I'll be interested to hear what others say.
My best posts can easily take over an hour, but a lot of that can be spent designing graphics. This post is a good example:
https://plus.google.com/101584889282878921052/posts/6JonPqQ2kG8
well, you can only get writers block if you're being forced somehow to write. I write a blog when I have something to say
Depends on how long it takes to draw. Usually I can draw in 1-2 hours and then post in 15 minutes. Sometimes I can take too many hours.
Max, I write on my own blog, not here. 1 hour is not nearly enough for me. 2 hours minimum, and sometimes it spans a few days when I'm stuck. I'm in the middle of writing one now, and it has already taken me more than 1 hour, and I'm not even half way yet 🙂
+Richard Green did you include research, collecting facts and dates, etc in your estimate for that post?
I see my blogging as all counting toward revenue eventually as building my overall credibility. A blog post for me then is generally longer than anything I drop into G+ alone. I probably spend more like 2 hours on blog posts which then get disseminated here and in other social media sites. This encompasses writing, editing, picking pix, creating videos, accompanying documentation, etc. I'm just getting started in this endeavor and find the thoughts of veterans of value. Thx for kicking off this topic!
I spend from minutes to days. But most of my posts are brief. They take a maximum of 10-15 minutes.
+Max Huijgen MYOB.
Tonight was especially satisfying as I managed to get ahead of most online publications. Always nice if you sometimes cover breaking news and manage to get some analysis in as well, but also important for the concept of writers block and how to avoid it.
Having a sense of urgency really helps. I would expect that most blogging is missing that and it's easy to keep on pondering and re-formulating.
It would be a lot easier if G+ had the ability to save drafts. Most of the time I dislike having to write everything in one go.
(And yes, I could work on them elsewhere and copy over when done; I suppose I'm spoiled by WordPress.)
being disabled and with plenty of time on my hands I'd say 5-9 hours per 24 on G+ alone… give or take.
Max, you are right, most blogs' topic are of personal opinion. Though there are a lot of them that rely on breaking news, or at least the latest ones. My blog for example is a Tech Blog, hence I can't afford to leave a good news/topic to pass to long. But since I'm doing this part time, I can't force myself to compete with the likes of Engadget, Mashable, TheNextWeb or The Verge. I must be content to what I can do, so in that sense there is no feeling of rushing. Having said that, I never ponder my paragraphs over and over again, I am in no rush but at the same time I also have limited time. So at the end of the day I have to post it, ready or not; as long as my reader understand my point I am happy with what I write. If you get stuck, try rewrite from scratch but from different angle. This is what I do often. In a startup term, you Pivot 🙂
I publish 5 posts a week and have done it for 2 and a half years (on my current blog) — I take as long as I need to produce a good post — average time spent (including research and html coding)? — about an hour and a half…
I tend to post them on g+ as they flow out, convincing myself I'll edit them into a future blog post later.
Blog posts are unique creatures in their own right.
I've found that well researched posts full of statistical data takes weeks of compiling information, a few hours of actual writing (varies – sorry) and a few more hours of making it interesting and presentable.
Updating takes years as I have experienced when one of my top posts with over 180,000 page views has been recently plagiarized verbatim and posted on several other blogs.
+Max Huijgen, I am a snail. I am a slug. Or maybe a turtle. What else is slow? Me.
You all put me to shame. It comes in fits and starts and I still do some fussing. I only started writing for our blog in January and have only been posting in G+ for a couple of months so I'm still learning my own ropes. The blog posts take longer. I enjoy writing and the focus tremendously, but speed is not a skill I can claim.
I have been blogging for more than ten years, and while sometimes I may think briefly about what I want to say or mull it over for a bit, generally it just comes out. That came handy when I had to write a book – I tend to think in paragraphs, and then I had to learn how to think in chapters. Ouch.
Extremely interesting thread, +Max Huijgen 🙂 My "yard stick for social media" is just the opposite: all time spent writing is free but all time spent reading and commenting is extremely expensive. I have mostly been writing on G+ since the very beginning and the amount of time I spend on writing a post varies greatly. Some of my posts have been cooking as notes for months on end. Others (sometimes long) are sudden bursts – frequently provoked by something I've just read or experienced. It's pretty much the same for my "real" blog posts
+Gina Fiedel Never let anybody pressure you into writing how they want you to write. If you love what you're doing it doesn't matter what I say or what he/she says.
For me the only reason I have to blog like this is – I am pressured to quantify time as money.
As a freelance blogger – I get paid per post. The more I write, the more I get paid.
I feel a bit the 'odd woman out' answering this. My blog has been sadly neglected since I spend so much time here, but it was never written for monetary reasons to start with.
Time spent on the daily art-stories varies, but I would say on average about two to three hours, as I spend a lot of time jumping around, choosing whom to write about, deciding which work, researching, getting distracted, starting over…..
Other posts will seldom take more than half an hour. As some of you have said, much time is spent reading others' posts and commenting – usually on posts of the commentators on this thread 😉
+Max Huijgen It depends. My only real blog posts on real blogs have taken months of work!
https://postmoderncuisine.blogspot.in
As for Google+ posts, things are variable. I usually check all related links and search for alternatives before posting. Nevertheless, I do a quick post and then edit it to remove errors, typos etc, add more links and so on.
I am not sure what writers block is. I often succumb to despair therefore I don't finish writing what I have started but despite not finishing I always know what I want to write. I probably have around 50 items in an unfinished state.
I don’t use G+ for blogging per se but even if I am simply sharing an article it could take several hours to read and analyse the article, to check the sources and references, to see if there is other relevant material and to sum up and evaluate the article.
+Able Lawrence fixing after posting used to be my strategy as well. Especially because only after posting I can see the full post in a proper way thanks to that extremely limited 'editor' window of G+
On fixing after posting: often a post is already shared before I can edit. I would love to have a full preview of a post before committing it.
+John Blossom Your experience is notable in the flood of original articles you post per day!
+Max Huijgen +Yonatan Zunger I don't understand why Google plus cannot allow a post to be 'fixed' once it has been shared. Ideally the option can be given to the sharer whether to update to the latest version.
I have pleaded for that option of 'dynamic sharing with consent' in the past +Able Lawrence
I can imagine however that it would be a feature which can be abused. Edits twisting the content going unnoticed by sharers.
Hmm, you can edit posts after they've gone out, and if you refresh a stream the updates will appear. Perhaps I am missing something.
+Max Huijgen you hit it on the nail. i try hard not to get that dialog going in my head when i sit to write. it is odd, some posts just WANT to get written and some, as you say, are better of left to pasture. no steadfast rule on time at all. about 25% of the time it feels just right.
But sometimes reading more just weakens your initial resolve and you end up knowing more, but without a post +Chris Lau
(not that this necessarily a bad thing of course, if people thought more and posted less, the world could well be a better place 😉
Thank you for saying that +Danny Garcia. I wrote my comment last night in the last few moments of a long car trip (on vaca) and neglected to say that luckily, I don't have any overt pressures or monetary scale on the time it takes for my writing to get done other than my own internal pressures and knowing it's important to keep the blog rolling. It all has value for myself and/or our business no matter how long it takes and isn't directly connected to our earnings. That said, I am looking forward to increased skill, proficiency and I would love love to be more prolific.
And if by writer's block you mean difficulty distilling ideas or topics, I do struggle with that. My G+ posts are more of a personal nature than the blog and have more flow from the heart so go more quickly. My goal is to link up and align the two more and more as time goes by.
I am fascinated by all your comments and can feel some learning swirling around in me, thanks +Max Huijgen and everyone. +Susanne Ramharter you are not so odd as you may think . 😉
+John Blossom if a post is shared and then you decide to make edits, that is possible in the original post but shares are not editable, even your own shares. I often post to public and then share to the Conversation community and found that to be the (frustrating) case.
no time limits other than what normal daily life away from the computer demands………commenting on other posts is included in that time
but I do get writer's block in a way that I don't post anything in my blog for weeks, here on G+ for days (or with nearly no words)
Interesting observation and great discussion! I've recently started blogging on wordpress and Google+. Initially both are on part-time basis and totally unpaid. I don't like to spend too much time on writing regular posts however, if I'm going write in-depth explanation on any particular topic then I prefer to spend some time on research and summarize my posts. In case I'm unable to compete it within hour or so, I kept it aside and try to finish it after some time in same day or next.
Considering how much time spent on writing blog post, I also focus on it's quality. Sometime it's easy to write interesting and well organized posts on familiar topics, many time it's hard to curate thought provoking content. In later case, I'm always ready to pay extra time although I get exhausted after that.
No, you can't +John Blossom dynamic shares don't exist on G+
Even deleting the post won't delete the reshares.
+Richard Green Are you sure? I have often seen reshares to blank pages with a message that this post no longer exists.
+Eileen O'Duffy you can then see the reshare. The message appears only when you try to open the original message.
About one and a half hours.
Sometimes about eight hours but about one and a half hours would be enough. 🙂 http://psychopathologisch.blogspot.de/2013/09/wohin-fuhrt-der-weg-des-zeitgemaen.html