Blog Housekeeping [7]

It's that time again! Time to polish up your blog until it shines!

Remember: All of these items won't apply to everybody. If you already have a system in place for handling certain things (review requests, updating your archive, etc), great. Don't feel the urge to change it. This is more of a reminder to do the little things than anything else.

*For Bloggiesta, Amanda challenged people to look at their blog through a visitor's eyes. The challenge is broken into three parts - things that every blog needs, ease of commenting, and ease of navigation and searching. Many of the items on her "Necessary Items" checklist happen to cross over with things mentioned here. It's a great tool to help you look critically at your site and I highly recommend it.

Update:

• review archive - are you responsible for sites other than your own? Don't forget about those
• sidebar - check for buttons or links for events that have ended. Have any new events coming up? Now's the time to add them.
• reading challenges - update your progress, add links to challenges where you can link up. If you're a challenge host, do you try to comment on linked reviews? Now's your chance!
• blogrolls -  clean 'em up!
• crosspost - do you crosspost to Amazon, B&N, Goodreads, Library Thing? Don't forget to add your reviews to Netgalley or Edelwiess for those ARCs.
• check your subscription and social media links - if this isn't something that you normally check, now's an excellent time to make sure it's doing what it should be doing. (check out Felicia's Tech Tips for ideas on what to do if you're getting errors on your subscription link)
• check your static pages (About, Review Policy, etc) for outdated information, broken links, etc.
• review your profiles - when was the last time you updated your Goodreads or Facebook profiles? Is everything up to date?

Get ahead:

• April is almost here! Have you drafted your weekly wrap-up posts? Do you prepare review posts for upcoming books so you can simply write up the review once you've finished reading?

Misc:

• respond to review requests and other bloggy emails
• check your spam folder - legitimate emails can sometimes slip through, catch them now.
• check the spam filter on the blog - get rid of the spam! save the legits!
• make the rounds - check back on blogs where you left comments, maybe spread a few new comments around like candy.

Did you do everything that applies to you? Well done! Now...

BACK UP YOUR BLOG!

| Blogger tutorial | Wordpress tutorial |

Leave a comment letting us know what you're working on this time around. If you have any ideas about items you'd like to see in the next post (scheduled for 4/13), shout them out. I'm trying to keep a running update on my FB page on what I am working on. Feel free to join me there or on Twitter. I WILL CHEER YOU ON IN (almost) REAL TIME!