-Blogs: Evaluate Where You Spend Your Time?

In bouncing off several suggestions I found on other sites about blogging, I began to evaluate where I was spending most of my time—was it really in posting and communicating a desired message or in the usual blogging chores of updating, responding to comments, flushing spam, checking stats, reading and commenting on other blogs, and etc.

Pastors and ministers, who already have a busy schedule, must make the time they take on blogging and the Internet an 'effective' part of their over-all ministry.

This is a problem that all of us involved in blogging need to look at from time to time. Especially those of us-which include most- who have only a couple of hours or less to spend per day on our blogging ministry. Here’s a few things to look at:

1. What are our goals and what is the message we really want to convey to others through our blogging?

2. What takes up most of our time—blog maintenance and improvement or posting?

3. Is our time really going towards fulfilling our goals?

4. What should we put most of our time and efforts into?

5. Where should we increase our investment and on what should we decrease?

There really are not easy answers to these questions. For some, more effort might be needed to improve the looks of their blog and make it more inviting to others.

I once got a email from a reader pointing out that the colors on my site clashed terribly (some still do) and that I should ask my wife for help in that area. The comment was entirely correct but I had been putting off making the necessary changes because I knew it would take several hours to solve. Since the colors were obviously bothering some readers I immediately made some changes—actually there is still more to do on this blog that I’ve been putting off.

For others caught up in the ‘art of blogging,’ find that a huge amount of time can be consumed on keeping up with everyone else and making sure their blog has all the best apps and plugins available. Then there’s the inevitable ‘make-over’/theme change from time to time that really does take a weekend or so. Not to mention the horror of horror—moving to a new host. Sometimes the message and posting really does take a back seat in some of our efforts.

The point is there is a balance to spending time on maintaining an up-to-date good looking site and writing those important posts that motivated you in the first place to enter the world of blogging. Sometimes it’s good just to stand back and pray for wisdom and help. Then take a look at what you have been doing lately, and ask for insight from the Lord on what you should be doing, and how you should go about prioritizing and spending your precious time.