Catharsis of the Bogue

Oddities, Profundities, Profanities and Dad Stuff

Tag: comments

Loyalty and Business Sense.

March 9, 2015 / / 4 Comments

I have been sitting on this post for a day or two but today I want to write it.  I started thinking about how great it is to start building traffic and actually having people reading my blog.  It is exciting to be putting out a product and having someone consume it.  A product that is part of my brain and has required no sweat or muscle to produce.

I have been excited to get replies to my comments on other sites, and on my site.  It is exciting to be “out there” and getting noticed.  If I keep on this way I will be famous in a few years.  That is my hope at least.

I was also thinking about loyalty.  I have several blogs in my RSS reader and I usually keep up with them fairly well.  I have been commenting more and have been plesantly surprised at responses.  Those blogs I tend to want to visit more and more.  If someone posts a comment on my site I want to reply to the comment and then go see what they have in store.  I have been keeping track of people on twitter the same way.

I follow a bunch of people and reply to many who are not following me because I have an opinion damnit and you will at least see there was a tweet directed somewhere vaguely in your general direction.  It is coold to “talk” to people all over the world from one interface though.  You all are my only friends….Just kidding I do interact with humans.  Mostly small ones, but still humans. (written as my 3 year old is begging for Dora the Explorer to return)

So, to go with Loyalty, I read a post on Mike’s Life blog today about reciprocity.  Go ahead and read it yourself but it made me think about loyalty to those who are “with” you on your blog/business.  Mike stated that he has been an affiliate of this other site and has sent traffic to it, if that traffic did not come to sales, that is business.  Mike has done his job and paved the way for a sale to take place.  My opinion, and the way I want to conduct myself in business, if someone I have even heard of doing anything for me wants my help I will do everything I can to help.

I may think differently later but ever since business school I have thought the same.  Give great customer service and go for quality over quantity.  That may limit some income opportunities but I will have loyal customers that will come back and tell their friends about me and my business.  You can’t put a price on that.

Until later,

Justin

PS check out my page For Our Troops for a patriotic message! Thanks

Where do you draw the line?

May 27, 2014 / / 6 Comments

Hello again.  Today I was looking over my computer and I noticed that I had a ton of ebooks.  I did a search for .pdf files and I came up with over 400 items.  Sure some are check stubs, some are user manuals for snowblowers, generators, tillers and the like but a good portion are e-books.

I have all of these because they seemed like a good idea at the time.  Many are related to my minor obsession with kettlebells.  Many are, lately, related to blogging and business building.  I then looked at my bookmarks in Firefox.  I have a ton of sites saved for later.  I then checked my rss reader and I have better than 50 sites to slog through on there.

I then looked at the jumbled mess of paper on my desk, the top sheet filled with notes on places to look at, affiliate programs to refer back to, forums to visit, and pages to write.

It made me think of the title of this post.  Where do you draw the line and dump all of the old stuff?  Where do you decide to make a break and just go forward?  I talked a bit about this in one of my previous posts: Seeking out the flash we want instead of the stuff we need. Where am I going to dump things that my brain says “yes I REALLY REALLY do want them” and just forget about it.  I can’t tell you how many bookmarks I have that I haven’t touched for years.  There were some on there a while ago that were so old the URL had expired and wasn’t even parked anymore.

I then get to thinking I am getting a handle on it, when I look at my bookshelf and see so many books that I would like to read.  Then I get invites to read something else.  Then I get free books to write reviews on.  But there is TV that is so good right now.  There are all of these movies that I have to watch.  (I have a couple of DVD’s from Xmas 2008 that I haven’t seen yet).

I am facing some truths now.  If I am going to be serious as a blogger and truly treat this as a full time job and be able to expect full time income then I have to break down and prioritze.  I hav4e to actually plan out my day in order to get posts written, novels written, comments out there and other things read.  I am going to have to dump 90% of my bookmarks that I don’t use anyway.  I am going to dump rss feeds that haven’t had a new post for a week.  I am going to visit forums on MWF and not every day.  I am only going to check my alexa and affiliate ranks and balances once a week.  I am going to write like a madman and comment like Ben Lumley or James Richmond.  If you don’t know they comment a lot.  Take that SEO.

So, today is forum day.  I am off.  It is also the start of the Pre-writing challenge!  See my page here! I have 4 ideas starting development right now and more to come this month.

I think I will also sort through all of those ebooks that I am never going to get to.  I can only hope that my ebooks won’t end up in the “never going to read that but maybe some day” file.

Thanks for reading yet again, tomorrow is fiction Saturday!  Part 3 of Death With A Vengeance.

Just a side note, this post was going to be a short one but it now tops 600 words.  This is cool because it is getting easier to write longer the more practice I get.  My biggest story barrier has been breaking 5000 words.  this is fantastic practice!

Until Tomrrow,

Justin

What I did today: The Grind Report

May 27, 2014 / / 4 Comments
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Image by DanielleCM via Flickr

Not that there was any way to avoid it, but I am sure you have noticed my lack of postings here on the Catharsis the past couple of weeks.  Call it lack of motivation, call it laziness, call it what you will, but I have been absent.  I hope that there is someone out there who is at least annoyed by that.

I have written something like this post before and I am sure  that if you remember those you are sick of it and are ready to unsubscribe.  Let me just say, please don’t.  I have ideas again and things to write about but my time is not balanced well at the moment.  I could blame it on a number of things including sick kids and a 7 month old who likes to wake up in the middle of the night, but the only person to blame is me.
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The Stupidest Comments of the Olympics

November 11, 2013 / / 2 Comments

Hello all.  Well I am late posting now but finally my server is back up so I have access to my website.  It is kind of funny how you can have a small panic attack when you can’t access your stuff.  I also can’t seem to write very much on word for blog posts.  Dunno why that is.

Anyhow, I have been watching the Olympics lately like many other people around the world.  I have noticed that there are several of the commentators who seem to be there just because there was an opening and they needed a job.  Sometime late the night before the event they are on Wikipedia to learn something about the sport before they get on the air.

I am further convinced that they had a meeting of all the commentators before the Olympics and a challenge was thrown down.  “The person with the stupidest comment that is still in some sort of context with the sport will win!”  I don’t know what they will win besides a lifetime of humiliation and scorn from the broadcast community.  Nah, it won’t go that far, even Marv Alpert is back after he did his jail time.

The first set of stupid comments that my wife and I noticed were during the pairs skating.  The woman commenting told us that the audience was clapping to help the skaters out and keep them motivated.  It couldn’t have possibly been because the music became rousing and people were actually having fun in the audience.

Second entry:  Women’s downhill.  The commentator actually said “The one who crosses the finish line with the fastest time will win the gold!”  No #%^@ Sherlock.  This is my third favorite stupid quote of all time behind a football commentator, “The team that scores the most points will take this one!”  and a basketball commentator for the Utah Jazz, “If you get the ball in the basket more times than the other team you are going to win.”

Back to the Olympics: Third entry: Biathalon.  One of the ladies took a water bottle from the support staff and took a drink.  Happens all of the time I would assume.  That is a lot of skiing.  I would be thirsty.  The commentator said, “She is taking the time to get a drink, there is a long way to go and she needs to keep her body going.  Probably some sort of sport drink in there.”  As opposed to what an ice cold Coca Cola and get a sponsor credit in there?

I am sure there are many more that I have either not heard or can’t remember.  There was one at either the skating or the luge track that said something like “The ice has to stay cold or it will melt.”  There are some beauties out there.  Anyone else hear one that I have missed they would like to submit for the contest?

I have to go and prewrite something now.  Thanks for reading.

Justin

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