Psst…I Need Your Help?

The beauty of blogging is we can make our blogs whatever we wish them to be. The challenge isn’t writing, we all have a plethora of things to write about, instead the challenge is earning and retaining readers, the challenge is time.

I think I am doing a pretty good job, but I can do better with your help. I miss you when I haven’t posted in a while, I hope you in turn miss me. This is “home” to me, a place where I can be myself and talk about things that are important to me [and hopefully you]; the place I find sanity in the insane and laughter in the ridiculous.

What Makes You (S)Tick?

I suppose that’s the age-old question for any writer that cares whether they have readers or not. With ever-increasing avenues for publishing, one can imagine how diluted the landscape has become for those who write and for those who read.

Gone are the days where the term “published writer” carried some weight. Welcome to the days where nearly everyone is a “writer” and “publishing” now merely means “posting” something somewhere in the public realm. A writer’s goal of publishing a real book, one that you can hold in your hands and smell the pages of, is simultaneously harder and easier to accomplish.

Is publishing a book more of an accomplishment than having a robust and well-read blog? I am beginning to think the answer to that [for me] is, “no” and I plan on writing a new piece all about it soon, but for now, back to the subject at hand…

Pick Me, Pick Me!

Some of you already have and I thank you profusely!

In a years time, I have had more than 33K hits to Cheri Speak and although I re-post or otherwise “share” my work on social media, I have little “cross-over” readership. Each network is its own pool of readers and I have a direct reach of more than 30K people on any given day through social media alone. In addition, I have avenues of larger audiences I can tap into monthly that gives me an additional reach of nearly a half a million people.

I’ve done no formal “advertising”, nor have I earned WordPress’s coveted opportunity of being “Freshly Pressed”; I simply write…and share happenings and history as I see it. If you are a regular reader then you already know that I write on a stew of topics from fluff to feather-ruffling and everything in between.

Peek-a-Boo, I See You

So, how did YOU find me? What exactly brought you here to begin with and what have I written that engaged you to the extent you pushed that Holy of Holies, the almighty “subscribe” and “follow” buttons?

More importantly, what more can I offer-up to continue to earn your readership, i.e. what do you find interesting that I can expand on or pursue further for you?

As my business itself grows, so do I and that means that my time can become limited and/or scattered when it comes to personal endeavors, like this blog. I have spent a lot of time creating, building and growing Cheri Speak and it is truly a labor of love for my sanity. I wouldn’t give it up for the world, but I also wouldn’t give YOU up for the world.

Streamlining for You and Me

I think most of us like routine; something we can count on or look forward to and I would like my topics here at Cheri Speak to become part of your daily/weekly/monthly routine. After faithfully writing more than 188 posts (nearly all of which were original), I can look at my stats and easily determine which topics were most read, shared, commented on, etc, but there seems little I can do to determine who of these readers are actually my core loyal readers and who is someone who stumbled upon me…nor does it help me determine who is coming back for more.

What this means is that although one article may have been wildly popular in views it is not a meter for what my readers, i.e. YOU want to read here or whether any of those stories where even read by my core readership.

The Days of the Week

Recently I hosted a 7-day blog challenge where each day had a theme. In order to provide quality here, I have decided that I need to create a routine that both you and I can look forward to, in other words a theme for each day of the week that I write for this blog.

In the poll below, I would like for you to choose the topics [as many as you would like] that you would like to read here.

I am going to create (or re-introduce) a few ongoing “series”, like my Song Title series and the one-on-one interviews that will now move beyond just political topics and include music and more. I am also going to write a little more fiction and poetry, continuing the 2027; Letter From the Future story by request.

Thank You So Much!

I look forward to your responses so that I can provide more enriching content for all of you. Please check back to see what the weekly line-up will be!

Related articles

Other places WordPressers call “home”…

1. Clutches | The Magic Black Book
2. Dogs Feel At Home | The Ambitious Drifter
3. Daily Prompt: Home Sweet Home | Awl and Scribe
4. I don’t wanna miss a thing (but I do) | Neva Samaki
5. Where My Heart Is | thelifeofagirlsite
6. Where the Heart Lies | tinypurpleme
7. Daily Prompt: HOME SWEET VIRTUAL HOME | SERENDIPITY
8. Gentle Hills and Fields | Reinvention of Mama
9. Daily Prompt: Home « Vicariously Poetic
10. The Sick Story | Mind of a Mouse
11. It’s almost, but not quite… | thoughtsofrkh
12. Daily Prompt: Home | VNA Images
13. Yoga Class | I’m just Super Saiyan
14. Home is where I put my hat… | Kate Murray
15. Confessions from the Cracked Pot (Part 3) | JC Bride ~
16. Cornish Lavender: fiction | alienorajt
17. Daily Prompt: Home Sweet Home | Whimsical Eclecticist
18. Daily Prompt: Home Sweet Home | Steve Says….
19. Under the Moon at Home | Misifusa’s Blog
20. Home Sweet Home | mostlytrueramblings
21. Dublin, Ireland | Daily Prompt: Home Sweet Home | Ireland, Multiple Sclerosis and Me
22. Home is where heart is | sylphontheloose
23. Daily Prompt: Home Sweet Home | Myas – A Tragic Lady But No TB
24. Food sweet Food | Life Confusions
25. Why Home Sweet Home Is The Best Place To Be! | The Political and Social Chaos Blog
26. Saying Goodbye Is Like Drowning (short fiction) | The Jittery Goat
27. Home – Post a Day Photo Challenge | Tidbits n Treasures
28. When Birds Come To Roost ‘Ere | Spirit Lights The Way
29. Daily Prompt: Home Sweet Home | Wordz on a Page
30. Daily Prompt: Home Sweet Home | Chronicles of an Anglo Swiss
31. Home Is Where The Jobs Are | mutatiomagistra
32. Missing Home | Flowers and Breezes
33. World War One, Coincidences and Family Birthdays | DCMontreal: Blowing the Whistle on Society
34. Daily Prompt; Home Sweet Home | terry1954
35. Home Sweet Home | SimplySage
36. What’s to miss when I’m gone? | Rob’s Surf Report
37. Home Sick: flash fiction | Motherhood and Beyond
38. Home Sweet Home- Daily Prompt | The Rider
39. Daily Prompt: Home Sweet Home | tnkerr-Writing Prompts and Practice
40. Please get off my bed | The Otter in my Jotter
41. Daily Prompt: Home Sweet Home 2 « Every day adventures in Asia (mostly)
42. Daily Prompt: Away Sweet Away | My Atheist Blog
43. Donna’s home tour of the flat | We Live In A Flat
44. What is home? | Tales of a slightly stressed Mother!
45. This place I call home | Madhura’s Musings
46. Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Sand | Under the Monkey Tree
47. Daily Prompt: Home Sweet Home | James’s Journal
48. Home Sweet Home ♥ | Perhaps yes, perhaps no. Exactly? I don’t know.
49. Not All Who Wander Are Lost . . . | meanderedwanderings

• Psst: Are You The Bins Best Reporter? (weeklyweevilblog.wordpress.com)
• When Life Gets in the Way; Finding Time to Blog
• Psst, Don’t Tell My Wife but I’m a Writer (growupnovelist.com)
• On Getting Published by Rianh Silvertree (silvertreebooks.wordpress.com)
• Are You a Writer? Part 1 (katherineharms.com)
• Celebrating 100 Posts! (thinkingthroughmylens.wordpress.com)
• Upcoming Guest Posts (shannonathompson.com)
• 7 Things you should know about your readers if you’re writing online (wiseslacker.com)