Think about it, you read an article or story and if you enjoy it you are likely to look to see who the author is, right? You’re intrigued. You want to know more about the person. Novels normally have a have a biography of the person, while articles online or in a magazine usually have a paragraph or two.

I know I read those, and  I’m sure I’m not the only one.

But there are a number of bloggers (geneabloggers included) who choose to remain effectively anonymous online. That’s their choice, and I say ‘each to their own’, they have their reasons. But there are some compelling reasons to have an About Me page on your blog.

Let me start by saying that I see the usefulness of an About Me page on my own blog. I use Google Analytics to keep track of my blog stats for me, and using that I can see how many people look at what posts each day (or even hour if I wanted to). And from that I can see that my About Me page ranks in the Top 10 looked at posts on most days. So that tells me that people are interested to find out more me, and about who is writing this blog.

I’m not saying your have to have your whole life story written there, but just enough to give those reading a sense of who your are. Besides, it adds a small personal touch to your blog, and that’s also important.

My own About Me page which you can read here, is small, but I think it says enough. It includes my name, where I’m from, approximate age, experience in genealogy and my goals! But it can say whatever you want it to. I’ve seen some very extensive ones, and some very short ones. There’s no real rules.

Apart from that, if you are a member of the GeneaBloggersTRIBE, Kate Challis compiles the Blogiversary details using info from the About Me pages on each blog, and here she’s writes why she finds About Me pages so important, and gives suggestions on what she feels you should include. All of which are good suggestions by the way.

Not only that, potential extended family could well find your blog thanks to Google and cousin-bait, and would like to know a little about you before sending you an email saying “hey, I reckon we’re 4th cousins, and I can tell you all about the lost branch of your family”.  But with no About Me page, they get no sense of who you are, and my hesitate.

So my suggestion is that unless you have a very good reason (and I know some do), whether you are a professional genealogist or just a hobby researcher and blogger, or even a blogger on other topics, add an About Me page, as it adds immense value to your blog.

Blogging is an amazing way to be able to share and communicate with others. You can tell stories, show photos, give facts … and more.

And it seems that genealogy blogging (aka geneablogging) keeps growing in popularity as people understand what a blog is, and realise the usefulness of them, and decide to make the leap into the exciting world of blogging.

But it’s not simply a case of sign up for a free Blogger or WordPress account, and get writing. Ok, technically you can, but there’s some things that you can do to make you blog a “great blog”, rather than “just a blog”.

Over the past few years I’ve written a few posts with tips on blogging which are useful for the general blogger as well the geneablogger. So for ease of use, I’ve compiled them together for you:
– Tips for Geneablogger Writers and Readers
– Tips for Genealogy Bloggers
– 17 Websites to Find Photos for Your Blog
– Leaving Comments on a Blogger Blog
– Facebook vs Blogging: The Pros and Cons

I’m no professional blogger, and don’t claim to be. I’m simply just someone who enjoys writing and and reading blogs. And during that time I’ve seen what makes a good blog, and what doesn’t.

So to all those who blog (particularly my geneablogging friends), keep on blogging. Remember every post you write, you are recording (and sharing) history.

I got a huge surprise when I found out that Barb from the Decluttering The Stuff blog had nominated me for a Blogger Recognition Award. To say I was blow away is an understatement. Thankyou Barb, I’m truly honoured.

So to accept the Award, there are some ‘Rules’:
– I must thank the Blogger who nominated me and provide a link to their blog.
– I must write a post to show the award.
– I must write a brief story on how my blog started.
– I must give two pieces of advice to new bloggers.
– I must select 15 bloggers to pass this award on to.
– I must comment on each of their blogs to let them know they have been nominated for this award and provide a link to this post.

So a brief history of how I started … well I started genealogy blogging for work back in 2009, but was finding I was wanting to write more about my own family, and experiences in genealogy, and having my own works far better than mixing it with my work one. So in 2011 Lonetester HQ was born, and I’ve been writing ever since.

Two pieces of advice … hmm narrowing it down to two, that’s hard, so I’m going to make it five.
– Write in your own “voice”, then it sound like you.
– Have share buttons. Never underestimate the usefulness of them. If someone can’t share your post easily, they won’t.
– Photos. They are important as people do like graphics (ie. Instagram, Pinterest and a decent portion of Facebook).
– Have categories. As your blog grows add categories, and file them into them, because it’s ridiculously hard to find something on someone’s blog if it’s just one l-o-n-g stream of posts.
– Don’t wait until it is 100% perfect to post. If I did that you’d be lucky to get a post a month. Just write it, check it for grammar and typos of course, and let it take its course. If you’re writing about your research everyone knows it’s a work in progress, so it’s ok to not have every single piece of information yet. (Keep an eye on future posts of mine, I have some of these comping up). Besides if you “put it out there” cousin bait might do it’s thing, and relatives might find you who can then fill in the gaps. IT WORKS!

Selecting 15 bloggers to pass this award on to … Well I might be breaking the rules here, but I’m not going to pass it on. Not because I don’t think there’s worthy blogs. But blogs awards did the rounds a couple of years ago, and my blogger friends all got numerous times. So instead I’m going to direct you to a listing of over 200 Australian History & Genealogy Blogs that I have compiled. Feel free to browse through those, and I’m sure you’ll find plenty of interesting ones to read and/or follow.

So again, a big thankyou to Barb for the Award. It was truly unexpected, but I am honoured that you thought of me. And also a thankyou to my readers. I will continue to keep writing, telling my families stories, and sharing advice along the way!

Over the past couple of weeks I’ve seen a few geneabloggers writing about the topic of “is genealogy blogging dying” (see the links at the end), which are suggesting that there are far less active genealogy blogs and/or bloggers, now than there were a few years ago, and that people are turning to social media (namely Facebook) instead. They may well be, but I’m not going into that.

Personally I can see that there is a case for both, but it purely depends on what the reason behind you doing it is. So I thought I’d just run through a few of the key features of both a blog and Facebook for you, to highlight the differences.

FACEBOOK

Let me start of by saying that there are different types of Facebook accounts. There is your own personal account, there are pages, and there are groups, and all of them have a different purpose.

The Pros
– it’s free
– the amount of people there … Facebook states that they have over one billion active Facebook users
– you can have a private group on Facebook (so you can have your own non-public family group, so you can get your cousins, aunts, uncles, nephews and nieces together on Facebook to chat and share family memories and/or photos)
– you can have a group for Descendants of … to keep in touch with the wider family

The Cons
– not everyone is (or wants to be) on Facebook
– it’s not indexed by Google
– a photo or story that is put up, is essentially seen once, then lost in the feed
– not everything shows up in Facebook, so many posts simply don’t get seen

BLOGGING

Please note some blogs cost money to set up, and others are free. For this purpose I’m simply referring to the free blogs like WordPress.com and Blogger.

The Pros
– it’s free (unless you get the paid version).
– cousin-bait. Everything written on your blog is indexed by Google, Internet Archive, the NLA’s Pandora site and other search engines. So if you write about your missing ancestor from Somerset in 1823 (or wherever) … someone could well Google that person’s name, and up comes your blog post! Ta da … you have a new cousin. And hopefully you have easy-to-find contact details on your blog, and they will get in touch. It happens.
– share the family stories, as then they are being preserved, and not just a memory in your head.
– finding and sharing the stories will get the wider family interested, which is a good thing.
– sharing your research journey (both your finds and frustrations), helps educate others.

The Cons
– you need to learn “how” to set up a blog and get started, which is where a number of people get stuck. Google and YouTube a great for this, and can give you step-by-step instructions.
– time to write can be a factor
– some people don’t want to write something until they feel it’s 100% right, which is admirable, but obviously takes time. My comment is just put up what you have, with qualifications saying it’s a work in progress.
– people are likely to copy/steal your info and photos without contacting you, or reference back to you. Sadly it happens. Too often no attribution is given.
– lack of inspiration on what to write about. Personally I don’t have this problem, but my blog genre although it is genealogy-related, is wide ranging. But others have chosen to blog about a very narrow topic, be it a family or a place, a person, a military battalion, a voyage, someone’s diary and so on. Thomas MacEntee of GeneaBloggers has a list of daily blog prompts which you can use if you need something to give your blog a boost.

————–

I run both blogs and Facebook pages, and am a member of many Facebook groups. My blogs work fine for me, in that I use them to record my family stories and get them out there, but one of my Facebook pages, which is about the history of a small town, I’m still not convinced is the best place for it. For discussion it is good, but for longevity, I’m not sure that’s where I want to put all my effort in – simply because you see it on Facebook, then it’s gone, and not easily findable again.

So in my opinion a website, or even better, a wiki would serve this purpose better. But that will take time, so we’ll see what eventuates.

So as you can see both are useful. But if it’s longevity that you’re after for your history and stories, you can’t beat a blog. But for interaction, a Facebook group or page can work well. And there’s no reason why you can’t do both.

————-

RELATED ARTICLES

Julie Cahill Tarr started the whole conversation by asking “What happened to genealogy blogging?”, so have a read of her post, as well as those following, who have responded with their take on it.

Julie Cahill Tarr – What Happened to Genealogy Blogging?
James Tanner – Are We Nearing the End of Genealogy Blogging?
Thomas MacEntee – Major Changes at GeneaBloggers.com
Amy Johnson Crow – Is Genealogy Blogging Dead?