Top Ten Tuesday (4): Top Ten Tips for New Bloggers

This is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke and Bookish.

My Top Ten Tips for New Bloggers

1) Be Honest in your reviews: If you don't like a book then you don't like a book. Believe me, I know it can suck not liking a book that everyone else loves but your readers will most likely appreciate you being honest with them instead of saying you loved a book that you actually hated.

2) Do memes. Memes like this one, Waiting on Wednesday, In My Mailbox can really help promote your blog and sometimes gain you followers.

3) Don't worry so much about numbers. Yes, followers are awesome. They give you promotion, help you find new books, and can become awesome internet friends. But stressing about whether you've gained a hundred followers or not or if you've gotten so many comments on a post just sort of takes the fun out of blogging to me.

4) Ignore the hype. Book hype is a way of life in the book world/book blogging but it can be a double-edged sword sometimes. Hype has found me some awesome books such as Harry Potter and Hunger Games but likewise it has led me to books I've outright detested. It is very random and strange what gets hyped sometimes so my best advice is to pay no attention to hype unless it's a book that does actually sound like something you want to read and even then, don't get too high of expectations because a lot of time hyped up books tend to get overrated.

5) Use Twitter. Twitter is another tool to help you get your blog out there. Plus you can interact more easily with your followers who are on there as well as get news from your favorite authors because a lot of awesome YA authors such as Holly Black or Maureen Johnson use Twitter a lot and you can get news about new books/movie deals whatnot from them. In many cases before everywhere else because Twitter tends get news faster.

6) Figure out what you want to use your blog for early on. Is it just a random review blog? Is it for YA only? A specific genre of books? Do you want to be a little blog or a big blog? Once you figure this out it can help you figure out how to proceed.

7) Use the library if you have access to one. Especially if it's a good one and especially if it has inter-library loaning available. Inter-library loaning is awesome because that lets you borrow from multiple libraries and you can pick up reserves at which ever locations are near you. My library has this and it's where I'm getting ninety percent of my books right now. True, you may have to wait a bit longer for new releases if there's a reserve list, but it is great for discovering other books.

8) Don't be afraid to try those books that not everyone has reviewed to death. Another flaw with hype is that it tends to overshadow a lot of books and thus many are missed because tons of books get published a month, it's impossible to hype them all. Some of these books that aren't reviewed much can sometimes turn out to be the most interesting. One of my favorites from last year: The Iron Thorn was one such book.

9) Comment on people's posts! I've been bad about this lately, I know (I'm sorry! I'm trying to get better!) but commenting on people's posts lets them know you genuinely read their stuff and may gain you followers as well.

10) Read books you want to read. I know that sometimes we can all feel pressure to read a book because well, everyone else is. While it is good to read books outside your comfort zone, if you don't want to read it in the first place then there's a good chance you won't like the book. Go with your instincts if you genuinely don't think the book will be for you then don't read it.