The Blog Lowdown – Mama, You Talk?

Today on The Blog Lowdown, I’m really pleased to be bringing you the lovely Ellen from Mama, You Talk?…

Please Introduce yourself:
My name’s Ellen & I blog at Mama, You Talk? I live in North Wales with my husband, 3 kids and our 2 dogs.

When did you start blogging?
3 years ago, although I still feel like a newbie! I started reading blogs & thought I’ll have a crack at this, although my first year was a bit hit ‘n’ miss with how often I blogged, I eventually found my feet.

Tell us a little about your blog
It’s a pic n mix type of blog! There are a couple of rants, recipes, reviews & my thoughts on life, love, family and home education.

Who designed your blog?
Me and a bit of help from wordpress! I’ve messed about with a lot of themes but generally like to keep things simple & uncluttered, I have thought of having it designed professionally, but I know what I’m like, I like the freedom of being able to change the look when I want to.

Which of your posts have been the most popular? Are there certain types that get more interest?
Syn Free Mushroom Soup gets a lot of traffic (I find this strange, my brownies tasted loads better!) as do a few of my Slimming World recipes! Local reviews of restaurants have proved popular too, it’s a bit random really.

How do you promote your blog posts, and which methods do you find to be most successful?
Twitter is the best for me, I get a lots of traffic from that and I like the interaction that goes along with it. I’ve recently started to use Stumble Upon & I’m now registered to use rich pins on Pinterest and I’m trying to get to grips with making my posts more Pinterest friendly. I should make more of an effort with Google +, that’s been on my to do list for a while.

Which linkys do you most enjoy joining in with/reading?
I love Reasons To Be Cheerful, The Prompt, Word Of The Week, Tasty Tuesdays, PoCoLo & SoFoLo and a couple of others that I like to dip in and out of, there are so many it can be hard to keep track!

When are your busiest days on the blog, and why? (if you know why!)
Mondays seem to be the busiest for me, not sure why though.

Can you name 3 things that blogging has brought you?
I’ve remembered how much I love to write, this has given me a kick up the bum to start writing a novel & the confidence to start dipping my toes into the world of freelance copywriting.
A place to voice my opinion & express myself creatively.
The chance to get to know other like minded people ie. bloggers, some I may never meet in person but still feel like I know them personally, all from reading their blogs.

5 tips for successful bloggingMy Top Tips for Bloggers:
1. As soon as you know blogging is for you, go self-hosted. I wish I’d done this at the start, it’s not as hard or scary as I first thought and there are lots of tutorials to help.
2. Use tools like Twuffer! It’s brilliant at scheduling tweets, I use it to promote old & new posts & can tweet links at all hours!
3. Review opportunities are great, but try not to fill your blog with them. Same goes for linkies, dont just write to link up.
4. It’s ok to take break! I often don’t blog for a few days, if we go away or if I feel I don’t want to but I always come back inspired, with a fresh pair of eyes & ready to blog again.
5. I’m sure this has been said before, but get rid of captcha, why make it hard for your readers to comment?!

My Social Media Links:
You can find me on Twitter, YouTube and Instagram Pop over & say hi!

Thanks very much, Ellen. Great tips, thanks and I hate CAPTCHA so much!!!

If you’ve any questions for Ellen, feel free to comment on this post, and she’ll pop by and check in. Next week, we will be hearing from Kate from The Adventures of Jack Jack, so be sure to pop by for that on Tuesday morning. You can catch up the previous posts from other bloggers here, too, if you’ve missed them.

If you’d like to feature on The Blog Lowdown, just email me at [email protected] to get involved.

To ensure you don’t miss any blogger posts, you can now sign up for my newsletter, and I’ll always include The Blog Lowdown round up in those.

Other posts you might like:

How to Write a Brilliant ‘About Me’ Page

My 20 Top Tips for Bloggers

A Blogger’s Guide to Pinterest

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Visit The Reading Residence’s profile on Pinterest.

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