Moving things around - where's best for my self help articles?

1. 75

   Lionrhodposted 9 years ago

   Maybe I haven't given Hub Pages enough of a chance...
   
   A year or so ago I was very active here and writing new articles. Then several things happened:
   
   I had a major computer breakdown that kept me off the site for a month or two.
   
   My book, SpellCraft Secrets was in DIRE need of re-editing and publishing as a 2nd Edition in ebook format.
   
   My sister was dying and asked me to  help her write her biography. And then three months ago she passed. Most of my time was focused on her healing and her story.
   
   Meanwhile, almost all of my hubs have gone off "featured" and while I could just revise a typo or two to regain featured status, it doesn't seem like a wise move.
   
   In the time I've been here I haven't achieved a single payout yet. Yes, part of it's that I haven't been keeping my hubs up to date, and part of it's that I haven't written new stuff here. Also, I feel it would be wiser to stop dividing myself between this site and my own. Just the small addition of my pagan-related and self-help hubs here would be helpful in solidifying my web presence on my own site (where the real intent is to sell my books).
   
   At the same time, I've never liked Blogger (where my Naked Without a Pen site featured my articles on writing) so my intention is to move all my how-to writing related articles here and my wiccan/pagan articles to my own website and see how that goes. Trying to not dilute myself too much on either side.
   
   I have a few hubs on relationships and other self-help related items. What's your take? Should I move them to my witchy site or keep them here?

   replyreport
2. 59

   paradigmsearchposted 9 years ago

   Hubs are sometimes 2 to 3 years old before Google "suddenly" decides to like them.

   replyreport
3. 83

   Buildrepsposted 9 years ago

   My condolences with your sister. I would keep your witchy site as withcy as can be, but if your relationship hubs are related to witchery, then why not move?

   replyreport
4. 0

   calculus-geometryposted 9 years ago

   I'm very sorry for the loss of your sister, what a generous gift of writing her biography! 
   
   With mental health, or any health related content, unless you are a medical professional publishing on an established medical authority site you're probably never going to get much traffic to those articles no matter where you post them.  Just being realistic. 
   
   You could rewrite them with more of a Wiccan bent to make them a better fit for your topical site.  Best of luck with it and everything else.

   replyreport
   1. 75

      Lionrhodposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      No, they're self help articles, not mental health.
      
      My qualifications for writing them are my hypnosis certification and three decades as a priest, religious counselor and psychic.
      
      I agree that I can make them more Witchy. LOL when I originally wrote them I was trying to keep them more generic, for a wider audience.

      replyreport
5. 85

   Marisa Wrightposted 9 years ago

   With a website or blog, it's absolutely crucial to stick to your topic.   Google HATES it if you include articles on other subjects, or even links to articles on other subjects - and you'd be hit with a penalty which will reduce your traffic to your whole blog, not just the offending articles.  So don't be tempted, unless you can give those articles a pagan/wiccan slant. 
   
   I'm not a huge fan of Blogger either, but it is possible to create a decent-looking site with a little tweaking.  Perhaps you could do some Googling, you might be surprised how easily some of your irritations could be solved by adding some code to your templates.    The main problem with Blogger, for me, is the navigation - it's pointless having an archive that's sorted by date, IMO.  However the secret is to use "labels" as "categories" (a lot of people use them as tags which doesn't really work), and then have a Labels gadget in the sidebar.

   replyreport
   1. 59

      paradigmsearchposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      Marisa, thank you for this. Truly excellent information.

      replyreport
   2. 75

      Lionrhodposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      My main challenge with Blogger is actually the suggestion in their Terms that they have the right to reuse my articles.
      
      Also the fact that I'm dis-comfortable with monopolies, and I feel Google is becoming too big, too far-reaching and I don't want to support that.
      
      I've always used labels as categories.
      
      Besides that, it's about juggling too many sites. The more I have, the more challenging to keep any of them up.

      replyreport