Sexy Writing

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When I was seven or eight my teacher reported that I wrote with “colour” and “imagination”. At 14 another described me as “gifted in English”. Many folk on the web have called me talented. I know I have a way with words. Sometimes I rediscover an old forgotten piece and think Wow, did I write this? Occasionally I squirm, but genius is prone to go awry at times.

To be honest, I reckon I went astray for a while in my early teens when I wrote many stories about Association Football. Some were lengthy lists of results! Then I went on to specialise in Science Fiction stories, a genre which lacks general popularity. Moving onto poetry was a creative must for me, though again not too popular amongst readers.

In the late 1990s I had some poems published in various anthologies. Fourteen of my poems were published in “A Storm of Perceptions” (1997) by Forward Press here in the UK.

January 2007 saw me make my debut on the net, on Poemhunter. That December I created my first blog on Blogger, called “Butland Times”. From Poemhunter I moved onto Triond, Voicesnet, Neopoet (currently out of commission), Poetry and Friends and many more literary sites. Helium, Writing, Bukisa, Wikinut, Poetfreak, Associated Content and Poetry123 have been amongst these later ventures. Recently I have been writing more articles, blogs and stories.  

Overall I have had some lovely comments on the web. Some constructive criticism too. Have made some good acquaintances too.

Money wise I made nearly as much money last month on Triond as I did over the last two years. But I am greedy. I want more. Voicesnet seems to have been best for sheer Views. Triond seems to be at least one of the hardest sites on which to attract traffic. I have been using the forum to seek advice on this. Promotion and marketing often get mentioned. My weakest suit I would say. SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) was suggested, and I did get a little vague understanding on this from Wikipedia.

I am still researching into how to win views. Being competitive has always been second nature to me. My objective is to be near the top of the league on hits or whatever counts as success. That may be childish, but no apologies from me.

An interesting exercise is to Google your name (plus maybe “writing”). I find that Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and other chat sites top the list. Then my Helium articles feature large. Triond, Poemhunter and the others follow closely below. Even the odd site is included which I’ve never heard of, e.g. “poemsabout” (which seems to be connected to Poemhunter). The oddest item I’ve come across is a Californian Biology teaching website which featured one of my poems (“Frenetic Genetics”)! I gather much of this is down to search-engine “league tables” and SEO operations. As I say, I do not know how far I am prepared to go down this “promotional”, technological route. After all, I am a Writer. I know I can write. Like anyone I misguide myself sometimes. I am human. Writing is my Love.