For the past several months I've tried to post on this blog at least four times a week. The material I place here is intended to provide helpful information to the reader as well as make you think. Because this blog was originally intended primarily for bivocational and smaller church leaders I've tried to provide material that would be especially helpful for them, but much of what I write here would equally apply to most larger church leaders as well. My concern is whether or not this blog is helpful.
In recent weeks the blog's counter seldom shows more than 30 readers for any one post even though it tells me I have 65 followers. Both of these numbers are rather discouraging given the number of months I've written this blog. It does take time to write and post the material, and I want to make sure I am not wasting my time doing it. Seldom do any readers respond to a post so the only thing I have telling me that anyone is reading it is the counter, and if that is right then this blog has a very small audience.
Late last year I ended the monthly e-newsletter I was sending to several hundred people who had asked to receive it. Again, because there was so little response from the recipients I had no way of knowing how many were actually reading it or just deleting it when it appeared on their screen. When I announced the end of the newsletter I referred people to this blog as a way to continue to get articles from me. I did receive a few e-mails from people who were sorry to see the e-newsletter go away, but obviously few, if any, made the jump from the newsletter to the blog.
I'm not sure what I will do about the blog, but if you find it helpful I need to know that. If you are reading it on a regular basis I would appreciate it if you would become a follower of the blog. If you find it helpful I would appreciate it if you would encourage others to read it as well. I do enjoy providing you with resources that I hope are helpful to your life and ministry, but I also want to be a good steward of my time. Thank you for any feedback you can give me.
4 comments:
Dennis,
I read your blog via RSS Google Reader nearly daily. I pass along our thoughts on occasion to Nazarene Pastors and District Superintendents. Hope this helps you in deciding whether to press forward. Personally, I feel you should.
Matt Zimmer
IMO your blog is helpful to me on a weekly basis as I do subscribe via RSS Google feed to my Reader. I pass along comments to Nazarene colleagues and contacts at local and district levels.
Matt Zimmer
I was happy to find your blog and follow it by rss, but have been disappointed that very little really relates specifically to bi-vocational pastors of small churches. I usually just skim the blog, looking for practical helps, but most posts seem to be filled with random thoughts.
Thanks to everyone who have commented so far. I hope more will still comment as your feedback is important. I would like to say that just because a post doesn't have the word bivocational in it doesn't mean that the ideas in that post do not apply to bivocational ministers. Most of the articles address issues I faced as a bivocational pastor of one church for 20 years. Like in my books, I try to describe the issue and then share what I've learned over the years either through my personal experience or from material I've gathered from other resources.
I haven't mentioned it in some time, but I am very open to having people suggest specific issues they would like to have addressed in the blog. It may be that a reader is going through something right now that he or she could use some help with. If you share that with me I'll try to address that in a future post.
Thanks again for the comments.
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