Short version: If it is eating more time than it brings in revenue or readers, or pleasure, you should probably rethink it.

Longer version: I was glowering at my blog a few weeks ago, feeling resentful of the time it was taking. Now, to put things into perspective, I had spent 7 hours the previous day doing nothing but writing, and had written for six hours the day of my grumble. It was not really eating into my writing time. It was more a case of my brain cells not wanting to come up with a blog topic on demand.

I try to have something daily. If you use a blog as your talk-to-readers place, you might limit your blogging to four days a week, if that is all you can do and stay on schedule. You do not have to have long essays. You can have photos, (mis)adventures in cooking, excerpts from what you are writing, random musings, rants if appropriate (or if that is part of your on-line persona), updates on estimated release dates … Lots of things, but ideally you post regularly and are mildly entertaining. After all, you are trying to communicate with current and future readers. I’ve tend to be scattershot as far as writing topics, but that also fits the genres I write in.

If four days a week is too much, three is fine. The idea is to do it on a regular basis, so readers check in every so often, peruse your catalogue if you have one, and are ready when you have a release, or when you post samples and ask, “Would you be interested in buying this?” Ideally, then answer will be excited replies of “yes, where can I send/throw money?”

You need a product to sell, however, unless you decide that you’d rather blog than publish. If so, good for you! Go for it, and be happy. I know of people who write on-line devotionals or fan-fic or even original work and prefer not to sell it. That’s their choice, and I respect it. I might wish they’d publish, but for whatever reason the authors prefer to keep things on the blog rather than between covers, and that’s fine. But if you are trying to sell stories, and not through a monetized blog, you need to find a blog/life balance. I tend to budget an hour a day for the blog, some days more, some less. That leaves between two and eight hours a day for writing, depending on the time of year, day of the week, and everything else going on. It works for me.

If you do social media, such as Twit/X, Tik-Tok, Instagram, Book-Toks, FaceBook, or other platforms, posting on a regular basis is also useful. Again, though, if you get in a long debate on X, or are posting lots of Book-Toks, or wade into a flame war on FaceBook or wherever, the WIBBOW Rule applies. Would you be better off writing? I am, which is another reason why I’m only on MeWe, and that badly.

Social media marketing also demands knowing your fan base, and if your readers are on those platforms. If you write for teens, then oh, yes, a social media presence is part of sales. Certain other genres as well. Does this mean you need to race out and devote time and resources (in addition to time) to developing a social media presence? WIBBOW? If no, then do it. It is an investment that might pay off. Or it might not, as FaceBook has shown, YouTube likewise. In my case, for several reasons, X, Tic-Tok/Book-Tok, FB, and other things are no-gos. I could do better with MeWe, but again, I’ve been blogging since 2014, and old cats are not fond of new tricks.

Whatever you choose, make sure it works for you and doesn’t turn into a giant time-sink or a PR nightmare. If you are better off writing, then write. If you are between projects and have time for something different, then blog, tweet, post, or whatever.