I love a spreadsheet. I use Excel and Google sheets for all manner of geneatasks. On one of my Google sheets I keep a record of the blogs I have included in my GeniAus' Gems or GAGs posts. I have columns for Date, Blogger Name, Blog Title, Post URL, Country and Blog type.You wouldn't believe the trouble I sometimes have finding information to record in the name and country fields. I realise that some geneabloggers are shy and concerned about security but you can afford to give a little information away about yourself.
You don't have to go overboard. On your About Me page or Widget you can simply call yourself Sue from Sydney, Wilma from Wyoming or John from Jersey. This small amount of information will give readers some context when they read your post and should not put you at risk of a major cyber attack. If you are a risk taker you might even add a little more biographical information that does not lead a robber to your door. Alternatively you can tell a little about yourself in the subtitle of your blog, I describe myself there as "an amateur Australian genealogist who enjoys collaborating via sociall media".
Printed books usually display the author's name and give a bit of biographical information. Let's make sure we do this for our blogs.
Today I looked at the About Me page of a "Professional Genealogist" in which she wrote glowingly of her skills. I had to do some major sleuthing to find out what country she was situated in, from the bias in her blog posts I guess it must be the US. Also amazing was that she did not mention about her areas of expertise. Duh!
Another About Me was from a a genealogy author who is a nameless blogger. Her About Me page had links to her books on Amazon so I had to go there to find her identity. Duh!
This little spreadsheet exercise sent me running back to my blogs to make sure that I was easily identifiable. On this blog I have an About Me widget that directs the reader to my Google+ profile and a Contact page that has my name. Phew!
Have you checked your About Me information recently?
