Announcing #MondayBlogs!

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Announcing #MondayBlogs!

Announcing #MondayBlogs!

If you use Twitter, there has been a lot of confusion over what exactly #MentionMonday is.

For a few years now I’ve taken advantage of what was originally intended as a blog meme (rhymes with theme), as a way to share my latest blog post and that of other writers, bloggers, and authors who also participated.

However, there have been a few drawbacks.

Let’s deconstruct the issues and my proposed solution.

PROBLEMS

1) The name itself: #MentionMonday seems to imply that we should be ‘mentioning’ people, similar to a #FollowFriday (aka #FF) or #WriterWednesday (aka #WW). Most people (especially those folks new to Twitter, which is a nice way of saying kinda clueless) have taken this opportunity to make it a mention party. For example, ‘Hey girl! You gotta follow @PrincessAwesomeness cuz she rocks my world!!!!’ which not only makes me want to strangle someone but also goes against everything #MentionMonday was originally intended for.

(Hey, Capricorns like traditions to be well, traditional.)

2) Subtweets: In case you missed it, this is the hashtag taken by people who are either A) creating ‘subliminal’ tweets (talking about someone as if they’re paying attention to you but they could really care less) or B) trolling for sex. On Mondays. (Yea. I don’t get it either.)

They’ve taken it upon themselves to use the #MM along with the #subtweet hashtag as a way to post relationship stats, pick-up lines, hook-ups, and other various and sundry things that have nothing to do with sharing blog posts and supporting others. Well, not like that anyway. Oh shut up.

Honestly, I wouldn’t care if they posted erotica blog posts. It just bugs me that they’ve bogarted the hashtag.

Speaking of which, there are two damn days that start with an S. Get off my hashtag. What.

3) Books: #MentionMonday is a blog meme, not a book meme. Hey, I’m an author. I get that urgency to want to do whatever it takes to get my work out there (except subtweet). But many writers seem to think that #MM is primetime for hawking their own books. It’s not, but I understand the confusion.

So…now what? I’m tired of being the bad guy and kindly (ahem) informing those who don’t get it. I’m busy, ya know? Plus, and this is the issue more than anything, I want to support other authors, writers, bloggers and small businesses who are doing it right and make it easy for others to do the same! But I have to scroll through hundreds of other (frequently inane) messages to find the right ones – as does everyone else who wants to share the blog love – and that’s just dumb.

MY PROPOSAL:

This seems kind of obvious yet nobody seems to have done it. So I’m going to.

I’m gonna change the hashtag, baby.

But I didn’t unilaterally decide this (ahem). I did some informal market research first: I ran a few hashtags past my Twitter following and Facebook folks and the consensus is:

#MondayBlogs. AND, if you follow @MondayBlogs and mention us in your tweet, we’ll retweet you!

(It’s worth noting that the preference was #BlogMonday except when shortened it looks like this: #BM. So, no.).

I like the cleanness of it. It says BLOG right in the title. I mean, it would be much more alliterative if there was a day of the week that started with a B, but since that’s not the case (yet. I’m working on that, too), this is the best we all could come up with.

And I like that even the newbies will see #Blogs in there and think…hmmm. Maybe I shouldn’t be promoting my book cause it says #Blogs, not book. (Duh.)

(Of course, now that begs the question: should we create #BookThursday – since people seem to be hawking their books every day, all the time, maybe a gathering of the masses might help? Would love your thoughts on that!)

#MONDAYBLOGS

So this coming Monday, DON’T USE #MentionMonday if you want to share your latest blog post and RT others. USE #MondayBlogs.

Let’s occupy this mutha.

Like this? Tell everyone you know who has a blog!

I welcome your thoughts, comments, curses, and Nutella.

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