Hi Everyone,
I'm Emma - the me in @marleyandme. I joined the Hive very recently (just 3 weeks ago) with ZERO experience of anything like this.
I'm the kind of energetic and enthusiastic person who goes all in when I DO go in, if you catch my drift, so I either do something wholeheartedly or not at all. It's just my vibe. I'm also not afraid to experiment and try new things, but it has already got me flagged up a couple of times for abuse of the system.... EEK.
So, hopefully this post might help someone who is starting out to not make the same errors as me. This is how we grow and learn, right?
My experience thus far has mainly been very positive :-) People are generally very helpful, polite and friendly. I'm getting used to all the many quirks of the hive, though I only understand it all at surface level. I was blown away by the depth of community, subjects covered and possibilities, and I can see so much potential to it. Generally, I love it! But I'm new and I'm not from a tech background so, I'm navigating this journey for the first time. I've been fortunate to receive genuinely helpful comments from people such as @erikah and @nathen007, warning me that I will get blacklisted if I do certain things.
So, I got to wondering - are there others who don't totally get it and drop out because their enthusiasm is curbed by stuff they don't understand? How many "infringements" does a rookie have to make to get blacklisted and how many people drop out because of things like this? I'm a firm believer in learning from mistakes and passing on that wisdom to whoever might benefit from it.
I'm also open to advice and suggestions, as well as sharing the pitfalls and how to do things better. ❤️ It might also prevent newcomers from getting blacklisted for being a rookie.
So, here's a quick look at a couple of things I have learned in the last 3 weeks from a complete rookie perspective.
Double Posting 1
TWICE I have already kind of double posted, but neither time was it intentional. The first time was when I posted a blog and it was very kindly suggested that it would be a good fit for the teacher's lounge. So I went and looked at the teacher's lounge, saw that it enabled you to post in in the lounge AND on my blog, and so I assumed that I could post it there (and not my blog again). You can't, I now know. This is considered "abuse", which is a strong word. I understand there are unscrupulous people out there who want to abuse the system, but there are also newbies who aren't tech-savvy and I guess one of the main points of the hive is getting more people involved, which means breaking down barriers to entry.
Lesson 1: BEFORE you write your blog, find out if there is a suitable community that you can post in because you only have one chance to do this. Add your post via the community and enable posting on your own blog at the same time. If you post something and later find a good fit for it, you cannot go back and add it to that community. 💥
Double Posting 2
The second time I fell foul of the same infringement was when I wondered about CTP and how to increase that on Listnerds. I found an article that suggested joining ctptalk, so I did. When I joined, there were no blogs showing. It said that I hadn't created any content yet so I assumed that I had to introduce myself again. I searched for my content, but could not find it. So, I wrote another introductory post similar to the one I have on PeakD with the same picture (it's the only one I have of Marley and Me because he's a new addition to the family - all completely innocent) and BOOM ! Another "infringement".
Lesson 2: Once you have introduced yourself ANYWHERE on the Hive, DO NOT do it again anywhere else on the Hive, even if it seems like a new site and shows empty of content. It doesn't work THAT way and you risk being blacklisted, apparently. All our content is linked EVEN IF you can't see it. 💥
Including Images in Listnerd's Emails
The first email I sent with my intro didn't come out well as I didn't embed the image. I don't know whether this contributed to a less than 100% click through rate, but maybe. Certainly, the faulty image link looked terrible, although it looked ok on the screen before I sent it, so I had no idea it would turn out like that.
Lesson 3
Unlike in the PeakD blogs, I discovered, you cannot simply paste images onto the email you are sending. Use a website to upload your images like https://imgbb.com/. Upload and click on embed codes/html full link, and copy it. In listnerds click insert/ media/ embed and paste the embed code there. To get the image linked to your blog, right click on the image and delete the url, replacing it with the full blog url. Click preview to check it all works. (Less haste more speed, like the tortoise, not the hare!!)
That's all from me for now. My enthusiasm hasn't been curbed and I will continue to post and engage. And of course I will pass on my learnings to other people who join through me. Thankfully, people stepped in to tell me, but in truth I really need to understand it myself. Are there any other pitfalls you know of or that you've experienced? Do you have anything else to add about blacklisting, infringements, and warnings? To a rookie it feels a bit daunting and overwhelming, mostly because of the language used. It kind of feels like being put on the naughty step for being a complete beginner, but everyone was a beginner at one stage.
So if you are new like me, please push through because I think it's worth it for the benefits of community building, which is super important right now. The potential is massive. 💚
Much love and gratitude,
Marley and Me xxx