Poem Posting

(Picture Credit - MacMyth)

 
2.05 PM BST (roughly) - I'm typing this "live". Usually I type on "Word" and paste. Just before lunch I "wrote" a poem called "Spring" and posted it on "Hello Poetry". "VoicesNet", "Poemhunter" and on my Poetry Blogger Blog. Every new poem will be posted on all these 4 sites straight away from now on. Okay, I might be competing with myself, but hey...

Today, however, I did NOT have time to "Share" my URL addresses on Google Webmaster, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Google Plus, Digg etc. I see now that my Views on all sites are rather disappointing. This shows the importance of "Promoting" your work through these and other Sharing platforms.

I will now do all that Sharing and see what happens. On HP I have usually "Trended" by now but have a paltry 31 Views (tho 5 "Likes"). Over and Out.

2.40 PM - Within minutes of me Sharing my URLs as above, my Views shot up. Interesting experiment. "Promotion" works. Nuff Said Fer Now. Out.

6PM Update - Well, promotion doesn't work that much! Here are the stats for my last 2 poems... On HP - Spring 70, "End Of" 385; VN - Spring 55, End Of 74; Blog - Spring 21, End Of 17.

The Poemhunter stats are more mysterious. My Poet's page says 106 Hits yesterday (no mention of today). On the "PH League Tables" I have 16 "Internet Providers", 4 today. The Member Page stats have 0 Views for End Of and a blank return for Spring.

So "Spring" has bombed on HP - that's very unusual. At 2.40 I recall the Views for HP and VN being identical at 51! Is this a common readership??? I know Poemhunter is quite highly ranked by Google, so that promoting might have worked there.

Interestingly Spring has done better than End Of here on Blogger. The plot thickens. Out.

13\4\16 Update - At 2 AM this morning "Spring" started Trending!!! It has now had 275 Views. Late yesterday my no. one fan Elizabeth Squires (NSW, Australia) Reposted it and again that did the trick! Trending of course adds to the Views considerably, but its getting it to trend that's the thing.

I call Elizabeth "Beth" on Facebook to avoid confusion with my cousin Jim's daughter Liz. Nuff Said. Out.

13\4 - 11.35 AM Update - "Spring" - HP 276, VN 70 (but 3 great comments), Poetry Blog Here 23, Poemhunter 0 Yesterday, 0 Today; 73 Total Hits (Down from 106), ISPs 15: 4 Yesterday, 1 Today.

Poemhunter has been a graveyard for years. Even their Forum has gone. But I keep "storing" my poems there. HP remains the best for me: I ignore all the politicking and trolling that goes on there. Nuff Said. Out.

14\4 - 10AM Update - "Spring" 376 Views on HP. Out.

15\4 - On HP: "Spring" 398, "End Of" 402.

18\4 -Spring 433, End Of 425!

28\4 - For the record: 298 poems on Poemhunter now - just about all the poems I've ever written. Oh and "Me, Paul Butters" has had 10.9K Views on HP now.

1\5 - Comparison - VN - End Of 94, Spring 116, Living the Dream 133, Death row 230, Some Men 106. HP - End Of 511, Spring 536, Living 327, DR 230, Some Men 228.

24\5 -  65 Views from 13 poems on "Poetfreak" com. lol. That's why I hardly bothered with them.

22\6 -  Have 312 poems on Poemhunter now: believe that's my complete collection.

24\6 - "Me, Paul Butters" has reached 11K Views on HP.

5\7 - Have had  87179 Views in Total on VN. The top poet Lee Emmett (female) has had over 4 million!

How Do I Successfully get an Audience for my Poetry? - My Quora Answer

(Picture Credit - G Salahuddin)

Getting an audience for your poetry. Well, here are some first thoughts. The easiest way is simply to Google some online poetry sites and post there. I happen to favour "Hello Poetry com", "VoicesNet" and "Poemhunter", but there are many more. Such sites are "communities" of poets who love to read and comment on the work of others. 

Poets also like to have THEIR stuff read etc. too, so it's very wise to read and "support" poems by your "colleagues". My most successful poem on Hello Poetry has so far had 10.8 K Views. On VoicesNet my top one has had 7,700+ Views.

By the way, I favour typing my poems on Word then copying and pasting onto the poetry site. That way, I keep a copy of my original for safekeeping.

I also happen to run a poetry blog through Google Blogger\Blogspot. It is quite easy to use. The tough thing though is that "Views" do not come so easily as you are operating in relative isolation. One of my poems did get about 7,000 Views however. You just have to soldier on with such a blog... I also use WordPress blogging site which is easy too.

When you post any poem on the internet it helps to "share" it with search engines and social media sites. I share mine with "Google Webmaster Tools", Bing, Twitter, Facebook, Digg, Linkedin, Stumbleupon, Google Plus.... In fact most blogging and poetry sites offer links to countless sharing platforms like these.

So there you are. An introduction to getting your poems Viewed and commented on (and even discussed).

Paul Butters

Is "Triond" Dead?

For several days, if not weeks, I have been unable to access the “Triond” com writing-website. Before that I had difficulty accessing articles there, but now I cannot get onto the site at all. So is Triond Dead???

I joined Triond in August 2008 and used it an awful lot. The site was very easy to use and provided free images for your articles. They paid for “Views” and sent me enough money for me to buy a few expensive table tennis bats. Yes, I come to bury Triond, not to criticise it.

This blog is typed for Wikinut, VoicesNet com and my Google-Blogger-BlogSpot Blog. All these are easy to use too. Like Triond, Wikinut paid until December 2015, though with a slightly different system. You also get decent Views and Comments. A good writing Community too.

VoicesNet does not pay but has a great Community of writers and readers. On VoicesNet I always get good responses in terms of Views and supportive comments. For the record, I also like “Hello Poetry” com for Views and Comments. On VoicesNet I find people very willing to comment on poems but not so much on stories or blogs for some unknown reason. I also get some positive feedback on “Poemhunter” com.

My Google Blogger blog is also very easy to use by the way. I can add images easily too. My only gripe there is that I feel “isolated”, if I may say so. Sure I get decent Viewing figures but nothing like what I get on “Community Sites” like VoicesNet. The exception was my poem “Mirror, Mirror”, which has polled over 7,000 Views. Must keep plugging away…

But I will miss Triond. Sure, they have a laissez-faire approach there. Or rather, they Did. I read somewhere on the net that their domain licence was due to expire within days. Maybe that is connected in some way with whatever has happened.

On Triond my funny blog “Crake Cake” attracted over 200,000 Views! And my “Beat the Bullies” blog got about 100,000! That was most encouraging. Not many comments, but hey…

So Triond, may you RIP.

What will I do now??? Keep writing here.

Paul Butters

© PB 8\3\2016.

PS 19\9\16. Facebook has reminded me that on this day last year I'd had 217,390 Views for my blog "Crake Cake"!!! Happy Times.

My Top Five Viewed Poems on the Web

Right now my top five poems for online Views are:

1) "Me, Paul Butters" (on "Hello Poetry") - 10.6 K

2) "Champion" ("VoicesNet") - 7,667

3) "Mirror, Mirror" (My Poetry Blogger Blog) - 7,239

4) "Remember" (HP) - 3.3 K

5) "Jacob Gamble" (HP) 2.8 K

Others: "Excitement" (HP) 2.4 K; "Existence" (HP) 2.2 K; "Dog's Life" (VN) 2,254; "Lazy Sunday" (HP) 2.1 K; "Look Up" (VN) 2,215.

On reflection the biggest surprise to me here is "Dog's Life" attracting so many views as it's an awful poem IMHO.  All the top 3 were totally "out of the blue" too.

19\3\16 - Am "Up to Date" on Poemhunter now. Have posted 291 poems, which is just about all that I've ever written. Most of these were done This century. Out.

29\3 - Just posted my 294th "poem" on Poemhunter (a small few are stories)...called "Let's Make History".

Paul Butters

My Poem 'Me, Paul Butters' goes Viral on 'Hello Poetry'

Until just three days ago my most popular poems on the “Hello Poetry” website were 1) “Remember” (15\1\2014) with 3,200 Views and 2=) “Excitement” (22\1\11) and “Great Nephew Jacob…” (2\1\15) at 2,400 Views. But then I posted a new poem called “Me, Paul Butters”. Yesterday I got up at about 4AM just to check my laptop. I was utterly gobsmacked to see it had had about 5,500 Views! Then it became my first “Daily Poem” there, so even more Views (and Comments) piled in. Right now it has had 7,000 Views.

Soon this new poem might challenge my most popular poems of all: “Champion” (25\8\08) on VoicesNet (7,602 V) and “Mirror, Mirror” (10\9\12) on my Blogger Poetry Blog (7,230 V).

Of course, I have no idea why any of these poems went “viral”. IMHO I have written many, much better poems. For the record, my most comprehensive collection of my poems is on “Poemhunter”, which holds 240 poems (including a handful of stories).

Anyway, here is the poem in question:

“Me, Paul Butters”

I’m no author, novelist or poet.

I’m just Me,

And don’t I know it.

I don’t need to be classified,

As long as I’m writing, I’m satisfied.

Typing out words, line by line,

I don’t care if they don’t rhyme.

I don’t care if my verses don’t scan:

I’m not always an Iambic Man.

I just say what I gotta say,

I’m not worried about any pay.

Words come to me without much bidding,

The world of its evils I hope to be ridding.

I love to spread lots and lots of Love,

Bringing peace to all like a messenger dove.

Things of beauty bring joy, John Keats rightly said,

To make us sleep easy when we go to bed.

So I’ll paint what I paint,

And sing what I sing,

Just letting those words

Do their magical thing.

Paul Butters

© PB 13\11\2015 (3).

(I will post the poem on my blogger poetry blog in due course). MMM it is about writing actually. And okay I’m being very honest with it. This all began when I read a lady who wrote that simply putting a novel on self-publishing site CreateSpace does not of itself make you an author. She was quite right of course but I had to think, “I might not want to be an ‘author’!” That set me off on writing the poem. Frustratingly I can’t find that woman or her blog now. If she only knew…

Maybe I’m losing my ego at last and becoming mature. Maybe! Odd thing to do, writing a poem about not writing poetry. That’s Me!

Paul Butters


20\11 PS - 8.8 K now.
24\11 - 9.5 K.
26\11 - 9.7 K.
30\11 - 9.9. Have 110 poems on HP now, apparently! 240 poems on Poemhunter.
2\12 - 10 K. Not bad for a poem about letting go of your ego, ironically.
9\12 - 10.2 K.
13\12 - 10.3.
5\3\16 - 10.7.

Where have all you UK Readers Gone???

(Picture Credit - Amazon co uk)

For years at Triond my Views were split roughly half UK and half USA. Then in 2012 I wrote “Beat the Bullies” (now 87,990+ Views) and America took over. “Crake Cake” (2014 – 215,000+ Views) compounded this. So where are you Brits?

On 6^th August 2015 my geographical Traffic Distribution (as shown on my Triond Dashboard) was USA 85%, Turkey (!) 3%, Brazil 3%, Romania 3, Germany 2, Spain 2 and Vietnam (!) 2. No UK! God Bless America.

Yet for about 4 years on Triond most of my Views came from the USA AND the UK: roughly a fifty-fifty split. Indeed there were times when the UK ruled.

Then in November 2012 my article “Beat the Bullies” emulated The Beatles in America. Again on 6^th August my View-count for Beat the Bullies was 87,982. In August 2014 I even eclipsed Myself with my “Crake Cake” spoof article: 216,042 Views – again mainly American. I don’t know why these articles were so popular in the USA, but hey, thanks over that big pond. But where did the Brits go?

Well maybe I need to write something for the Brits now. By the way, I understand (or misunderstand?) Britain is “only” England and Wales really, whereas the UK also includes Scotland and Northern Ireland (or so I just read on the web). But let’s not get bogged down with semantics. To most people the UK and Britain are much the same.

Right now, of course, the Big News in the UK is the relatively early death of Cilla Black (72). She was one of our greatest icons and closely associated with The Beatles. The UK has much to be proud of with its Music Industry. Queen, Genesis, Tom Jones, The Rolling Stones, Shirley Bassey, Bryn Terfel…

Lol, I’m reminding myself of that Norwegian football commentator Bjørge Lillelien, who in 1981 made a famous speech after Norway beat England 2-1. He said (English translation): "Lord Nelson, Lord Beaverbrook, Sir Winston Churchill, Sir Anthony Eden, Clement Attlee, Henry Cooper, Lady Diana, we have beaten them all, we have beaten them all. Maggie Thatcher, can you hear me? Maggie Thatcher? Your boys took a hell of a beating! Your boys took a hell of a beating!"

Good job we didn’t lose 5-0. Ha ha (No pun intended – that being almost the name of a Norwegian group).

I suppose today such a speech might include Andy Murray, Chris Hoy, Steve Redgrave, Freddie Mercury, Prime Minister David Cameron and so on. You could do the same with Canada of course: Justin Bieber…er, maybe NOT, lol.

But yes we are a proud nation. We once had the Great British Empire. I have mixed feelings about that however. Colonialism, slavery… all rather dodgy in my view. And colonialism did spawn…the USA!!!! Nuff Said. Over and Out.

(PS Yes this is a bit dated now, but the sentiments still apply).

(PPS - This was published on Triond 8\8\15 and got a princely SEVEN views to press. No change there then!!! Think I'll View it now and make it 8 lol. Incidentally my latest diet blog there is on the Most Popular list with ONE View (Me!)!!!!!!).

Paul Butters

2\11 PS - 25 Views from Portugal!!! Wow! They also like my recent poems. Thank You there.