Publishing Careers Gets NY Times Mention!

Well, sorta. Actually, New York Times columnist Marci Alboher mentioned this blog in her NYT-sponsored blog on Friday (read it here). Her blog, which is excellent, is called "Shifting Careers." It's all about "the newfangled ways we are custom-blending careers."

So how did this come about? Back in late January, Marci made a call for "day in the [work] life" bloggers to let her know about their blogs in the comments section. I saw it as a perfect opportunity to spread the word about the Publishing Careers blog. I left a short comment telling about this blog and including a link. She was true to her word and checked out all of the blogs that were suggested to her in the comments. She linked to most of the ones that were genuinely relevant.

Of course, you'll always see someone trying to get more readers for their blog by mentioning it in the comments of a high-traffic blog. Often their blog is just barely relevant, or maybe not at all. Marci even mentions this phenomenon later in her Friday post. She says, and I agree, that this sort of publicity seeking is a real turnoff. But on the other hand, if you follow other blogs carefully and wait for your golden moment, as I did, it will pay off for you. Also, there's nothing wrong with contributing to blog conversations and being genuinely helpful, with the only mention of your blog being the link attached to your signature.

Now, as for the net effect of being mentioned on Marci's blog? Publishing Careers had a great day for a Friday, but it wasn't a record-breaker. There's the possibility that a lot of people will read her post on Monday and come by for a visit. Monday is always this blog's biggest day in terms of traffic, so let's see what happens! I'd love it if we could get a lot of new people to join our conversation here.