This year marks the fourth year of the #AtoZChallenge, the brainchild of Arlee Bird with Tossing it Out. He began the challenge as a way to develop community among bloggers, and since its inception, it has grown to an event worthy of the greatest blogging praise, with nearly 350,000 page views since last January and a list of around 2,000 participants for each of the past two years.
The concept of the challenge is simple - blog A through Z every day in April, except Sundays - and visit as many participating blogs as you can. Any topic, any genre, any format, so long as the title of the post begins with the right title. It's a great lesson in time management and scheduling blog posts, and it's a wonderful way to meet fellow bloggers.
Two years ago, as a brand new blogger, I met some of my favorite bloggers through the challenge, and was able to complete the challenge with inspiration to spare. Last year, I made it past the half way point and didn't quite see it through to the end. Vacations and exhaustion as a mom caused me to pause. However, last year I was far more successful in visiting other websites - while I may have visited 5 a day that first year, last year I made it through about 25-40 every day, thereby increasing my contacts and visibility, and learning some really cool things to boot.
This year, I hope to take lessons from the past two years to both post daily all the way through to Z and visit a great number of sites along the way. And ... give writercize some love. Concurrent with the challenge last year, my freelance work picked up considerably which was wonderful for my portfolio and general career satisfaction, but not so wonderful for my beloved blog. I hope that A to Z lights that fire once again to bring inspiration and creativity back into my daily writing!
To see an interview with Arlee Bird, check out this article on Technorati media from last year.
To sign up for the challenge, visit the A to Z Challenge blog.
Your writercize challenge today? Sign up! And start that list of A to Z blog titles now!
exercises to inspire word play, hone the craft of the written word and bulldoze writer's block for authors, bloggers, poets, freelancers, teachers, students, dreamers and writers of all kind
