Interview with Jennifer Saunders

I am so excited to introduce you to a long time friend of mine and successful blogger, Jennifer Saunders (@ihearttalkradio). Jennifer blogs over at www.ihearttalkradio.com and has some great information to share. 

V: Tell us a little about yourself  (i.e. Family? Job? Any awesome amazing friends you went to high school with? Your obsession with Anne Boleyn?)

I'm a technical writer and instructional designer at a software company, which allows me to use both the left and right sides of my brain on a daily basis. I have a 12-year old son, Logan, who loves quantum physics and operating systems. (Don't ask.) In my spare time, I listen to talk radio and practice Bikram yoga. And, okay, I do have a slight obsession with Anne Boleyn. (No, she did not have six fingers.) Thank you to my amazing, awesome high school friend, Jennifer Tubbiolo, for asking me to participate in this interview! I hope I don't stink at it. 

V: How did you get started blogging?


A local talk radio station – KLSX in Los Angeles – switched formats from FM Talk to Top 40. Listening to the final broadcast was just so sad. I basically cried the entire day. And for about a week after, I felt sick to my stomach every time I thought about it. I had all these feelings and thoughts and things I needed to say and no one to say them to. Exactly like when you break up with a long-term boyfriend or something. So I started my blog (www.ihearttalkradio.com) as some type of weird diary/therapy session. (Btw, I realize this all sounds crazy. But I promise I'm mostly normal.) 

V: Why did you decide to start blogging about talk radio?

Well, I'm not very well-rounded. Talk radio is pretty much the only thing I know about. It was either talk radio or Coach handbags. And I'm not sure I have enough to say about Coach handbags for a whole blog, except that they're beautiful and I want all of them.

V: Can you remember the first time you thought "People are noticing my blog."? Can you tell us about it?
About a week after I started my blog, I received an email from a local talk host complimenting me on my writing, and encouraging me to keep it up. Shockingly, that continued to happen and I realized a couple things. 1) Talk radio hosts like to read about themselves. 2) Not many people write about talk radio. It was a niche I could easily fit into. (A niche into which I could easily fit? My grammar is not the best.) 

V: Have you worked to systematically build your following, or do you feel it just came naturally as you interacted with other players in the talk radio field?

I didn't go into blogging with a specific plan to get followers, but I try to stay active with the typical social media – Twitter, Facebook, etc. I do think it is very, very important to post often and consistently. People forget about you when you're not there. However, I admit I'm not the best example of this. But hey, there's always time to improve. Right?

V: What advice would you give bloggers just starting to build their following?
Don't check your blog statistics more than like 7,000 times a day. Any more often than that is just too much. You need to leave time for important things. Like deciding how many Coach bags you can buy before it becomes a problem. Really, it is so tempting to obsess over hits and page views and referrals; it will make you crazy. Write your blog because you like writing it. Don't worry if an individual post doesn't get the response you expected. The good thing about the Internet is – it'll be there forever!