A while back, I had been scrolling through some old posts on the blog, and I was surprised to see how cringe-worthy some of my old posts were and went "how did I ever write this crap". We all have those posts from long ago that we're embarrassed about, and frankly, some that we'd rather not let readers see. So what should we do with them?
Keep written material as drafts.
If we're really uncomfortable about them, take them off the blog and keep them as drafts. Old posts are a great way to see how much you've improved since the beginning of blogging. Don't delete unique material you've written, such as reviews. Sometimes I love looking at old posts to see improvement and how far I've come. I remember looking through some old reviews of mine and just feeling mortified at every sentence I've written. I did get a pretty good laugh out of them, though.
Delete the "copy paste" posts.
Over time, we will start having too many posts to keep track of. If we really want to keep our blog tidy with meaningful posts, delete those copied and pasted book blasts/blitzes and cover reveals. I usually skip these on blogs, because they're just things copied and pasted and it essentially just acts as an advertisement on blogs. We don't really get to know more and see the person behind the blog, we just see text about a book that we don't know if we'll be interested in because there aren't any thoughts or a review about it.
Leave old posts on your blog.
Sometimes it's great to leave reminiscences of our writing style from the beginning! People who read your blog can go back to see the past self you were in resemblance to the person you are now. The more meaningful posts we have on our blogs, the better. We get to know so much more about the blogger and connect with them.
What do you feel about old blog posts? What do you do with the old cringe-worthy posts on your blog?
