Blogging a Short-Cut to Peer Review: How to Do It Effectively

In this talk, widely read biblio-bloggers Matthew and Madeleine Flannagan from New Zealand blog MandM explain how blogging, though not a replacement for peer reviewed publication, can provide a very useful way of getting a theological scholars work widely read and known. Matthew Flannagan will explain how four years of blogging has proven a more successful strategy in getting his work known to leading scholars in his field than peer reviewed publication has. Blogging has directly gained him citations in academic works, invitations to publish and co-publish with those working at the top of his field; he was even invited to speak at the Evangelical Philosophical Society’s session at the Society for Biblical Literature on the strength of one of his blog posts! His handful of peer reviewed publications have not received anywhere near this level of attention. Further, Matthew will attest that putting a piece on a blog gives him a good opportunity to test it and refine it in light of blog comments before submitting to peer review. Having strong content is an aspect of blogging that many biblical and theological bloggers may have but getting it noticed and making it stand out is another. To that end, Matthew has had another tool in his belt; his wife and co-blogger Madeleine has dedicated hours to learning the arts of search engine optimisation, page rank building, blog promotion, link building and the crucial art of effective networking with those academics who have online profiles, which requires a solid understanding of blog and social network politics and etiquette. Madeleine has tailored her tactics to suit the theological blogging niche of MandM and the results speak for themselves. In January MandM were once again ranked in the top 5 biblio-blogs and they are one of only 2 biblio-blogs to have a Google Page Rank 6 – a very high Page Rank for a blog on any topic.