Greetings, Prosers,

Having read the title, we know what you’re thinking, and no, we haven’t had a momentary lapse of intelligence, we know it’s not Friday.

We would like to introduce something new that will accompany our Friday Features and invite you all to join in. Before we do that, let us just level with you as to why we are writing this blog piece.

Firstly, we don't have a team Tuesday for you this week. Z is busy for reason that shall become apparent very soon. So we have this gap within which to talk to you all.

Secondly, we have had shed loads of emails and messages from the Prosers asking how they can help Prose. We are completely touched at the generosity you guys have shown with your time. There are a number of things you can all do to help, which helps the community, in turn helping Prose to grow.

Five Friend Friday:

First up is Five Friend Friday or #FFF (because the long way is a mouthful).

The idea is that each and every Friday we all share a piece from Prose (our own or another Prosers’) with five friends. This can be on Twitter, Facebook, other social networks, private messenger services, or even text.

We want to show the world how talented this community is and what better way than sharing the words from Prose with non-Prosers.

Now, we would never ask the community do something we ourselves weren’t prepared to do, so each Friday the team will be doing the same; we will take it in turns to write about which piece we shared with five friends and why, and then post it on Prose using the hashtag #FFF.

We’d love it if you would all do the same!

Blogging for Prose:

This one is pretty self-explanatory, but is so helpful to Prose and Prosers alike! We need more content, Prosers want to read new and fresh content, and what better way than to read the words etched by one of this very wonderful community?

Making Social Noise:

Using external social media to bring more readers to Prose is a great way to help each other gain greater exposure. There are a number of ways to help here:

1) Share links to your work or to others work on Facebook, Reddit, and LinkedIn or any other writing groups.

2) Reviews: Be it on your blog, or on the respective App Store, it helps us help you get more readers. (If you do write a blog about us, good or bad, we’d love to read it!)

3) Social sharing: continue what you are already doing! The sheer amount of you that share your words and others on Twitter alone has grown exponentially, and we love it. We will always try to interact with all of you over there, if we miss you, tag us again!

Supporting One Another:

The Prose community is like no other when it comes to the support we all provide to each other, newbies and seasoned Prosers alike. As the community grows we want to maintain this intimate, close-knit group by continuing to support each other.

We might not always catch every new Proser, but we want to. In the next week or so, we will be launching a new Introduction Portal. This is for new users to post a bit about themselves and say hi. It’s a way for us all to find newcomers and welcome them how we were all welcomed to Prose, warmly, welcoming them home. Keep an eye out for this Portal, drop by and say hi! Encourage new users to drop a post in this Portal too! That would help them so much.

Commenting, bookmarking, re-prosing, and reading each other’s work. This is self-explanatory; we felt it necessary to repeat this due to the number of new Prosers that have joined us as of late. We all should be reading each other’s words. Why? Because to write well, you have to read well. It’s that simple. The power to change someone’s day just by leaving a comment, or bookmarking their piece, should be motivation enough to read every day. Even if you only read one piece more than normal, comment on one piece, that’s one person who will have been touched by your thoughtfulness.

Lastly, providing feedback on the writes within the Letters from Prison Portal. If you’d like to be tagged in future pieces there, please let us know. We cannot tell you what impact your comments have had on the residents because there are no words to describe it, but you are changing lives just by taking the time to read their words and give non-judgemental feedback.

To wrap this all up, we as a team just want to thank you all for your support, your words, your kindness and your generosity. We are completely overwhelmed with what a wonderful community we have here. Reading your words, being able to relate to things we have all struggled to relate to in the past; it’s a gift, a gift we can never re-pay. All we can promise to do is to continue improving this site with your words in mind. We are all putting our digital fingerprint on the literary world, one day at a time.

Thank you all so much, from us all.

Until next time,

Prose.