Are You Part of This Bungling Band of Bloggers?
February 12, 2008
Do you run a blog as part of your business? Do you find that it’s more difficult than you imagined? We all make blogging mistakes. I’ve made several. And members of the bungling band of bloggers seem to make them all.
While some are simple errors, others are idiotic. So, check out the following blogging blunders and if you’ve made any, correct them and leave the band pronto.
Band Members Try To Sell Something In Every Post: When a blogger is trying to sell something in every single post, it’s a huge turnoff. Nobody wants to read adverts all day - especially bad ones.
Band Members Never Respond To Commenters: On popular blogs, it’s impossible to respond to every single comment. But band members never respond to commentors at all, even if they have little traffic. You might as well tell your readers to go away - and they will. They’ll tire of your arrogance and unsubscribe. So make sure you respond to yours.
Band Members Don’t Have An RSS Feed: An RSS feed is something that I didn’t understand for a while. But you need one, so that others can add your blog to a reader. That way, they’re more likely to return. Click here to get an RSS reader for your blog from feedburner. And click here to get a feedreader from Google.
Band Members Only Allow Google Bloggers To Comment: This is a common mistake made by bloggers who use a Google blogger platform. The trouble is, not everyone has a Google account and you could alienate other commenters. So, go into your blog settings and enable other people to comment on your blog.
Band Members See Other Bloggers As Competition: Band members don’t network at all. And they see any blogger who blogs on the same topic as a potential threat. They spend a lot of time visiting blogs and trying to belittle other bloggers, in the hope that readers will see how superior their knowledge is and read their blog instead. The trouble is, readers usually see them as jerks.
Now, I’m not saying you have to agree with everything you read. Just don’t go onto Problogger and say he doesn’t know what he’s talking about and you know far more about blogging than him.
Band Members Put Little Effort Into What They Write: Band members write on topics they know little about and can write a post in 10 minutes. Write on a topic you enjoy and take the time to do it properly. If it was that easy to write, it isn’t going to be worth reading.
Band Members Sell Their Own Product At The End Of Each Post: If you do sell your own product, it’s fine to put it at the end of some posts - but not all. If you do, it gives the impression that the reader can’t become a member of your community unless they buy your product, so they’re unlikely to hang round.
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25 Responses to “Are You Part of This Bungling Band of Bloggers?”
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Hi Catherine,
I would guess we may have been on some of the same blogs.
It still amazes me when I read that a blogger spends 10 minutes to write a post. It takes me that long to write my first few words…..sometimes longer.
Responding to comments left on your blog not only builds a community, but lets the commenter know that you care, and are reading what they say. Often, the comment section takes off, and adds tons of value to a post.
With regard to ads, it’s a known fact that most bloggers do not click on ads. If your audience is other bloggers, learn to use your blog’s real estate space, wisely.
Great tips……as usual.
.
Barbara’s last blog post..How Keywords Attract A Larger Audience
Hi Catherine, that’s a good eye catching headline! I suspect the reason people are making these mistakes though is that they’re not in a band at all - they’re blogging on their own without spending time going round, looking and learning from the way others do it.
So I think I’d add… don’t read other blogs
By the way I’m glad you seem to have moved from partial feeds - I really have a hard time with them, much more likely to call in if I can read the whole thing from my reader first.
Joanna
Joanna Young’s last blog post..27 Secrets To Writing Like Hemingway
PS I meant “Band members don’t read other blogs”!
Joanna Young’s last blog post..27 Secrets To Writing Like Hemingway
I’m glad I’m not one of those
Yes, I sell my stuff, but I sell other’s stuff and have more goofy posts or sometimes rants and I can, if I want to separate the private from the business stuff.
That’s what I love about the b2evolution platforms.
You can run more than one blog and still have them joined on one main blog, separate them any time you want and join them again whenever it pleases you
Then I asked a question - no response. I asked a question on another post a few days later - still no response. So I unsubscribed at the weekend. and that blogger only had 11 subscribers and no other commenters! No wonder.
By the way - talking of space, I am trying to choose a new theme, so I’ll need to pick your brain Barbara. I did collect my new glasses now which helps a little.
Hi Joanna - thank you. I figured people would want to check if they were doing something wrong when they saw they headline.
I realised you meant they don’t read other blogs. I don’t think some of them read anything at all.
Thanks for the feedback on the feeds. You’re the second person who commented on that, so I’ll definitely keep them on full feeds.
Plus - I love your rants. There’s some real nutty people where you live. I don’t think I’ll forget the guy who said they eat dogs in Spain!
I have not checked out B2evolution, but I’ll definitely take a look at it now.
Catherine, I had a similar experience where I left a comment and got no response. Giving them the benefit of the doubt, I made another comment to give an update a few days later, and still no response. I didn’t unsubscribe, but the blog went down a notch in my mind.
P.S. Am I the only one on earth who reads every post on the blog itself, instead of in my reader? Google Reader is great for letting me know when new posts come in, but I want to see the variety of blog themes instead of the same old boring window. Not to mention that you don’t see comments in the reader (unless you subscribe to a comments feed, but I think that’s excessive).
Hunter Nuttall’s last blog post..The Science Of Being Great
I used to be even worse than you. I didn’t have a reader at all until December. It used to take me forever to visit my favourite blogs, because I didn’t even know whether they’d been updated!
I’m still struggling with the respond to comments issue. I like to respond to the person by e-mail if I can, so it may seem like I am not responding to others since it is not in the comment section. However, the No-Reply issue on blogger is frustrating. I like to be more personal, but when there are several comments that don’t really have something to say back to them other than “Thank you” I seem to fail.
I do like to add those people to my feeder and visit their sites, however, and hope that in that way they do not feel unappreciated.
Deb’s last blog post..Hearts and Valentines
As you say - it’s difficult to respond to those who don’t have much to say though. I’m mean - when people just say something like “great post” I put them in the spam folder.
Hi Catherine (yeah I finally made it).
This is really a insightful post and some great advices that many (me included all the time) kinda slip out of their hand.
Just to connect somehow to your post and especially about responding to comments thats so true. Not responding (or rather entertaining and communicating) to your readers it makes the blog look like the guy doesn’t really give a damn about his blog. I have since always said commenting can create friendship and much better it can help you learn something new (you took the big bloggers as example, they have several times said that commentators are their inspiration and that they learn lots from the commentators, so how could one turn them off).
Hunter, join me in that list. Even tho I am subscribed to blogs I prefer reading them from the blog directly instead of from the reader (I know that I will want to comment, so I better go directly there instead of taking the long way lol).
SEO Optimization’s last blog post..Optimizing Kontera Ads
It’s taken me about 9 months to even begin to understand Stumble.
I don’t think I’d ever say I fully understood blogs in depth because there’s always something to learn.
One of the things I’m ashamed to say I can’t get into is RSS readers, but I think I need to.
Like alot of things, it’s best to just jump in and try and also develop habits.
I bet it saves time?
Like Hunter, I always visit the URL of the blog. And I type in the address as many years ago I got into the habit of typing addresses and I can’t seem to kick it!
Ian Denny’s last blog post..Blog Survey: Why Bother? Survey To Reveal Your Motivations
The Google login particularly bothers me because I have a small blogger blog I toy with, but I mostly comment as Mrs. Micah. I don’t want to leave my comment as the other blog.
As for other sites, I login to post at Consumerist or at Lifehacker, but otherwise nope. There just aren’t enough hours in the day. And if The Simple Dollar and Get Rich Slowly don’t make people login, who am I to do it?
Also, I don’t know why but offering a feed from Feedburner somehow seems more legit than using your site’s own feed. Most people have an automatic feed at somewhere like mrsmicah.com/feed. But feedburner has the market.
Excellent post. It made me realize that I’ve been blogging since September and I’ve yet to write a post about blogging. I’ve certainly made my share of mistakes but thankfully not these mortal ones.
It drives me nuts when those Google bloggers do that. I don’t know much yet but I certainly know that it’s crazy to make it difficult for folks to comment.
One other thing I find amazing. There are a lot of really name authors out there writing pretty good posts and they get 0 comments. It proves no matter who you are - you have to work it.
Tom Volkar / Delightful Work’s last blog post..Seven Things That May Surprise You About Money
Ian - I have used one since December and it definitely saves time. You really should try it.
Hi Mrs M - having to sign up and wait for an email to join a blog is a real pain isn’t it. I don’t understand why people want to make you jump through so many hoops.
Hi Tom - that is so true. You can land on a quiet authors site straight away and know that they’re an experienced writer, despite having no comments. But, I think when they do get readers they’re a different type.
I’ve seen so many of these make money blogs that are complete crap. They get a lot of traffic because they appear to be busy already. But the commenters are mostly spammers who want a heap of traffic themselves.
Hi Catherine,
Thanks for the insight.
I find using an RSS reader is very essential to managing all the feeds I subscribe to — full posts are most useful, as many have mentioned, and when I want to comment, I click on through.
The reader also makes it easy for me to “sample” a blog for a while. I get to see the frequency of posts, as well as the quality. After their “probationary” period, I can decide whether to keep the feed of unsubscribe.
Nez’s last blog post..Quick Thinking: Recycling Plastic Saves Oil
Ian, I use my RSS reader everyday. I use Firefox web browser and it has a nice built in feed reader. It’s on my bookmark toolbar for easy navigation of the blogs I read.
And Stumble, yeah, I hear ya. Me too.
Catherine, good post. You’re right about not trying to sell your product at the end of every post, but some is ok. It’s like any other sales situation; one of the key ingredients to sales is getting your buyer to trust you.
By not shoving your product down their throat and showing them you’re here for more than just selling something (you actually care about your customer), you gain their trust. And gaining someone’s trust creates loyalty which creates a customer.
John Hoff’s last blog post..My Marketing Hero Himself - Seth Godin
Speaking of feed readers, I’m curious if anyone would share what reader they prefer?
John Hoff’s last blog post..My Marketing Hero Himself - Seth Godin
Cath I played in Bands for ever and we had no time at all. On top of that most band sites are run by fans and the artist never see them.
Now…the smart ones will work the net hard and get signed/ famous. It really is a great time to be heard as a musician.
Re: Feedreader, I like My Yahoo, because it is right in my mail account to review!
RacerX’s last blog post..Are you Getting a Tax Refund?
Hi Nez - that is a smart idea. A couple of bloggers I used to really like just stopped blogging without warning.
Hi John - that is so true - trust creates loyalty more than anything. But, I’m not the best person to ask about feedreaders - I’ve only tried the Google one. Mind you, if i can use it, anyone can.
Hi Racer - v funny. Ok, I’ll admit - I know there is some outfit out there called the band of bloggers!
cathlawson’s last blog post..Are You Part of This Bungling Band of Bloggers?
great points. i hate especially on number 1, i hate when people try to sell you something all the time…i know where the store is.
also its nice when bloggers comment back on their blog instead of just getting comments. it lets people know you are a real person who just doesn’t want to receive but also gives too.
natural woman’s last blog post..Why I Blog
Hi Valerie - thanks for dropping by. I feel the same way you do on the commenting issue.
Some bloggers need to remember that it was their loyal readers that made their blogs successful to begin with. But many of them act as tho they’re an idol who everyone should be worshipping.
cathlawson’s last blog post..Internet Branding: Did You Screw Up Too?
It really does suck when any blogger doesn’t really respond to their readers! I try to respond to any questions that anyone ever has for me. It actually shows that you care. Readers really do care about “interaction” which will evoke a more sincere community on your blog. You have that Catherine. Good job.
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