Dear Blogger,
I have some things I’d like to share with you and get off my mind. I hope you’ll take the following pointers to heart so that we can both have a healthy relationship going forward:
- There are a lot of things I have to do today. I subscribed to your blog because it is interesting, it is helpful, it is inspiring, or all of the above. Please don’t waste my time with uninteresting, unhelpful and uninspiring posts. If you really don’t have anything to post about, it’s probably better to not post anything.
- Your posts are most interesting, inspiring and helpful when you don’t wander off the beaten path and ramble on about things that didn’t make me subscribe to your blog in the first place.
- You only get so many chances to overpromise and underdeliver. If you promise something is going to change my life or be some “sure-fire” thing, please don’t disappoint me because, like I mentioned before, I have a lot of things to do today and I don’t have a lot of time to spend doing things I like, like reading great blogs.
- I can spot a novice blogger from a mile away. They are always the ones with lots of badging on their site, an under- or un-developed About page, and Google ads pasted everywhere.
- You may fool everyone else with your affiliate links but you don’t fool me. If you don’t label your links as affiliate links and I find out about it, you can be sure I will read your posts with caution and this may be the last time I visit your blog.
- If I visited your site because some other blogger has called you out on something bad you did (like steal a design), it’s best to be forthcoming and remorseful. Because, like everywhere else in the world, nobody likes a bad person.
- Don’t make me jump hoops in order to leave a helpful comment. It just makes me not want to comment.
- Please don’t talk in the abstract. Please do give examples whenever possible. They help me to understand better and makes me believe you know what you are talking about.
- Please don’t talk down to me. Use words like “you should” very carefully. How do you know I don’t know better?
- It’s uncool to make a scene with your writing. When you accuse someone of something, there is a nice way to go about it and a not-so-nice way. I call the not-so-nice way verbal diarrhea and it reflects badly on you as much as the person you are accusing.
- You shouldn’t pretend to know something when you really don’t. It is totally obvious.
- If I can’t find your RSS feed or email subscription form at first glance on your blog, I’m going to assume you don’t really care about those things and I won’t look any further for them.
Sincerely,
Your Reader
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{ 17 comments }
Dear Reader,
First thing of all, I would like to thank you a lot for speaking out your heart to me and increasing my blog value with your positive criticism. I may not be an A-listed blogger but I will strive on your criticisms to become one. But I would like to provide certain answers to your pointers.
1. A blogger has to cater to all the readers of his/her blog. Readers are people with different personalities and what may not satisfy you may be the kind of posts other readers were looking for. So a little indulgence on your part is not too much to ask for.
2. A blog was a place first meant for people to ramble about. Personal opinions are what readers in a blog look out for. If not, you would have been better off reading wikipedia. Also if you subscribed to my blog in the first place, this means that at some point you realised that afterall despite the ramblings, my blog was providing some value and you were learning something from it.
3. If they were things like “sure-fire”, I guess the blogger would have been better off changing their own lives than helping you doing so. You must realise that the blogger is only pointing you in a certain direction and it is only by your own efforts with the guidance of the blogger, that you may achieve something in your life.
4. I started blogging since last week and the first thing I wrote was an About page about my past life and how my blog could help you. And if you manage to spot an Ad on my blog, I’ll stop blogging.
5. Like you said, I’m a “novice” but if you manage to spot an affiliate link without “aff”, I’ll remove them and give you a permanent link on my blog.
6. Till now, I haven’t done anything to be ashamed or remorseful of.
7. Your comments are always welcome and although I may not be a blog designer at heart, I managed to simplify comments entry as best as I could.
8. I always try to include my past life experience in the posts I wrote so that you can understand it better. Where it wasn’t my domain, I always asked a friend to write about it. And as far as I can, I write in lists and always short posts to make your lecture as pleasant as possible.
9. Usually people like me who write about a topic are usually experienced in their niches and by using the term “you should”, they are making it clear to you that this something you SHOULD… You must not take it at heart as if I was ordering you. Also, if you were more experienced than me, you would not have subscribed and read my blog in the first place. You would have been better off blogging on the subject I am writing.
10. Like I said in #6, I haven’t done anything to be ashamed or remorseful nor have I accused any blogger, but if ever that happen in the future, be sure I’ll have this pointer in mind.
11. Like I said in #9, most bloggers are experts in their niches. And for the others, they are just trying to make a few bucks here and there, and you shouldn’t look down on them, when you are more knowlegeable than them. You are better off using your pointer in #10 and be courteous to them just by avoiding them instead of making a scene about their blog.
12. Most bloggers are not tech savyy and although not all, but some bloggers I know, write wonderful contents but have poor blog design. Also a little suggestion to implement an RSS feed to the blogger, I’m sure will be really appreciated by the blogger.
Please do not take these answers to your pointers at heart, because these are just meant to clarify any misundertandings betmeen me and you and in your own words “so that we can both have a healthy relationship going forward.”
Happy reading (and blogging),
Blogger
Interesting list, thank you.
On #5: I don’t really do affiliate links much on my blog, but I don’t think there’s any real convention for disclosing them.
The high road would definitely be to put an “(aff)” or something with such links, but I haven’t seen any consensus on it. -j
Go Sania
I agree with alot of the points made in this post but it really comes down to the purpose of your blog and whether you are writing for the reader or for yourself. Each to their own.
I agree with the statement about To Each Their Own. I think blogging has certain rules, but like anything else there isn’t something that says you can’t be different.
I agree with the orignal #12, even if I find a great blog I would read and there is no RSS feed I move on. I don’t do bookmarks because I have way to many as it is.
A lot to take note from in this post, I just started blogging as well and I learned a few things by reading this.
Thanks for posting it
Thanks for posting this list. Being a new blogger, it’s things like this that help me become aware of how readers are viewing my blog. When it’s your own blog, it’s difficult to critically look at it through the eyes of your readers.
I reckon it’s time I changed my theme! Everyone is using Cutline…
…hopefully I’m complying with the various points otherwise. Is it easy to see how to get my RSS?
db
David, welcome! I thought I was on my site when I visited yours! Your RSS is standard Cutline but I reckon the button could be bigger. Chris has a bigger image. At least it is above the fold, which is important.
Heheheh. It’s quite strange isn’t it? I’m gradually replacing the supplied images with some of my own to try and make it unique (in one sense), I know of at least a dozen other sites that use the same theme. I’ll look into using a bigger rss icon, good idea.
Thanks for dropping by.
db
valid viewpoint(s) - thanks
Of late I’ve been making notes of my own habits while surfing other blogs (length of stay, what makes me look / click) and am tailoring my posts accordingly.
paperbull, that sounds like a pretty good idea…trouble is you’ll be observing your habits from the perspective of someone who runs a site. You need to ask friends who don’t know much about blogs and rss and see what they think of your site.
db
hm - good point. Kind of like setting up a store from the standpoint of a shop owner rather than the people coming in the front door.
Hi Phillip, just wanted to say that the comment I wrote was just for fun.
I’ve received a lot of emails and comments about this with people comparing your post to my comment. Just wanted to clear things out. In fact, I’m a new blogger and as such I’m trying my best to follow the guidelines in your post.
Keep up the great work,
Sania Wyatt
Sania, that was a GREAT comment! Probably the best one so far across all my posts. There is nothing to clear out in my opinion, you deserve all the coverage you get. Happy blogging!
Very interesting and well-put. Thank you for this one.
That’s sad, but that’s true!
I liked this, great satire. It does make me look at my own blog and blush though.
Your attitude is great!
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