BloggersWalk

Yesterday on ahnternet, I wrote a post about how an artist that I’ve been waiting for finally released her second album after nearly over a year of hiatus. The moment I got my album in my hand, it was one of the most happiest moments of this year! I’m serious!

Then yesterday, while listening to the album, I was also thinking about what would be a good post to put up on BloggersWalk today. Instantly I knew that this was the post that I had to make. Popular blogs already have hundreds and thousands of subscribers anxiously waiting for the next post. However, that is a bit different with beginning blogs and bloggers. So, I decided to see what type of posts could attract visitors when you’re just starting out. Note that even if you are a long time blogger, you could still use these to attract even more readers.

Write a Series Post
Series posts are great at attracting the crowd. One of the most famous examples in the blogosphere is WPDesigner’s series post on creating a WordPress theme from scratch. As a reader these series posts are like a TV show or an anime series. The desire to know what will be next can be quite huge. Even if you spaced your series posts every other day, there is a great chance that your readers will visit your blog everyday secretly hoping that the next series post is out a day earlier.

Case Studies are Interesting!
Blogs are an informative website (most of the time), so case studies are a great thing to try out. However, as it takes a lot of work, I’ve noticed many bloggers including myself staying away from case studies. Nonetheless, like series posts, interesting case studies spread out over a few posts can have some great positive effects.

Comment Contests Rock
Competitions always attract a crowd, but comment competitions especially can get some people anxious to come and check out your latest post. A live example is Shoemoney’s comment contest where he randomly picks a commenter from that day and gives out a Shoemoney t-shirt. I genuinely like Shoemoney and what he writes, which is why I frequently comment on his posts. However, I’m sure that there are some comment freaks there too commenting for the t-shirt. Whether a genuine interest or not, these contests can definitely give you some nice exposure and some anxious readers.

Give a Short Preview!
You know how some series books have a little preview at the very end of the book as a little teaser? You know how movie trailers make you want to watch that movie even more? Same concept. If you know what you’re going to write about the next time you post, a little catchy preview at the very end of your post can go a long way. This has its ups and downs, but it certainly is a trick that you could use.

Try these tips out and tell me how it works out for you. If you have any tricks that you do to get readers to visit your blog on a daily basis, feel free to share them by commenting on this post!

Unique Blog Designs is especially well-known for designing blogs like Shoemoney, John Chow, Entrecard, and more recently, Yahoo!. Well, they just celebreated their first year and are holding a contest! They’re giving out some awesome prizes and considering that it’s free, it never hurts to participate!

Prizes
Grand Prize: 8GB iPod Touch + the upcoming UBD Citrus WordPress theme
Three runner-up prizes of the upcoming UBD Citrus WordPress theme

Entering is really simple. Just make a comment to the UBD’s contest post and send a trackback to it via a blog post and you’re in.

If that iPod Touch comes to BloggersWalk, you know that it’ll be going back to one of you guys.

I bet that all of you bloggers want to boost your RSS feed count and want more people to read your posts. I’ve been blogging for quite a while and I’ve felt the same desire. So I thought and thought again to see if there is anything I can do to increase my “fan base” if you could call it that way.

If I was a surfer/visitor…
The two things that you should keep in mind when viewing your blog in a visitor’s perspective is quality and keywords. Are the stuff that you’re writing informative? Is it really worth a read? You visit your blog everyday because it’s yours and you have to manage it, but visitors visit to gain something. They’re not going to come for no reason. Also, think about how your visitors are going to get to your blog. Keywords. It’s big! If you’re using WordPress as your blogging platform, utilize all those SEO plugins and make some nice titles using the keywords your audience will probably search for!

Be an Opinionated Blogger
There are always new debates and arguments going on in the blogosphere. Whether it is in the form of a thoughtful comment or a full blown blogpost, usually stating your opinion will get you some publicity. Play the villain or the hero that solves the debate; it is sure to give you some exposure.

Link for Further Reference
Usually those who are selfish won’t get the “fan base” that they crave for. You know how Wikipedia links to its own articles whenever possible? By them doing this, they can keep the visitor within their site. However, from a visitor’s perspective, you know that when you go to a Wikipedia information page, you will gain more than enough information. By linking out to other bloggers, first you form a relationship with them, but you also build this reputation among your readers. Your readers will know that your blog is one that is quality and is one that will offer more than enough information. You want more, not less.

Readers > Advertisements
BloggersWalk has very little advertisement. I’m personally not a fan of so many advertisements, but at one time, I had Google AdSense up. Personally, I thought it was slightly ugly, but a few of my designing friends told me that it was really distracting and made the page look very ugly. Some even said that they’d rather NOT visit the blog! That was like a wake-up call to me. I’d rather make a thousand less and have a hundred more subscribers.

Spice Up Your Posts!
Do you remember the time when your English teacher told you to use the bold, italics, and the underlines sparingly? This is because they really are powerful. As a blogger, you should be utilizing them anyways. However, that’s not what I wanted to say for this post. Your English class probably was a Times New Roman, 12 pt, with a black font. When you’re blogging, the restrictions are quite the same. Who said your words can be in a different color? Put some makeup on those posts to make your post look a little bit dazzling!

I’m sure there are a lot more tips to increasing your loyal reader count/RSS subscriber count. Care to share your tips? These are just a few that I thought of, but I’m sure that you probably have some under your sleeve too. If you don’t mind, make a comment and share it with the BloggersWalk community!

Besides the monetary investments needed to start a blog, probably the biggest investment you need to make is time. In all the time that I spend to get BloggersWalk clicking, creating informative posts is probably what takes up the most time. After all, content is king right? So, my goal recently has been trying to cut the amount of time I invest on writing content while not losing quality.

Ask Questions
There are many types of blog posts ranging from daily ramblings to product reviews. Regardless of the type, a technique that can be used to efficiently write up posts is asking questions. These questions can range from simple questions asking yourself on what you did today, to a common question in a niche you are dealing with, such as what is the best blogging platform when starting out. This is the spark that gets your post going. Most blog posts have a definite point that it is trying to get across; usually these questions help in focusing the blog post into delivering a specific point.

“Blueprint” a Post
You know how architects create a blueprint before working on a building? The theory is a bit similar. Before you start writing your first draft, plan something out. If you’ve got some scrap paper, it’ll do. All you have to do is make a simple outline on how your finished post will look like. You can do this in two ways. For every post, you can make a new blueprint from scratch where you plan everything out. Another way, which is the one that I often do, is creating a general template where all you have to do is fill out what point will go where. Basically, you would need pre-made template. I keep a simple template that I just fill out quickly: an introductory paragraph, a few paragraphs with my points, and a concluding paragraph.

Research for Quality
Remember how a blog is a compilation of useful information? Unless you know about everything in the world, research is necessary. This can include some important quotes or statistics relevant to your post. At first, researching will be quite time consuming. However, once you gain a lot of experience, you’ll know where to go to find the information you need. Although this step is not always necessary, once done, it can certainly boost the quality of your post.

Seek Feedback
Always seek feedback. Feedback can come in the form of comments and emails from the readers, and maybe even some of your friends. You can’t be perfect alone. If you do want to increase the overall quality of your blog and the posts, constructive criticism is necessary.

Analyze the Results
In my opinion, this step is crucial in growing your blog. After you make a post, with your favorite statistics analyzer (in my case AWStats, Google Analytics, and a few others work), monitor and see which posts are popular and which aren’t. There’s a reason why one post receives many times more visitors than another. See how your popular post is different or better than your not as popular post.

To be honest, I don’t go through this list every time I make a blog post. However, it is a little guideline that I do follow quite often. If you can’t be bothered to go through all the five steps, you can also implement portions of it. In my case, some posts, I will post without any second thoughts, but seek feedback later on from some of my fellow bloggers.

Do you have any tips that you could share with the BloggersWalk community on writing quality posts? If you don’t mind, please do share your tips!

I’m constantly starting new blogs with my random domains and from time to time on Blogger too. With blogs, the initial launch is a great opportunity to form some relationships and make some buzz. To do that, you need posts. However, I have always believed (and still do) that the first post should be a brief introduction post. Nonetheless, some people seem to think otherwise, so I’ve tried to compile some pros and cons with what seems to be the rule of thumb in the blogosphere these days: launch your blog when you have 10 posts.

Pros of Launching with 10+ Posts

• A good first impression. The last thing that you want is a newcomer to your blog thinking that your blog is not worthy of reading and subscribing.
• Your blog seems consistent. Especially if you space out the 10 posts on a certain time interval such as daily or every other day.
• You can start promoting your individual posts right away! While this is do-able with a blog that launches with only the “Hello world!” post, it is a lot easier with a blog that already has quite a bit of content.
• You aren’t pressured to keep up with a blog schedule. If you have a blog setup, you better get posting regularly if you want some visitors. However, if you haven’t even launched it, you can take some time to write up your posts.

Cons of Launching with 10+ Posts

• The 10+ posts before starting does not guarantee anything. It is more of a gamble.
• It is likely that these posts, regardless of their quality, will be pushed back quickly anyways as you update your blog.
• It can be tiring and you COULD suffer from a burnout before even starting your blog, as you would, at the back of your mind, know that you are writing up posts that are not going to be displayed today or tomorrow or any day until the launch.
• When do you know that it is enough posts? Is 10 enough? Or is 15 enough? How about 25? Obviously the guy that prepares 50 will have a better chance at achieving a successful blog launch, right?

Conclusion
In my opinion, it really comes down to your preferences. Personally, I like to give a new blog a start with no posts. I like to see it develop into a successful blog right from 0. However, that is merely my opinion and others could pursue a different tactic when launching a blog. I have met more bloggers who like to launch their blogs with 10+ posts. That’s not me, but that could be you.

So I’m asking all you bloggers out there. When you started your blog how did you start out? Did you start from 0 posts or did you write a few posts before the launch? Whichever one you go with, care to share with the rest of the community why you choose to do it that way?