Blogs: Dos and Don'ts

Original Content

Keep it fresh and original.

Write about what interests you and not what you think will interest others.

wallowismel said:

Write about what interests you and not what you think will interest others.

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I second that!

Also, take note of which posts generate the most feedback. I tend to write about a variety of topics, but most of the comments I receive involve my music-related posts.

Always raise questions somewhere in the post, or at the end, to facilitate comments and discussion.

wallowismel said:

Write about what interests you and not what you think will interest others.

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Thirded.

Sunflowerrei said:

Always raise questions somewhere in the post, or at the end, to facilitate comments and discussion.

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I actually hate it when bloggers do this, and it makes me less likely to comment. It tends to feel desperate to me, and sometimes it significantly turns me off even if I'd been thinking about commenting.

(I'm not talking about when it feels natural, like when the whole post is a request for feedback on something or the author says something like, "Hmm, that's weird, does anyone else do that?" and then moves on with more blog entry. I'm talking about when people end the post and then ask a bunch of, "Tell me what you think!" questions that are clearly meant to facilitate discussion. It makes me feel like I'm suddenly being quizzed -- possibly because it's so similar to the thing they do in school textbooks after literature passages and things! -- and makes me have a nontrivially more negative opinion of the blogger/blog entry. It also makes commenting feel like WORK someone is asking me to do rather than me thinking, "Ooo! I want to say something!")

The exception is when the author has so many people who comment that his/her blog is kind of a hang out area for scads and scads of people. Then it feels appropriate, like a moderator kick-starting the hangout with a discussion question, rather than someone desperate for comments.

(Sorry for the rant. This is one of those things that just bugs me for some reason! Personal preference as a reader, IMHO, of course. )

I mainly use my blog to promote my quest to become a successful novelist but I occasionally chime in on issues if they arouse my passion.

I hadn't thought about the Dos part, but I wrote a post about the Annoying Features of a Blog.

I love to read blogs, but I find that I turn away from most blogs that feature one or more of those. Not sure why, it's just frustrating to me.

I'll start with the don'ts:

Don't beg people for blog comments, either on your own blog or theirs. There's a blogger doing this to me right now and it's super annoying.

Alternately, don't ignore your readers. It's nice to respond to comments when you can, especially if specific questions are asked.

Don't blog too much. You need to give your readers time to digest & respond. I get much more views when I blog twice a week rather than every day. I think people can get overwhelmed.

Don't put an enormous head shot of yourself in your blog header. I don't want to feel like you're literally watching me as I read your entries. It's creepy as hell.

Don't be pretentious.

Don't make things up (events, quotes, etc.) for blog content. (Unless it's fiction, of course). Your readers will see right through it.

The Dos:

Make your blog easy to read.

Be consistent in your blogging.

Put a short bio on your blog. I enjoy learning about the blogger and I'm sure others do, as well.

Do put photos in your blog entries! This is a big one. Photos not only make your entries easier to read, they will draw the reader in.

And my number one "Do" is:

Pour your heart out.

When I started pouring my heart out on my blog (rather than bland, general entries about writing), my readership quadrupled in only a couple months.

Hope this helps!

Moonpetal said:

Don't put an enormous head shot of yourself in your blog header. I don't want to feel like you're literally watching me as I read your entries. It's creepy as hell.

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This made me LOL!

I just started a blog, these are all helpful tips! I'm having trouble just finding things to write about. I guess I'm not a very good blogger, lol.

I don't mind my comments being moderated on other blogs, especially when I see examples of blogs that have been flooded with spam that got through. So I have comments moderated on my blog, and specifically warn spammers that their entries may be harvested for my text-generation side business (for artwork). In return, I try to check my blog at least once a day.

I admit, I'm lax about including photos, because 1) I'm more verbal than visual, and 2) I don't want to accidentally intrude on someone else's copyright. If I take the pic, or cite its origin, that's fine, but I may not always have time to snap a picture.

Questions have to be well-phrased on other blogs, or they can appear to be more like attention-begging. I never want to intentionally do that to my readers.

My blog is an online diary for me, so it not only covers my writing but art, music, science, local events, and national trends I find interesting.

Blogging is a conversation with your readers, so DO write like you're writing to a friend.

Great thread.

This isn't exactly a do or don't, but it is a tip for newbies.

I had once read a suggestion to use pictures in your posts. Well that sounds nice, but I'm not a photographer. And as writers we should be sensitive to the issues of people using your material without permission, so I didn't want to do that with photos. So what's a girl to do?

Then I discovered publicdomainpictures.net. I love that place! If you are using the picture on line they do ask that you link back to them. Sounds reasonable to me. I like to put the photographer's name directly underneath the picture and then at the bottom of the post, I put an attribution link with the photographers name repeated. Like so:

Photo attribution: Junior Libby

Occasionally, I also use Flickr commons. They are great for museum type pictures. For example, for a post scheduled for next week, I found a cool picture of survivors of the Titanic in a lifeboat right before rescue. It is from the Library of Congress.

If you use flickr be very careful to get your pictures from The Commons....for example, if you are on The Commons page and put some word in the search engine, it may bring back pictures from all over the site, not just the commons. Consider everything outside the commons copyrighted.

I have found that I really enjoy finding just the right picture to go with my posts...give it a try, you might like it!

P.S. I found the coolest picture of a sand sculpture dragon that had come up out of the ground and was swallowing a child building a sand castle. (I used it on yesterday's blog post if you want to see it. It's so cool...you never know what you might find on The Flickr Commons

Thanks for the tips here!! I'm a relatively new blogger (well, new to the world of the relatively professional blog, as opposed to my personal rantypants bloggity) so reading all of this has been extremely handy. Although I have to say, I did laugh a little at the idea of putting a huge picture of myself as the header.

In regards to advice, I agree blog about what you want to talk about. I suggest keeping a list of topics you'd think would be interesting. I used to make a mental note of certain topics, only to forget about them later. So I've made a list and it's a great way to keep track of each topic, such as writing, self-publishing, vampires or anything else.

I am open to discussion on my blog, but I think I make the mistake of asking a question in the heading. I'm trying to stop that, because I am not asking for help, I'm just wondering about certain things.

As for moderating comments, it can be a good idea. I used to get this author leaving comments that were more about her and her books than my blog. Meaning, she kind of stole my platform and did some spamming. You might also get a rude comment or spam slips by. Moderating comments saves such problems.

To paraphrase, my approach to blogging is like playing jazz: it's best to improvise.

nighttimer said:

You probably won't get rich from blogging so you'd better try to have fun.

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Hee hee, I like that! Blogging is fun, at least for me!

I disagree on the point about blogging too much. I think it depends on how fast you want to build your audience. I tried blogging only several times a week, and even with putting it out there I just couldn't build the audience that I needed. But now that I'm promoting my book pre-publication, I'm blogging a few times a day and am building a bigger audience and gaining more views. Once I have my audience at a certain point, I'll probably slow down, but since my posts are 500 words or less, readers don't need a whole lot of time to digest. And if they are loyal followers, they won't care how many times you post so long as you post quality stuff. In fact, my followers love it because they might read something on my blog that catches them at just the right time.

In any case, one tip I'd like to add is to not make long posts. It's a blog article, not a newspaper article. I tend to ignore ones that are 1000+, even if the blurb is interesting.

I second the "end with a question".

I found that responses increase nearly double when I end with a question or a "what's your opinion on..." type thing. It's the opening for people to leave their two cents there.

Also, tag your posts. I ALWAYS forget to do that! :/

Just don't make the question too vague. "What do you think of scary monkeys?" is a bad question. "Has anyone had any success dealing with the scary monkey problem, and if so what solutions did you use?" is a much better question.

One thing that helps

Learn just a bit about SEO and how to format your posts to be as Google friendly as you can. My blog is just one of many, a drop in a huge ocean of internet sites. Anything I can do to help make my sites easier to find is time well spent.

Create lists of your favorite books, Web sites, writing tips, YouTube videos, etc. Lists are easier to read (or skim) and, I think, everyone likes to have a bit of insight into what the blogger likes/recommends. Also, I find, when someone lists something in one of their "like" posts that I end up finding invaluable, I show my appreciation by becoming a regular reader and begin looking forward to, and trusting, their recommendations.

On that note, do a bit of "content curation". Once a week, have a post devoted to other blog posts, videos, resources, etc, you have come across. Listing links to other blogs is great for SEO and helps you build relationships with other the bloggers.

Good post, Pyrosama. I also like instant gratification; if I post a comment, I want to see it.

My blog's about a year old and it's doing pretty well, with over 21,000 hits. Not sure how to explain this, but I imagine it has to do with its focus on demystifying the business of publishing as well as talking about the craft of writing. Since I used to be a literary agent as well as an editor, I have plenty of info to share--never been short of opinions, either. A good number of hits come from interviews with industry friends, well-known writers, agents and editors: useful stuff for writers, I think. But I've also noticed a surprisingly large number of hits on posts that are more personal; not sure how to acccount for that.

I read a lot of blogs, too. Solid information from well-informed, thoughtful people is a huge attraction. Blogs on the writing process, not so much. Stories are like sausages, I think. Better to enjoy the end result that watch the process.

Can I poke my head in and ask a question?

Do you find, in general, that having a picture on a blog post to be that big of a draw? I get that it will visually break things out a little but to entice a reader in?

Is it really that intimidating to read a blog post that doesn't have an image, even if the content is the same?

Also, I want to address length. Some of the blogs that I frequent have really short entries. So there's this huge image and maybe 200 words that hits some high level thought or idea. There doesn't seem to be a lot of 'meat' to the information. Just splash, an image, some question at the end and boom. Entry done.

Maybe it's just me but it really feels cheap. If blogs are supposed to be about engaging the reader, what is there to engage when it's only 200 or so words of stuff that everyone else is talking about, sounds like a regurgitation of all the other 'wisdom' out there and most of the screen is taken up by some guy looking meaningfully off in the distance?

...maybe I'm just used to LiveJournal style blogging before it became all the rage to 'engage' your audience with flash and sound and smoke with little else to recommend it.

I probably sound disparaging on blogging and bloggers and I don't mean to, but by the same token, if I'm going to have a blog, I'd like it to be different than other blogs out there. ...and I admit to being a bit lazy. I really don't feel like having to scout around for images of roads or grassy fields or brilliant sunsets or relevant to the topic pictures of books and pens and frustrated persons. Not if I'm going to attempt to be engaging with my words. Which means, a bullet list of Five Things All Writers Need to Watch Out For is right out as well.

tl;dr This blogging thing. It's frustrating but I want to do it well and be engaging. Do I really need stock images and 200 word soundbites of some 'relevant' topic for that?

It's frustrating but I want to do it well and be engaging. Do I really need stock images and 200 word soundbites of some 'relevant' topic for that?

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No. You don't need to use images. I think the whole stock image thing is a blogging style that needs to die off.

And what's even worse than stock images are those graphics that are popular on Pinterest and Facebook that consist of some quote. Ugh. People use them on blogs on. Again, ugh. I swear, if I see one more variation of "Keep Calm and Carry On" my head will explode.

Images should illustrate the text. They're great for things like recipe posts, for a travel post, and even to highlight a personal post. It's also cool to have posts that have the photos tell a story.

But just including an image for the sake of having one isn't going to make or break a blog. And those 200-word posts with a 600px image will eventually drive readers away.

However, if you're going to have paragraph after paragraph of text, you do have to come up with your own unique style when it comes to breaking that text up to make it more readable. Creating a style and using that style consistently has it's own visual impact.

Personally, I like the use of bold text, text in quotes, subheaders, and short paragraphs when it comes to making text more visual.

Wendy Jenae said:

Creating a style and using that style consistently has it's own visual impact.

Personally, I like the use of bold text, text in quotes, subheaders, and short paragraphs when it comes to making text more visual.

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I suppose that was the direction I was sort of leaning towards. I see so many blogs (and I suppose in my -or someone's- defense, they usually are also selling some kind of 'system') that all look the same. Image to the upper right, sometimes centered. Three paragraphs or a list of 5-10 things, then the closing question to 'engage' the reader.

So this idea that using an image to look 'different' doesn't seem to be working in my opinion. And since I want to get noticed, looking like everyone else is defeating the purpose.

Maybe I'm hampered by the fact that I see these 'patterns' and having read so many damn pitch pages of red text with bold sub headings and, frankly, ugly-ass colors, with a long scroll of testimonials that just screams "I'M TRYING TO SELL YOU SOMETHING", I just see what look like templates for blog formatting with nothing really dynamic about them.

I'm trying to understand trends so I know how to use them to my advantage without falling into the same traps. :/

This blogging stuff is haaaaaaaaaard.