The Responsibilities of Blogging
As you might have noticed, this blog isn’t being posted to very regularly. And posting regularly is one of the key pieces of advice given to those who want to blog well. So why have I not been posting? In a nutshell… Life. Contrary to popular opinion, bloggers do have them. In my own case, I am a single mother with a small child. I am a university student. I am renovating a house to sell and trying to orchestrate a move. I am in the process of setting up a charity. I have real life friends and family who require some of my time. I get sick. I get tired. And so on and so on…
This blog was an unrealised dream for quite a while before I started it, and I started it when I did, not because it was the perfect time for me, but because I was fortunate enough to receive the domain name and hosting as a prize from All For Women, for which I am extremely grateful. But it is still to a certain extent an unrealised dream, because I have expectations of myself as a blogger, of which posting regularly is only one.
This raises an interesting question about blogging, for me at least. When I don’t meet my own expectations as as a blogger, I feel as though I haven’t met my responsibilities.
Why is this so?
Many personal bloggers start by blogging “only” for themselves but once readers come into the picture, the dynamic changes. It took me a long time to get that first reader but as soon as I did, I realised that this art form is not like most others. It is not only interactive: It is social.
And it brings with it, I think, social obligations.
That is one of the reasons why, in my very small blogroll, I list the Reader Appreciation Project. They are all about meeting those obligations: Doing those simple things like replying, like saying thank you. I have a lot of respect for their blogging philosophy and the writers, and other bloggers like them, are what makes being part of the blogosphere so rewarding.
The blogosphere is about giving.
Other art forms are about giving too, of course. If art is a form of expression, it is also a way of sharing; sharing ideas and emotions and ways of perceiving the world. And sharing in this way elicits a response. Few mediums have the ability to appreciate the response directly the way that blogging does. And actor can take a bow to acknowledge the audience’s applause. A blogger has many more options available. But one thing which perhaps doesn’t get discussed so frequently, is that other kinds of artists show their appreciation by performing well.
Obviously, this is a complicated form of appreciation, because it is also it’s own reward and the art is practised for the love of it. But it does generate a responsibility to perform as well, and especially so in blogging where the audience involvement is so immediate.
Other bloggers, with a different character than mine, might use different language to express this idea, or might strike a different balance between the satisfaction of private creation and the joy of communicating, but I do feel it as an obligation, as a responsibility I took on when I decided to communicate this way.
So I’m wondering, do you? Or are you able to draw a defining line between blogging just for the love of it and the audience who rewards you?
How Much Traffic is Too Much?
I think most personal bloggers have an idea of how much traffic they would like. There are numbers of subscribers, or visitors, or comments, they aim for. Usually, those numbers are small because personal blogs are not (generally) driven by ambition. I still remember the first time I got comments on my blog from people I didn’t know. I still remember the first time my blog was viewed 10, 20, 50, 100 times in a day.
It’s always nice to see progress and if you are anything like me, each time a small goal is attained you fill the void with another.
But at what point should we stop increasing those numbers in our head?
In the last two months I have had 2 major traffic spikes on my personal blog, one due to StumbleUpon and one due to a link from a blog in the Technorati Top 50. Rather than being thrilled, I found myself a little freaked out. I found the idea of dealing with that amount of traffic overwhelming.
The beauty of slow growth on a personal blog is, for me, the organic evolution of relationships. My readers and I grow in our understanding of one another. We are building friendships and it is comfortable.
When spikes occur, or your blog grows at a faster pace, I think things get harder.
Being Invaded
My personal blog is a sanctuary. I don’t mean it’s private or closed: In fact, I try my best to make it open and I rarely censor myself. But it’s a living room not a town square. An influx of strangers can seem like an invasion and leave me feeling defenseless. It’s a crowd standing too close.
Sometimes that’s a wonderful thing - it’s how friendships begin- but in real life you can only maintain a limited number of friendships and a blog is the same.
Being Responsive
Most of the personal bloggers I know place a very high value on being responsive to their readers. When the numbers become too great, it’s hard to adjust your expectations of yourself and do only what you can. If you can’t reply (or visit, or subscribe, or comment, or email, or Stumble, or link, or reward..) the way you like to, the “invasion” creates a lot of pressure.
For me, those spikes were something to be proud of because I was proud of those two articles. Until the added responsibility made me feel as though I had failed.
What I Am Left With
I’m not sure there is such a thing as too much traffic, but there is definitely such a thing as too fast. With those spikes, I learned how ill-prepared I was for them. I learned what expectations I have for myself when I clearly failed to meet them. I learned what I have the capacity to handle right now, and what I need to build on.
The weakness that was really highlighted for me by those spikes was that I need to be more organised. I can’t afford to be a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants blogger any more if I want to live up to my own standards of responsiveness. In my current schedule (I use that term loosely), there isn’t much wiggle room to allow for the extra tasks spikes generate, let alone the time for me capitalise on them, so I’m left with this…
Next time I will do better.
Blogs are perpetual learning. Have you ever been sent into a tailspin by an influx of traffic? Did it thrill you, or freak you out? What did you learn from it?
Is Your “About” Page All About You?
When people come across your personal blog and are trying to decide whether or not they want to make your daily life a daily part of theirs, your “About” page is often the first place they look for more information. While it’s never going to be the most visited page on your site, when it comes to turning visitors into readers, your “About” page is very important.
Personal blogs are often introspective but if there is only one page on your site written specifically for your audience, I think it should be this one.
So how do you write an “About” page?
The Good Advice
In How to Write the Perfect ‘About’ Page (by Numbers), Skellie points out that although many “About” pages are the digital equivalent of the author bios found on a book jacket, the “selling text” on a book jacket also contains a blurb and the priorities are clear…
The blurb should always come first.
- What does your site have to offer?
- Who is it written for?
- What are the benefits?
Then, the bio.
The Difficulty With This Advice
If you’re anything like me, you might baulk at the idea of defining your audience and unless you have some megalomaniacal tendencies, you might draw a blank when it comes to perceiving any benefits for those reading.
I’m joking about the megalomaniacal tendencies, of course. Some people are naturally skilled at selling themselves and some people have learned those skills the hard way. I think the majority of personal bloggers, however, are fairly humble about what they do and find it difficult to assess the value of what they labour to create.
But humility isn’t always a virtue.
Most people don’t like a braggart and we try to avoid seeming like one, even to ourselves. We talk down our commitment, our achievement, our talent. Because it’s the polite thing to do.
However…
It’s Still Good Advice
If you are stuck at the idea of “selling” yourself and your blog, step back and look at it from the other side of the glass: This advice is polite.
As Skellie says in her article…
Personal bloggers don’t get out of this one. You still need a blurb, you can still explain what your site has to offer, who it’s written for and what the benefits are. You’re writing for an audience, just like anyone else.
If you’re introverted like me, your focus is most often turned inward. When writing your “About” page, however, you need to switch gears and focus on your readers.
Because your “About” page is actually all about them.
Can We Workshop This?
The line between us and our blogs is pretty fuzzy so separating our “blurbs” from our “bios” in the linear way described above is problematic. What I’ve written above is mostly philosophy and I’m not entirely sure how we should put it into practice.
If anyone would like to volunteer their “About” page for dissection by the community here so that we can workshop it together, let me know in the comments or via my contact form. I think it could be a really useful exercise.
In the meantime… Whose “About” page do you love, and what makes it work? Do you love your own and, if not, what don’t you like about it?
[A Note for Blogger Users: Obviously Blogger doesn’t have the ability to create static pages but you can still create a psuedo page by writing an “About” post, backdating it so that it doesn’t display on your front page and then linking to it from a text widget in your sidebar. Tip from Sephy at Sephy’s Platzish]
UPDATE: Lightening has kindly volunteered her About page for us to workshop. The workshop will run in 2 weeks time, so if you’d like to familiarise yourself with her blog you’ll find her at LIGHTENING. Pop on over. She’s lovely.
The Content of Your Character is King
Content is King.
It has been said ad infinitum and it echoes in our minds. We think that it means that beautiful writing, fresh ideas, a unique perspective, consistent quality and regular posting will be rewarded. And it does.
Sort of.
What many personal bloggers don’t realise is that “Content is King” is about Search Engine Optimisation: The Golden Rule of SEO. It’s about copywriting and keyword research, building keyword density and attracting links. It’s about getting your content indexed and increasing its rank. There is no doubt that this is a valid approach to getting a blog seen, even a personal blog, but it isn’t everything.
“Something else is necessary“.
Writing good content is not enough. You need to put yourself out there - commenting on other blogs and using social media - the same way you need to in real life if you want to make friends.
But this post isn’t about how people will find your personal blog: It’s about why people will return.
Your personality is present in every aspect of your blog, from your design to your writing style to the subjects of your posts. And it should be. That’s what a personal blog is for. Writing “good copy” would be counter-productive. That’s not to say that you should ignore the tenets of good writing but if you want a maxim to blog by, this is it:
The content of your character is king.
Finding a personal blog you want to read is the same as meeting a person who interests you. Whether you are attracted because their character is similar to yours, or different, or nice, or challenging, it is their personality which will draw you in. Just as it is personality that repels.
While not everybody is going to like you and your blog, there is one thing almost guaranteed to turn people off. Fakeness.
Photo Credit: .Tatiana.
Whether you try to reveal the fullness of your personality in your blog or explore just an aspect, if you aren’t genuine it isn’t going to work. People can sniff out a poser a mile away and they don’t like them.
If you want to appeal to the broadest audience possible, if you want to satisfy your readers, and if you want comments and connections and community, Shakespeare’s version is better than mine. Even if it isn’t as search engine friendly.
To thine own self be true.
Perhaps that seems schmaltzy and idealistic but I really do think it’s one of the keys to creating a successful blog, however you define that. And not just for personal bloggers.
Feel free to disagree with me.
A Personal Blog is Art
It’s my turn to answer the question I posed, What is a personal blog?, and I doubt anyone will be surprised by my answer.
A personal blog is Art. And personal blogging is an artform.
Some people might have an immediate negative reaction to that statement: The idea “Art” has a lot of baggage. It might seem elitist, it might seem like hubris, it might even seem daunting, but for any of you struggling to make connections between some of the advice written for bloggers and the work (Yes, work!) you do, I think that you’ll come closer to something you can hold on to by considering yourself an artist. Or, at a minimum, an apprentice artist.
Reading through all the responses to my question, there were a number of common threads. One of the strongest was how indefinable a personal blog actually is, that it was unique to each individual, to each blog, subjective and without limitation. I agree.
The same can be said of Art.
Another idea was that it was a place of exploration, somewhere to express the things that are often left unsaid in life, somewhere you can develop your understanding of yourself and of the world.
The same can be said of Art.
Others thought that it was a way of communicating and connecting on a different level, one where you are able to both reveal and learn things you otherwise wouldn’t.
The same can be said of Art.
It doesn’t matter whether your definition of Art is the Sistine Chapel or Piss Christ, a ragged piece of embroidery or a cartoon. In fact, whatever your subjective definition is, that bias is probably present in your blog whether you are aware of it or not.
To be honest, I could write an entire book on all the comparisons that can (and in my opinon, should) be made, but I won’t belabour that point because I have a greater one.
Viewing personal blogging as an artform is functional.
It can help you develop as a blogger.
There is so much brilliant advice out there about blogging, and it does apply to personal blogs, but the majority of that advice is about understanding the medium, like learning the technical aspects of using water colours, or writing poetry. When it comes to purpose, however, a personal blog (whether comedic and light-hearted, or dark and philosophical) exists for the same reasons Art does so there are answers to be found there as well.
In many ways Art is about learning the rules and then breaking them in order to create something new; to make us experience the world in new ways, to stimulate our mind and our emotions, to comfort us or challenge us or inspire us. Personal blogs, even the ones that appear on the surface to be mundane, do all those things for all the same reasons.
So I want to examine both parts of the whole.
What is a personal blog anyway?
Perhaps this seems like a silly question. It’s fairly self-explanatory, right? It’s a blog that’s personal. But does that tell us anything? If someone asked you to define it more fully, would you be able to put it into words?
A search for the exact phrase, “What is a personal blog?” yields only nine results, mostly not relevant. If an easy answer were to be found it would have been there, repeating in the echo chamber. I think the reason it isn’t is because the number of possible answers seem exponential.
Jon Dyer wrote that, “Sometimes writing a personal blog is like being sent to the supermarket with a note that simply says ‘Get dinner.’” And he’s right. On our personal blogs, we can serve up whatever we want, whenever we want. We are multifaceted and there are no restraints on which facet will be reflected in any given post. There is no limit to the number of facets the entire blog will reveal. Instead of trying to encompass all the possible permutations, it’s easier just to say, “A personal blog is an online diary,” and leave it at that. But should we?
I don’t think we should.
If we set out to build a car, or bake a cake, we have a clear idea of the end goal. We know the function and the form and that knowledge informs every step we take along the way. A personal blog isn’t quite the same - it is never finished and it evolves over time - but I believe we can still benefit by understanding more fully, and more consciously, the purpose of what we do and the medium we use to do it. If we don’t, we are left aimlessly wandering the aisles of the supermarket.
I have what I think is a better answer to this question (and there is a fairly obvious hint at what it is in that quote in the header) but first I want to hear your thoughts.
Can you tell me what a personal blog is?
And do you think it is important that we know?
Blogging Personal Arriving Soon!
Blogging Personal, a blogging resource written specifically for personal bloggers, will be launching in January, 2008.
In the meantime, information about the blog is available on the About page and if you have any questions or comments, feel free to contact me.
Blogging Personal aims to open a dialogue about personal blogging, to provide a space where we can talk about about what we do, and how we can do it better. It is a place where we can ask questions and, together, find answers. [read more...]
Your Opinon Matters
Loading ...