ContentRobot

If you have been managing your blog for a while, you might notice that things have been getting cluttered as you’ve added new features, buttons and widgets - it’s time for spring cleaning!

Blog Design

• Even if you feel you haven’t done alot of modifications to your blog’s design, be sure to take the time to validate your home page, blog templates, and CSS files at http://validator.w3.org and reduce all errors.
• Check your blog in multiple browsers and multiple plaforms. Viewing IE 6, Firefox, and Safari on PCs and Macs can help you to iron out the bugs.
• Play with the increase and decrease font features in any browser to see if the design still holds up.
• Turn off stylesheets in your browser. Does the blog’s structure still make sense?
• Turn off images in your browser. Is everything still understandable? Is the text still readable?
• Resizing your screen’s resolution to 800 x 600 pixels and then to 1024 x 768 pixels. How does it look?
• Use the Google Mobilizer to view your blog the way mobile users will see it.

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No one wants to lose their hard-earned blog readers, but here are some reasons why visitors might turn off your feed.

1. Infrequent Posting
If you hardly post, and then post only with apologies for not posting, it’s a surefire way to bore your audience. Irregular posting can be OK, if what you eventually post is something worthwhile and valuable to your readers.

2. Constant Negativity
While there is a place for an occassional jolt, rant, or snarky writing, use that type of post sparingly. Remember that rattling on and on about why you hate Google (or whatever) gets old fast. Also, think twice about posting if you are in a bad mood, depressed, drunk or have nothing to say.

3. Being Elitist
Talking down to your audience and treating them like idiots will send them right to the “unsubscribe” button. Skip the “in jokes” and asides that some of your readers might not “get.”

4. Being Cryptic
When your blog if full of cryptic post titles and snippets that give little indication of what your posts are about, it’s not a good thing. Instead use great navigation and other cues that excite readers to explore your blog, not incomplete titles that don’t readily clue them in.

5. Being Irrelevant
If you are publishing a technology blog, don’t post constantly about your kid’s sleeping problems. Remember, constantly cultivated niches are goldmine blogs.

Blogging is hard work, so treat it as such. Keep at it!

When you are blogging, do you realize that your readers are your customers? As such, you should treat them right so they’ll keep coming back. We’ve outlined some dos and don’ts to help you along the way.

DO … Make your design as pleasing as you can and your navigation as intutive as can be.

DON’T … Make big changes overnight. People don’t like sudden surprises. Drop hints, openly discuss your plans or add the updates over a lengthy period of time while telling them. Any radical changes can cause a dramatic downturn in readership.

DO … Be polite and nice to them always (no matter what they do to you).

DON’T … Insult them. Avoid flame wars and resorting to swearing. If you must, smile sweetly and block their IP address if they become a nuisance.

DO … Say hello to your readers. Never ignore them or pretend that they are not there. Don’t forget to answer your email and comments promptly.

DON’T … Take them for granted. Just because they click on an ad or comment one day does not mean that they will next week.

DO … Help your readers with any queries or problems that they have. Put negative feedback to good use and implement changes when possible to correct any minor issues.

DON’T … Get angry at your readers even if they for whatever reason don’t seem to ‘get it.’ Good and happy readers are worth their weight in gold, so never forget that.

DO … Keep it simple. Avoid using overly complicated terms, or if you do, take the time to explain them within your posts. If you need to, point them to another web resource, such as the Wikipedia, to help you help them.

DON’T … Think that your readers are stupid. Don’t show off and never talk down to them.

DO … Use your own common sense. Think about how you would want to be treated. Yeah, the old golden rule also applies when blogging.

DON’T … Confuse, be pushy, or be annoying. No one likes a snob, afterall.

Thanks to performancing for this article’s inspiration.

When bloggers go into their blog editors, the first thing they are encouraged to do is to write a post title followed by the content itself. Actually, it should be one of the last things you do. When the post is ready for publishing, go back and check to see if the title reflects the copy, has some great keywords in it, and is enticing enough for your readers to actually, well, read it.

Here are five questions that can help you to make your blog titles the best they can be.

1. How long is your post’s title?
An effective title is short, simple and easy to understand. Also, by curbing the babbling, provides a better chance for your entire title to appear within search engine results.

2. Would you click on your post’s title?
Strive to ensure that the title is compelling enough to entice a reader to click on it and read on. It can be factual, provoke thought, or even be controversial – just relate it to the content inside.

3. What can your reader learn from your post’s title?
Try to write a title so that they just have to read more. How about asking a question that you have answers to? Can you teach them how-to? Solving problems and sharing experiences often can draw in readers.

4. Does your post’s title quickly explain its content?
A title should succinctly express what readers can expect to gain by reading more. An evocative title without the supporting copy is a major turnoff!

5. Did you optimize in your post’s title for SEO?
We think crafting an SEO-optimized title is always a good idea. While we hate to write anything for search engines solely, a keyword laden-title can go a long way toward building a new audience.

So next time you are writing your post, try to develop your title last – your audience and search engines alike will thank you!

Steve Pavlina has written some great ways to build a high traffic blog. His strategy isn’t based on tricks or techniques that will go out of style, but providing genuine value and letting word of mouth do the rest.

I’ve excerpted his 10 best suggestions for building a high traffic web site:

1. Create valuable content.
He suggests imaginging yourself in from of an outdoor concert stage before an audience of a million people. What would you say to them? Remember that strong content is universally valued, and quality is more is more often important than quantity.

2. Create original content.
While it takes more effort to produce original content, your site becomes the “final destination.” Then, your visitors will often stick around for a while.

3. Create timeless content.
He suggests thinking about how your work might influence future generations in addition to my own. What advice can you pass onto your great grandchildren? We forget yesterday’s news, but we remember those things that have meaning to us.

4. Write for human beings first, computers second.
Don’t let the prevailing search engine strategies intefere with your desire to deliver genuine value and creating timeless content. Your traffic can grow because people tell other people about this site, either online or offline.

5. Know why you want a high-traffic site.
Do you know your site’s purpose? Is your work driven by this purpose? If you do succeed by building a high-traffic web site and are in the privileged position of being able to influence millions of people, what will you say to them? Don’t forget to honor those readers with your best.

6. Let your audience see the real you.
Getting people to know you makes it easier for them to understand the context of what you write. His attitude is that it’s perfectly OK to fail or to be rejected publicly - trying to appear perfect is nothing but a house of cards that will eventually collapse.

7. Write what is true for you, and learn to live with the consequences.
Being honest is more important to him than being popular. He doesn’t treat any subjects as taboo or sacred if they’re relevant to his site’s subject (personal growth). Truth creates trust, and trust builds traffic.

8. Treat your visitors like real human beings.
The human-to-human connection between Steve and his readers matters to him. Real human beings helping real human beings is ultimately what traffic growth is all about (think links and referrals). If you align yourself with the intention of genuinely helping people because you care, you’ll soon find yourself with an abundance of traffic.

9. Keep money in its proper place.
Money is important, obviously you have bills to pay.
He sought to earn money for the purpose of increasing my freedom. By paying close attention to how he earns money and not just how much he earns, he keeps money in its proper place.

10. Focus on genuinely helping people, and the rest will take care of itself.
One of the great benefits of focusing on helping others is that it gets fear out of the way. Without fear you become free to just be yourself. You’re able to take intelligent risks and remain detached from any specific outcome because the journey is more important to you than the specific stops along the way.

In sum …
Do your best to help your visitors out of genuine concern for their well-being, and they’ll help you build your traffic and even generate a nice income from it. It’s as simple as that.

You can read Steve’s full article here. He started his web site from scratch and build its traffic to over 700,000 visitors per month in about 15 months — without spending any money on marketing or promotion.

Here are some tips for getting your creative juices going:

1. Take it in Pieces
   Break the job into manageable pieces and do the easy stuff first. By building momentum and confidence, your progress can be a motivation.
2. Take a Break
   Don’t feel compelling to sit their hour after non-productive hour. Talk to someone, get some fresh air, drink some coffee, or do whatever you need to re-energize.

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