Post by Deleted on Mar 9, 2014 8:50:56 GMT -5
I am not much of a superblogger, but I do read a lot of blogs. I follow a bunch on Feedly, not just about writing, but about all sorts of things. I see some common problems among bloggers that often lead me to unfollow them pretty fast. If you want any examples, you can pm me and I'll send you a few.
I wanted to write this on KB or reddit, but I figured it was better off here. I don't think anybody here is guilty of these things. Just sorta had to get it off my chest...
The Bait and Switch Blogger - It happens fairly often. I see a really cool blog post title, and I get excited about reading it. Then I find out the article doesn't discuss that issue at all. All of their posts are only about their book or how everybody loves them as an author. Or they make you think they will discuss the issue, then you find out that to get the "answer", you have to buy their book or subscribe to their service. This blogger often puts their Amazon associates book link in about 50 times in the post. This is a pretty much guaranteed instant unfollow.
The Vague Post - Posts which say nothing detailed or helpful about the subject, just summarize the problem. The posts are generally very short and offer nothing practical or fun or even interesting. This is not the type of post that has an emotional quotient, such as a memoir style post. It's just a summary of a problem the bloggers sees, but does not offer anything to solve or help the problem. Sometimes I wonder if the poster even spent more than two minutes on the post. I dunno, maybe these posts are just keyword linkbait. But I will unfollow a blogger after repeated vague posts. For the vague poster, even a small tip can turn this type of post away from being completely useless to a reader. Or add an emotional personal story of your experience with the problem. Unfortunately, I see this type of post all the time, and have unfollowed bloggers who only seem to post this kind of thing.
The Nonexpert Expert - With the rise of self publishing, I will concede that we've given platforms to people who think they are experts and aren't. However, the "self proclaimed expert" often sell books only from their blogs at exorbitant prices following some sort of secret publishing advice from someone who's just as much of a nonexpert as they are. They often bait and switch, as above. I have a friend who does this, and who claims that charging $30 for each of his eight pdfs off his website is the way to "big money", even though I know I make more selling my 2 "fun" novels on Amazon. Most of them have the EXACT same sales pitch and web format. I come across so many of these that I wonder where they are getting their info. I hope they didn't pay $30 for it...
The Linkbaiter - We recently had a discussion about a linkbaiter over at KB. These are the people that post inflammatory things to get hits to their blogs. These people probably aren't going to earn a following. People may visit once and never come again. I think if you ever want to be successful as a blogger, you need to focus on gaining regular readers. Not to say that you can't be inflammatory (I still follow Joe Konrath), but to post completely jerky stuff that is not rationalized, or to just flame people by name for one mistake is not going to earn you readers, and it may even damage your career in the long run. If you are going to linkbait, you better actually have some worthwhile content. Unlike HuffPo (lol). Most people who linkbait aren't half as smart as they think they are, and everybody knows it but them. Pretty sad.
The Woe is Me Blogger - Some of you will know what/who I mean, but to repeatedly post that you don't blog for fun and so people should pay you is lame. I'm not against asking for donations on your blog, as long as it's done in a classy way. Something simple like "If you enjoyed my post and you think it was worth your while, I encourage you to donate via [Paypal link]." Positive, simple, and still clear. I'm totally fine with people who use Google Adsense or Amazon Associates. But to tag every post with "These posts are a waste of my time unless you donate and pay for them because I'm really above this" isn't the best way to treat your readers. It's condescending. If you don't like blogging, then don't do it, and just put all that stuff in your books. If you can't get attention for your books any other way than blogging, then you are getting something out of it, so stop treating your blog readers like you don't.
I wanted to write this on KB or reddit, but I figured it was better off here. I don't think anybody here is guilty of these things. Just sorta had to get it off my chest...
The Bait and Switch Blogger - It happens fairly often. I see a really cool blog post title, and I get excited about reading it. Then I find out the article doesn't discuss that issue at all. All of their posts are only about their book or how everybody loves them as an author. Or they make you think they will discuss the issue, then you find out that to get the "answer", you have to buy their book or subscribe to their service. This blogger often puts their Amazon associates book link in about 50 times in the post. This is a pretty much guaranteed instant unfollow.
The Vague Post - Posts which say nothing detailed or helpful about the subject, just summarize the problem. The posts are generally very short and offer nothing practical or fun or even interesting. This is not the type of post that has an emotional quotient, such as a memoir style post. It's just a summary of a problem the bloggers sees, but does not offer anything to solve or help the problem. Sometimes I wonder if the poster even spent more than two minutes on the post. I dunno, maybe these posts are just keyword linkbait. But I will unfollow a blogger after repeated vague posts. For the vague poster, even a small tip can turn this type of post away from being completely useless to a reader. Or add an emotional personal story of your experience with the problem. Unfortunately, I see this type of post all the time, and have unfollowed bloggers who only seem to post this kind of thing.
The Nonexpert Expert - With the rise of self publishing, I will concede that we've given platforms to people who think they are experts and aren't. However, the "self proclaimed expert" often sell books only from their blogs at exorbitant prices following some sort of secret publishing advice from someone who's just as much of a nonexpert as they are. They often bait and switch, as above. I have a friend who does this, and who claims that charging $30 for each of his eight pdfs off his website is the way to "big money", even though I know I make more selling my 2 "fun" novels on Amazon. Most of them have the EXACT same sales pitch and web format. I come across so many of these that I wonder where they are getting their info. I hope they didn't pay $30 for it...
The Linkbaiter - We recently had a discussion about a linkbaiter over at KB. These are the people that post inflammatory things to get hits to their blogs. These people probably aren't going to earn a following. People may visit once and never come again. I think if you ever want to be successful as a blogger, you need to focus on gaining regular readers. Not to say that you can't be inflammatory (I still follow Joe Konrath), but to post completely jerky stuff that is not rationalized, or to just flame people by name for one mistake is not going to earn you readers, and it may even damage your career in the long run. If you are going to linkbait, you better actually have some worthwhile content. Unlike HuffPo (lol). Most people who linkbait aren't half as smart as they think they are, and everybody knows it but them. Pretty sad.
The Woe is Me Blogger - Some of you will know what/who I mean, but to repeatedly post that you don't blog for fun and so people should pay you is lame. I'm not against asking for donations on your blog, as long as it's done in a classy way. Something simple like "If you enjoyed my post and you think it was worth your while, I encourage you to donate via [Paypal link]." Positive, simple, and still clear. I'm totally fine with people who use Google Adsense or Amazon Associates. But to tag every post with "These posts are a waste of my time unless you donate and pay for them because I'm really above this" isn't the best way to treat your readers. It's condescending. If you don't like blogging, then don't do it, and just put all that stuff in your books. If you can't get attention for your books any other way than blogging, then you are getting something out of it, so stop treating your blog readers like you don't.
