The Reader Appreciation Project » Surveys

If You Could Start Over…

Ronald Huereca — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 14:00:49 +0000

Simonne is out this week, so I’d thought I’d post a quick question to the readers.

Several months ago a friend of mine reflected on her experience joining the blogosphere. She wrote an insightful post on what she wished she knew before starting her blog. It’s easy to reflect on the past and say, “I wish I knew this.” But reflection shows that you have experience and how you would probably do things differently if given a second chance.

I pose this question to the readers: What if you could start over with your blog?

What would you do differently? What would you do the same? Would you do anything differently when it comes to appreciating your readers? Please respond in the comments or perhaps with your own post.

Thank you.

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Do You Like ‘Thank You Sponsor’ Posts?

Ronald Huereca — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 14:00:35 +0000

I’m going to write a post soon that will lay out my very blunt opinion on the usefulness of sponsor type posts. I admit I am a little naive when it comes to criticizing things like this because I haven’t ever tried to monetize a blog before. However, to me as a reader, I don’t see any benefit of these posts whatsoever.

One type of sponsor posts that comes to mind are the ones from Daily Blog Tips. In this June sponsor post, Daniel thanks the readers:

As usual, I would like to thank the readers on the first place.

The next sentence gets to business:

Secondly, Daily Blog Tips has 2 Sponsorship spots open for July, if you are interested just head to the Contact page and send me an email, I will get back to you as soon as possible.

As a reader, what do you think of such posts?

Please respond as I’d like to use your feedback for a follow-up post.

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Is It Okay to Gain More Readers by Tricking Them?

Ronald Huereca — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 14:00:08 +0000

A Google security flaw (which has been fixed) allowed malicious websites to automatically subscribe readers to RSS feeds using Google Reader. The way it worked was an iframe was loaded on a page that would automatically load a page adding users to a blogger’s feed count.

The trick (hack?) mentioned above is a blatant attempt to game the feed counters that are so prevalent on many sites. It can also be interpreted as an attempt to lure advertisers in since a high feed count might be a good indication that a site is doing well.

A large side-effect of adding all of these readers as feed subscribers is that the readers had no choice in the matter. All a reader had to do was go to a website. If many websites had participated in this technique, a reader would suddenly be overwhelmed with new feeds and no idea how they had gotten there.

Michael from Copyblogger wrote how it is never a good idea to force readers into anything. I am against forcing readers to have advertisements blasted in their face, and also forcing readers to unknowingly subscribe to content.

I’d like some feedback on this if any of you have time to comment. What are some of the ways you’ve been “tricked” to click on an ad, subscribe to a feed, or stay longer on a website? Are there any benefits at all for tricking readers to do a task?

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Do You Differentiate Between Real and Fake Appreciation?

Bes — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 06:35:28 +0000

More bloggers are starting to talk about reader appreciation. Maybe the RA Project is starting to be very effective on many levels. We are seeing more people look into it, and we are also seeing more people treat their readers with respective comments.

Should fake appreciation be as respected as real appreciation?

A question arises in my mind every day though: if I see obviously fake appreciation online, should I still respect it, the same way I would respect real appreciation from someone? Is replying to comments simply to fulfill an obligation and give an illusion of caring about the community the same as responding to comments because of wanting to and caring about the community because of a real feeling of care?

Do you care if businesses showed fake appreciation only to get your money?

Imagine going to a dentist where the receptionist thanks you for visiting the dentist that day, and you know it is fake for some various reason, like the receptionist saying that to everyone, verbatim, word for word and outside the office you see that same receptionist telling someone that the dentist office only cares about money.

Would you differentiate between the real and fake appreciation? Or would you be satisfied with appreciation even if it is fake?

Please let me know what you think. Thank you.

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A Blog Is Not a Community in the First Place. Or Is It?

Simonne — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 18:00:41 +0000

Readers appreciation is getting more and more attention from bloggers of all shapes and sizes. Contests and debates are popping up every day, readers are invited to more and more interactions, on some blog posts, there are more words in comments than in the post itself.
After the hot debate whether or not paid comments are a disservice to readers, a new controversial move triggers lots of reactions: Kumiko Suzuki decided to switch off comments on Cash Quests, explaining in details how her blog benefits from this move.

I’m not going to argue with Kumiko’s decision, as time and Kumiko will probably tell us if it was a wise step. Nevertheless, I’d like to bring into your attention two of her points regarding switching off comments implications:

1. The sense of community will decrease:

This one made the decision quite hard! Without comments, there is definitely a decrease in the community feeling of the site. However, I believe that a blog isn’t a community in the first place. If Cash Quests were a community everybody would have an equal chance of having their voices heard and there wouldn’t be just one person writing 90% of the content for the site - and taking 100% of the revenue! A blog is part of a community of bloggers but it isn’t a community itself.

2. Better relationships will be built:

Without having to spend time reading, moderating and replying to comments I predicted that I would have more time to spend e-mailing and building relationships with other bloggers. This has definitely occurred with some fantastic relationships being built that have resulted in some very high PR links being both given and received.

Reactions from the blogging world were not so positive: people like Kevin from Blogging Tips, Julie Ann Bonner, I Thought Therefore I Blog, 45n5 or John Chow expressed their opinion and their reasons for welcoming comments to their blogs.

Back in October 2005, Steve Pavlina explained the benefits of switching off comments on his blog, being confident that it was a good decision. However, one year later, Steve associates a forum to his blog, allowing the community to interact even more. It seems that he missed the comments, after all.

What do you think?

Is your blog a community in the first place? Do you believe that not spending time moderating comments will allow you to build better relationships?

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Your Blog Is Like a Party: Do You Invite Everyone In?

Simonne — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 10:02:47 +0000

If you care about your readers, you probably want to build your community in such a way that the most loyal ones develop a feeling of belonging, of pride that they are all members of the same group, that each time they arrive to your blog, they can exchange comments and start conversations, like they knew each other since centuries. Your blog can be like a party, with you, the host, being the connection between all guests. However, it is your blog, so it’s up to you who’s invited to the party and who’s not.

How can you make a selection? An option would be to allow only subscribed members to post comments. Or, like in the case of Lifehacker, in order to be allowed to post comments, you have to register and send one first comment. If the moderators like your comment, you’re in. Even so, posts on Lifehacker usually have a lot of comments, and you are not even allowed to put a link in your signature.

Community Appreciation Poll

I’m challenging you now to look at this from a reader’s angle:

- Do you feel that you are more appreciated, or more valuable if you are part of a community which has an entry barrier (be it only a simple, free registration)?

- Given the fact that you are lazy (who isn’t at least a little bit?), which would be the “stimulents” that would make you subscribe to a blog, in order to be able to leave comments there?

Thank you for giving us your thoughts in this matter.

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In What Ways Do You Invest in Your Readers?

Ronald Huereca — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 01:08:41 +0000

Daily Blog Tips did an interview with Lorelle VanFossen where Lorelle explains that blogging is a hobby for general bloggers. As with most hobbies, there is a certain cost involved to keep the hobby up. For example, if your hobby is photography, you must continue to buy equipment and printing services.

For the majority of bloggers, blogging will always be a hobby, regardless if some attempt at monetization is made. Besides the obvious investment of time, what are the other ways you invest in your readers?

The rest of this post will be what I consider some of my attempts at readership investment on other blogs as well as this one.

Quality Content

For me, posting once a day would be impossible. I would quickly burn myself out and run out of things to say rather quickly. One thing I attempt to do is to post when I really have something to say and attempt to put out that “quality content” that everyone seems to blog about lately.

Andrew Rickmann has a similar mindset with regards to content:

For me posting is directly related to my enthusiasm, I often feel that I should write something but I don’t want to write for the sake of it. Not because it would be a disservice to my readers, but because the result would be rubbish.

Stats Packages

Here at the Reader Appreciation Project, we have Mint installed. It enables all of the authors to determine which posts are the most popular, where the referrals are coming from, and some other miscellaneous statistics.

Stats packages are important to the readers indirectly in my opinion. It helps a blog author know what posts are not ringing well with readers (in terms of views) and also enables to blog author to see trends in traffic and/or reader behavior.

Another stats package I will try very soon is Crazy Egg. Crazy Egg enables you to see what readers are clicking on and what they aren’t. It’s a good way to not have to “guess” what readers are doing.

Hosting Packages

Another area of investment is that of a hosting package. Do your readers get shared hosting (such as with this site) or is your website on a dedicated server of some sort?

A lot of money a year could go into hosting. I thought paying a premium for web hosting would be more reliable, but I was wrong. I recently canceled my account with Media Temple (former host of my personal site) because of numerous reader complaints about downtime.

Theme Design

As with any blog software, some effort must be made in the design of the theme. With WordPress there are many free themes available.

After the first few months of RA Project, it became evident that in order to grow, a new design must be launched. Unfortunately, I’ve had other things come up to delay the design launch. Designing a theme from scratch is very time consuming, and sometimes it’s easier to just tweak a theme (such as with this current theme).

One of the things I personally am trying to avoid is to stop posting while the design is being worked on. A design is secondary to the content in my opinion. An analogy would be picture framing. The theme design is the actual frame. The content is the picture that goes in the frame. What’s more important, the picture, or the frame?

Contests

Another way to invest in the readership is to have contests. RA Project has yet to run a contest outside of Reader Appreciation Week simply because the blog is still young and is still growing a readership. Contests will come in due time hopefully.

ProBlogger has a useful tutorial on how to run a blog contest.

Communication

The last investment I will discuss is that of communication. Probably one of the bigger investments a blogger can make to the reader is that of communication. Communication helps build relationships, establish goodwill, and lets the reader know that he/she matters.

Here at RA Project, I try my best to respond to most comments (if applicable). A lot of times I don’t respond publicly and e-mail the commentator instead of making a comment. Sometimes I will email and comment. Other times I might not comment because I didn’t see the comment (with a multi-author blog, it’s tough to keep track of comments).

What Are Your Investments?

Thank you for reading the ways I try to invest in my readers. In what ways do you try to invest in your readers? I will try to do a follow-up post that will implement your suggestions.

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What Type of Atmosphere Is Your Blog Store?

Ronald Huereca — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 00:43:31 +0000

Every blog is a store. There’s no question in my mind about that. You don’t have to be selling anything on your blog. I still consider your blog a store. The question is, what kind of atmosphere is your blog store promoting?

Why is Your Blog a Store?

Think of your blog as a store on a street. People may do some window shopping and actually come inside. Others may not even notice, or be repulsed by your store’s outside appearance.

Once inside your store, however, it is your job to lure that customer in and convince them to make a purchase. I don’t care if your blog is a personal blog that doesn’t aim to make any money whatsoever, you are still trying to get your customer (reader) to purchase something.

What Items Are For Sale at Your Blog Store?

Besides the obvious things a blog sells (advertisements anyone?), there are other things that blogs try to get readers to purchase.

Feed subscriptions.
Comments.
Newsletter/email subscriptions.
Word of mouth (aka, Social Networking).
Donations.
And more…

What Sales Atmosphere Do You Give Your Readers?

There are a few stores I generally like to avoid. I dislike going into a store where I look around and actually have to search for a sales person if I need help (Wal-Mart anyone?). I also dislike the stores I go into where I walk in and immediately am bombarded with salespeople trying to convince me to make a purchase.

A nice compromise is to provide an atmosphere where you are available, but not overwhelming to your customer. An example of this is a store where you can walk in, browse for a few minutes, and have the salesperson approach you and inform you that he/she is available if you need to inquire about something.

Do you give readers the impression that you are not available? Is your about page visible? Is your contact information easy to access?

On the other hand, do you give readers the impression that you’re a pushy salesperson? Do you force readers to jump through hoops to comment? Do you push ads in the reader’s face?

What Is the Purpose of a Store?

One must remember that a store is there for customers. If customers didn’t exist, the store wouldn’t exist. Customers come to a store for a good or service (simple economics).

Your blog is there for readers. If readers didn’t exist, your blog wouldn’t exist (the same argument is, if a tree fell and nobody heard it, did it really fall?). Readers typically come to a blog for content (information, entertainment, etc).

Why should a reader make a “purchase” at your particular store? And what type of atmosphere do you promote at your blog store?

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Is It Ever Okay to Lose Readers?

Ronald Huereca — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 14:00:38 +0000

A few weeks ago I came across a post that discussed when it was okay to lose readers.

Leroy Brown from Green Llama said this:

If someone unsubscribes from your blog, or just stops visiting over an advertisement that they don’t like, then you’ve lost nothing.

He went on to conclude:

So if you have a chance to make some coin, go for it - the important folks will stick around. The rest can go their own way, and you shouldn’t lose any sleep.

I’ve sat on this for a while to keep as objective as possible, but I’m still of the opinion that the second you choose money over readers, you have sold your soul to the blogging devil.

So I ask the readership and fellow bloggers, when is it okay to lose readers?

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How Is Your Blog Handshake?

Ronald Huereca — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 17:00:05 +0000

Shawn Blanc asked on his blog how one’s handshake was.

Shawn said this:

You’d be surprised what a solid handshake, some eye contact and a smile will do. Let’s not forget that other people are just that - people. Whatever situation you encounter people in, try being a little more friendly to them, and carry yourself a little more dignified.

So I ask this question: how is your blog handshake? What are you doing to make your readers feel welcome? Do you give them “eye contact” and a smile?

Please respond in the comments.

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Being Lost in the Conversation?

Ronald Huereca — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 17:00:50 +0000

Have you ever been in a conversation where everybody was talking and acknowledging each other, but when you spoke, it was almost as if your comment was ignored?

When one is ignored, I would imagine that one would feel rejected, left out, belittled, unkempt, or a host of other negative feelings.

A Question for Bloggers

If you are a blogger, do you make an effort to respond to comments so that people don’t feel lost in the conversation?

A Question for Readers

If you are a reader of blogs, how do you feel when you make a comment and it isn’t acknowledged by the blogger? This blogger may even have acknowledged other comments, but not yours.

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