Granted, I am a newcomer to the association world and the association blogging world, so I can enjoy some detachment as I haven’t invested nearly the time, energy or effort that folks like Ben Martin, Jamie Notter, Jeff De Cagna, and many others have put into the effort. But at the same time, I can appreciate where they are coming from because I too share their passion and concern for advancing the professionalism of associations. Needless to say, this issue is really resonating with me largely because it’s causing me to think about the many well-written blogs that exist, that do provide valuable and worthwhile information for the readers and how much time, energy and commitment those who write them put into the effort.

In my past posts I took a look at some of the possible root causes of low blog-readership among Association Executives and some action items that could/should be examined more closely as we move forward. I think one of my recurring themes throughout has been the fact that as bloggers we really need to figure out what is important to our target audience. We also need to set reasonable expecations of ourselves and our audiences if blogging is to continue to be a worthwhile activity for us to conduct. As I continued to think about the topic, I remembered an post from one of the blogs that I read regularly that was written a few years titled: “How to Increase Your Readership” by Dave Pollard. As an aside and an endorsement, I highly recommend his blog because he is a brilliant man with a lot to say on a wide variety of topics and I can say while I am not always familiar with what he writes about but I do learn a lot in the process. I guess you could say he challenges me to keep thinking…and that is a great quality.

I thought it would be a worthwhile refresher and perhaps help me see the root cause or possible solutions more clearly. In the article Dave makes the 5 suggestions to improve a blog:

1. Provide Something Unique: There are so many blogs out there, even if you’re writing brilliantly, you won’t attract an audience if someone who’s already more widely-read is writing on the same subjects.
2. Provide Something of Value: Give readers a high ‘return on their investment’ in reading your blog.
3. Be First: The first person to write about a particular topic will probably get a large share of traffic about it.
4. Do Your Homework: Invest time to learn as much as possible about what you’re going to write about. Spend much more time reading and researching than you do writing.
5. Learn to Write Well: Master the art of story-telling. Learn to be brief without being too dense. Write in a conversational, accessible, friendly style.

Perhaps none of this is earth-shattering, but I really liked seeing it right in front of me. Let’s face it, even the best of us need to get back to the basics every now and again.

The next half of the post was dedicated to attracting more attention to your blog and included the following suggestions:

1. Use Alternative Approaches to Attract Readers: Don’t just write great stuff and wait to be discovered. Use e-mails (sparingly, selectively) to tell people you think might be interested in reading your blog about a particular article you’ve written.
2. Wite About Hot Topics (Every Now and Again): Being very focused on narrow, deep topics will get you a faithful readership, but not a particularly large one.
3. Make a Good First Impression: The average reader who links to your site looks at 1.5 pages and stays 90 seconds.
4. Know What Works and What Doesn’t: At the end each day take a look at your blog stats (most blogs have a ‘referrer log’ tool that lists your visitors). If you don’t recognize a reader by their URL, drop by their site to see who they are, what brought them to your site and thank them for visiting yours.
5. Think Outside the Blog: When you find a ‘like mind’, link to them, e-mail them, comment on their weblog, or otherwise let them know you exist and where to find you.

Again nothing that breaks new ground but all great reminders. We have to keep telling ourselves that the medium may have changed and evolved but the fundamentals underlying it really haven’t…a best practice is what it is for a reason. Dave closed out his post on the topics with the following reminder which I will quote directly:

Be patient — Viral marketing is very effective but takes time to work. Stick with what you’re doing, especially if people are complimenting you — word will spread, and the audience will come. And be yourself. If you try to affect a style that isn’t ‘you’ it will come off as forced or dishonest.

I think for the most part all of the association bloggers that I read regularly (most of them) do a great job on all of the aforementioned points, but I did find the final reminder poignant and something that I will keep in mind as we continue to work through this…

Something else that was really quite interesting about this specific post, and perhaps Dave’s website in general is the fact that he has two great lists pretty far down his right navigation bar. Personally, I think they are important enough to deserve a better position on his site, but regardless, I will share them with you and hopefully do some viral marketing for Dave. It’s called what the Blogosphere Wants More Of:

Blog readers want to see more:

1. original research, surveys etc.
2. original, well-crafted fiction
3. great finds: resources, blogs, essays, artistic works
4. news not found anywhere else
5. category killers: aggregators that capture the best of many blogs/feeds, so they need not be read individually
6. clever, concise political opinion (most readers prefer these consistent with their own views)
7. benchmarks, quantitative analysis
8. personal stories, experiences, lessons learned
9. first-hand accounts
10. live reports from events
11. insight: leading-edge thinking & novel perspectives
12. short educational pieces
13. relevant “aha” graphics
14. great photos
15. useful tools and checklists
16. précis, summaries, reviews and other time-savers
17. fun stuff: quizzes, self-evaluations, other interactive content

Blog writers want to see more:

1. constructive criticism, reaction, feedback
2. ‘thank you’ comments, and why readers liked their post
3. requests for future posts on specific subjects
4. foundation articles: posts that writers can build on, on their own blogs
5. reading lists/aggregations of material on specific, leading-edge subjects that writers can use as resource material
6. wonderful examples of writing of a particular genre, that they can learn from
7. comments that engender lively discussion
8. guidance on how to write in the strange world of weblogs

Source: How to Save the World

What does that mean to all association bloggers? Maybe something, maybe nothing. It depends on the lens you are looking at it through. For me it provides a lot of ideas, areas of possible improvement and fodder for keeping the conversation alive.