Ask The Readers – What 3 Things Will Make GLBL a Better Blog For You?
By glblguy
Each morning I have to check my Google Statistics. How many page hits did I get yesterday? How many new RSS subscribers? How many unsubscribed to my RSS feed? I’ve tried not to worry about it. I try to keep myself from checking, but I just can’t help it. It’s exciting to see the page counts and number of subscribers grow. I really get a lot of satisfaction out of providing value to you the reader. That’s why I’m here and why I started this blog to begin with.
I checked my statistics this morning, and noticed my RSS subscription rate dropped. This isn’t the first time, as it goes up and down depending on the day, but it did make me begin to wonder why. A quick google search and I came across an article by Darren Rowse over at Problogger titled 34 Reasons Why Readers Unsubscribe From You Blog. Good article and it made me realize I should probably just ask you, the readers.
My second Ask the Reader questions is this(my first is here):
What 3 Things Will Make GLBL (Gather Little By Little) a Better Blog For You? This could be 3 things I need to stop doing, 3 things I need to start doing, 3 things I am doing but could be better, whatever you think.
Fire Away! Oh, and don’t worry I’m thick skinned and very aware I have a lot to learn, so don’t hold back!
July 27th, 2007 at 8:14 am
Make sure your posts are on-topic
Fix your right sidebar
Be as enthusiastic as you are – and don’t sweat the small stuff
July 27th, 2007 at 8:45 am
Hi plonkee, thanks for the feedback. What’s wrong with my right sidebar?
July 27th, 2007 at 8:48 am
Nevermind, pulled it up in IE and I see…working on it now, thanks! I am learning a valuable lesson, whenever I change my layout, I need to test it with both IE and Firefox.
Update: Yikes, got it working, but that was painful…thanks again!
July 27th, 2007 at 10:23 am
Write about your choices in financial matters and how they impact your family [or your family’s involvement]
Do a series based on the exposition of Proverbs 13:11 [maybe you’ve already done this and I’ve missed it]
Remember that your statistics are also part of Romans 8:28 :) Share how this blog is causing you to grow in your sanctification
July 27th, 2007 at 10:41 am
@Randy – Great point, I have noticed that the articles that get the most attention are one’s written about us. For example, the 7 Stupid Financial Mistakes I’ve made has been pretty popular.
Haven’t done a series on Proverbs 13:11, but that is a great idea. I did do a post though.
re: Romans 8:28, you are so so right.
Great suggestions Randy, thanks so much for the feedback!
July 27th, 2007 at 11:50 am
I notice that you have a ‘recent readers’ section but there are some people who visit your site (like ME!!!!) who are not part of the MyBlogLog community. Maybe you could put in a ‘recent comments’ section so that the rest of us can see who is talking on your blog….it works even if they are not part of the MyBlogLog.
July 27th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
@LuLu – Funny you should mention that. Downloaded the recent comments the other night, and couldn’t get it to work with my template. I plan to get it working this weekend. Thanks! You should join up to MyBlogLog though. Honestly, I joined it to do a little marketing, but I’ve found some pretty good blogs that way.
Spent last night and sometime early this morning getting Popularity Contest to work, managed to mess up my sidebar :-(
July 30th, 2007 at 12:04 am
Maybe some nice banjo playing in the background :)
July 30th, 2007 at 9:43 am
@ChristianPF – Ha, I’ll have to upload a couple of MP3’s I have and fit it into one of my posts :-) Thinking playing the banjo in the background might scare people away (unless you are a bluegrasser like me) ;-)
August 1st, 2007 at 8:08 am
@LuLu – Hi, I wanted to follow up, as you may have noticed I didn’t add the top commenter plugin. There is however a recent comments listing in the footer along with Recent Posts.
I decided not to add the commenter plugin, as I want to keep my sidebar clean. I am really trying to focus on keeping the design and layout simple, clean, and focused on my content.
In liu of not having a ‘top commenter’ sidebar widget, I am going to recognize the top commenters for the month through a monthly posting. To me this is a much more personal way of saying thank you.
August 7th, 2007 at 6:57 pm
My number of subscribers jump up and down also, and I have the same problem of being to curious about the stats. But in the end, I think writing good content (and even more important…good title) is the key.
I don’t really have time to read everything, so I just add blogs that I like to my technorati favorites and read posts here and there.
August 7th, 2007 at 9:09 pm
Glad to hear I am not the only one. I agree on title, been trying to focus more on my titles. I spend about 1/2 an hour reading daily at least, sometimes an hour. I try to only comment when I have something useful to say. Ok…well what I consider useful anyway ;-)