Who is Your Blog Pleasing?
The other day a blogger said to me that they can never work out what will please readers so now they please their self.
I didn’t have an argument. Fact is, sometimes an audience can be unpredictable. You spend hours carefully crafting every word of a 1000 word post and it hits the web with barely a ripple. Posts you dash out quickly cause a huge splash. Looking back you can’t figure out why. It’s happened to most of us.
So who should you please? Yourself or your readers? … It’s a tricky question, readers can be misleadingly split about what they do or do not like. In fact, the better job you do the more people will be divided about how well you are doing. You are not a true success until people hate what you do! The only person you can really satisfy that you have done a good job is your self.
On the other hand you must consider your reader. As Lorelle says you are communicating with an audience, so you should at least think about them with what you are writing. It’s no use writing the news for you, you already know it. Putting together a tutorial without considering the reader is like trying to explain a limerick to a Martian.
Constantly chasing others approval is a certain route to despair. People never agree, you end up with the least offensive solution rather than the best loved. Building by committee is rarely a way to enjoy your work or succeed with any endeavor.
The answer seems to be somewhere in between. Develop your blog for your audience but to the level of your own satisfaction. Take feedback but you have to be the ultimate judge of how well you have succeeded.
Good point. I aim to please myself, but when readers speak up I’ll change my ways to please there needs.
Me, me, me :-)
I started my blog as an experiment. Two years on I am staggered it is still going. Why, sometimes, I read back old articles and laugh at my own jokes.
If any other person happens to read, comment or subscribe, then that is great but purely secondary.
I think bloggers shouldn’t worry about writing for their audience. Their own passion is far more important than what the audience wants. This is doubly true for bloggers who blog for personal development.
Bloggers who want to make money should do science. Experiment month by month trying new things and watching the stats. See what works.
Bloggers who want to be professional writers and journalists should write every article as though you don’t have regular readers. I mean, slip in a few little references here to old stuff, but don’t take anything for granted. Don’t assume they read your blog regularly or know what you write about.
It would be nice if you personally had a better grasp of the english language. It is themselves, not “their self.”
I Chris, it’s very good question, my point of view is to write honestly with passion. To want to express our views and ideas and interact with other bloggers… The audience will come.
A good answer to a difficult but important question.
There isn’t much to add to it actually …
Lex – http://www.newmediatype.com