Blog Tipz

An underlying problem that bloggers face as their blogs grow is that there simply isn’t enough time in each day to connect with all their readers. As you are starting out, it can be even more difficult, as a good percentage of the comments are spam and haven’t been generated by humans. Down the road, it may become a challenge to connect to people who may be first-time visitors, but who still deserve the level of connection that you give your most dedicated visitors.

Like any business, having a good relationship with at least ten percent of your readers (or customers) can greatly impact how you are able to grow and prosper in the future. Even though you might find it difficult to maintain a quality relationship with ten percent when you have a few hundred thousand readers, it is much easier initially when it is in the few hundred range.

For some who have a background in improving relationships and promoting your brand, it will be much easier to develop the relationship that you need. Others may not know where to start.

For me, the most important element of online relationships – with your blog readers – is to focus on what will inspire them to come back. Telling your readers that they aren’t important and simply indicates that they should never return and find someone else’s blog to read. It’s honestly that simple.

Starting from Day 1

As soon as you create your blog, think carefully about how you want to position it amongst the millions of other blogs in your niche. Theoretically, it will be some time before you even have reached an audience that you will be able to connect to, but you have to start somewhere.

Leave your contact page open. Ensure that all new visitors and readers can quickly contact you should they have a question, and ensure that you check your mail on a regular basis to avoid any missed messages.

Your contact page should either have a form on it that directly emails you, a direct link to your email address, as well as the other locations to find you online. Again, you have to make it as simple, yet inclusive of all the required details to establish the fact that you want to be contacted and that you’ll find it a pleasure to respond to all requests.

Keep the comments area well-moderated. From day one, you have to plan well in advance and think about how you will be positioning your blog. Don’t let too many spam comments through, or your visitors will likely think that they are only as valuable as the people who are just promoting spam links.

Reply to and address each comment, extending them beyond your blog onto other social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook, if you have already begun developing relationships there.

Continue developing your network. Beyond comments and social networking, make sure that your visitors have other ways to connect with one another on your blog. Create a forum dedicated to you helping your visitors or allowing them to interact with one another. There is nothing more important than creating a website dedicated to something that your visitors love to talk about.

Forums, a wiki-like area, or some other type of alternative can greatly improve the number of people who want to stay on your site, rather than finding a competitor’s site.

Gradually Building During the Long-Term

Generating great relationships doesn’t come overnight. There is much more to it than simply indicating that you are someone’s friend. You really have to prove it to them. This means that you may very well have to spend twenty percent or more of your time addressing comments, replying to emails, and creating alternative methods of interaction. The end result will be a much more supportive community.

After you have followed the three main ideas addressed in the first stages of building your blog, you can move onto the long-term approach. Great companies have a way of continuing their tradition of providing great support and dedicated help when their customers really need it. They are also able to shine through less-than-stellar performances, and this is the philosophy and strategy that you have to employ on your own blog.

Even though you may have a hundred times more visitors, subscribers, and emails a year after you initially begin, you still have to think about each visitor as someone who could greatly benefit the success of your blog. Some companies throw out figures that each customer is worth a few thousand dollars – if you were to lose them, that is lost income for your company. Figuring that a lost reader on your blog may very well go onto another blog, not recommending you, and purchasing someone else’s product(s), this is something that should be kept in mind.

Typically, visitors lead to subscribers, which leads to sales, and further recommendations. However, when this cycle is broken, such as when a subscriber no longer enjoys reading your site, there is typically an adverse effect on your blog when one person leads to hundreds.

Neglecting your most dedicated visitors and readers won’t help you in the long-term, and more than anything else, it’ll give you a bad reputation for not providing the same level of support as someone else in your niche.

The Competitive Picture

What makes you stand out is how you do things differently. Doing things the same won’t get you anywhere, nor will it get you noticed. By extending your full potential beyond what you are capable of, you can certainly get the desired results.

Others who see success will try to imitate it, often failing at trying to capture what you have been able to develop. This is the position that you want to be in, one in which others feel that you are the authority at what you are doing.

Don’t feel that others can dictate how you run your blog. Companies that let this happen often fall flat in delivering what they have promised to their faithful customers.

All the blogs in your niche are ultimately working against you, trying to derail you from reaching your goals. However, you shouldn’t let this happen – stand out from the crowd through the relationships with your visitors and ultimately lead the pack.