One Month of Skelliewag
This blog welcomed readers on the 26th July, and a month has passed since then. I thought I’d take the opportunity to reflect on the content so far and ask you a few questions about where you’d like to see Skelliewag go from here.
When it was quiet
Like most blogs Skelliewag was a pretty quiet place when it first welcomed readers at the end of July. I made an effort to open the blog only after I’d written a number of so-called ‘pillar’ articles, but most of those who read the blog now probably never saw them. I wanted to take this opportunity to highlight five posts I’m proud of that probably got lost in the quiet opening days of the blog.
“The key ingredients to making money through your web content are more readers and more trust. How do you get both? Great content. When advertising impacts upon the readability and usability of your site, or casts doubts over your trustworthiness, you’re irreparably damaging your earning potential.”
– Monetizing Trust, Not Tricks
“The most valuable content you can write has the potential to change the way people think or the way people act. Lifehacks have the potential to do both.”
– Lifehack Your Niche
“It’s hard to find web content which does not, at least to some degree, fall trap to the echo chamber effect. When inside this mental echo chamber we create content that echoes other content or is derivative of it, direct readers to other people’s work instead of our own, link out only to viewpoints and facts we agree with, and otherwise quash what is unique about our content.”
– Escape the Echo Chamber
“Don’t think small. Don’t be afraid to almost bite off more than you can chew. Don’t be modest about your abilities and capabilities. If you attempt something grand and believe you can do it, so will your visitors. When the spectacle is over, they might just stick around to see what you’re going to do next.”
– Modesty is Not a Virtue
“When a conversation starts with someone it’s natural want to know about who you’re talking to. Every commenter you engage with in a meaningful way is a likely candidate to go and investigate your web presence.”
– How To: Leave Quality Comments
Some questions
People will often try to define the most important essence of a blog or website. Sometimes it’s traffic, for others it is content. For me, it’s the readers, and I’m not being sentimental here. Readers are different to ‘traffic’ because they are the people who engage with your content. Traffic is any person who finds themselves at your page, whether they engage with it or not. Many boast huge amounts of traffic, but very few readers.
It’s like the analogy of the tree falling in the woods. If content is the most essential element then the tree will be grand and beautiful to behold. Still, if it falls in the woods and nobody knows, what does it matter? The same applies to traffic. A thousand people might surround the tree but if every one of them is deaf and blind to the tree falling they may as well not be there at all.
It is the readers who make your content matter — they’re the ones who care about the tree and give it significance in the world. You might ask, why focus on content, then? Why not focus on readers? The truth is that when you focus on one your are focusing on the other. Content is the variable we can control.
I’d like to ask you to help me focus on the reader through Skelliewag’s content by asking you a few questions. You can answer via the comments here or email, and you can respond however you like. You need not answer each question, either, but you’re more than welcome to do so.
- If you could choose a topic for a future post, what would it be?
- Is there a topic I’ve written about that you’d like me to explore in more depth?
- What has been your favorite article so far?
- What article did you find least useful and why?
- If you could add one thing to Skelliewag, what would it be?
