Category Archives: Blogging

Why I May Not Comment On Your Blog

December 21, 2010 Mitch Mitchell 57 Comments

It seems to me that there’s enough information online and people talking about this subject that other folks might start listening to it in some fashion. Alas, it’s not the case, so I’m here to be the guy to bring it up, popular or not. It’s probably going to come across as a harsh post, and that’s not its intention. Sometimes I just have to be real; this is one of those times.

Comments by Boltron

I comment on a lot of blogs; I visit a heck of a lot more. It still surprises me that so many people have set things up that discourage many of us from commenting on your blog. I mean, it’s not hard; it’s not rocket science. All that’s needed is a thought about where your blog is, how your blog is set up, and what you’re hoping to get out of your blog. Making it easy for people to comment on your blog, no matter what; is that too much to hope for?

Okay, some of that might not be fair, but then I haven’t gotten into any details yet. I guess that’s where I should start, so we can get a discussion going.

1. If you’re moderating comments, you’re getting on my nerve. Moderated comments tells me that you care more about spam than about thanking people for wanting to comment on your blog. If it worries you so much, then put up a disclaimer up front that you’re moderating comments and I won’t waste my time. But then, if you did that I, and maybe a lot of people people, won’t comment on your blog. That’s somewhat disingenuous, isn’t it? The other thing about writing a comment on a blog that moderates comments is that suddenly you’re getting bombarded with a bunch of comments all at once in email, and if the owner of the blog isn’t putting any names in, you have no idea which response is to you, if there’s one to you at all. I hate that, but it leads to point #2.

2. If you’re not responding to my comments, you’re getting on my nerve. I didn’t just stop by and write “good post” and move on. It might not have been the theory of relativity but I at least gave you a response that showed you I read what you had to say. Now, do I expect a response all the time? Actually yes I do, but if you miss one or two I won’t mind. But if you seem to exhibit a pattern of not responding to my comments, I probably will stop coming, and I don’t want any complaints about it, whether you visit me or not. Goodness, I’m as busy as the next person, and if I’m responding to almost every comment I deserve knowing that you appreciated my taking the time out to respond back to you.

3. Are you still using Disqus, or one of those other services? Haven’t you realized yet that you’re losing comments? Obviously you didn’t see Sire’s poll, which is still ongoing by the way. I mean, 45% of people said they wouldn’t leave a comment on one of these blogs; are you really getting enough comments that losing 45% of potential visitors is okay for you? And, by the way, if you read the post, you’ll see that some of the people who said they’d still leave a comment overwhelmingly said they didn’t like it, and didn’t do it on all blogs that run this service, but most of them. So, add at least another 25% to the mix and then ask why you don’t have lots of comments. By the way, you’re a dying breed; so many people lately have jumped on the CommentLuv bandwagon and found other ways to block spam and they’re starting to thrive. One guy told me his comments jumped threefold; how’s about that!

4. Are you verifying that people are receiving your responses back to them? This one’s dicey because of you folks running free blogs on WordPress.com. It doesn’t give you the ability to set things up so you can make sure people are seeing that you’ve responded to them, and that’s a shame. Since I’m someone who won’t subscribe or login to receive comments when I get that email (after all, I already checked the box on your blog that asked if I wanted to subscribe to comments), I’ll only revisit blogs of those of you I happen to like; you know who you are if you’ve seen my comments on your blog. If you’re answering a lot of people and rarely hear back from them, this could be an issue for you. But I’m not the guy who can tell you to spend your money on self hosting and a domain name; spend your money your way. However, I am the guy to tell you that it’s the way to go if you get serious about blogging.

5. Some of you know I don’t like Blogger/Blogspot blogs. I don’t like them because you have to create a login name to comment so that you’ll get responses back. I have one for my business name, and I’m still trying to figure out how that happened, but not for any of my other blogs or websites, including this one. Some blogs I want to comment on aren’t appropriate for my business account, and thus I’ll either skip it or comment using the email for this blog, but of course Blogger won’t let you put in an email, and thus you never know if you got a response or not. This fact impeded a lot of blogs I wanted to check out when we had that network meme a week or so back. On this one, same answer I gave to the previous point; I can’t tell you what to do, but if you’re serious about blogging, think about it.

That’s it; that’s my rant. I’ve actually ranted on all these things in the past, as you can see from some of the links, but I guess it’s been awhile. People forget, and thus I figured I’d bring it up again. If you don’t really care, then that’s fine; if you do, well, at least think about it.

Blogging

A Networking Meme

December 12, 2010 Mitch Mitchell 33 Comments

I’m giving up my normal Sunday Question once again to be a small, outside of something that I think could end up being kind of cool; or not, as my wife sometimes thinks my sense of cool is skewed.

Meme by Michael Boston

Back in late November, our friend Kissie wrote a post talking about having what she was calling a Community Networking Meme. She wanted to set something up that was kind of formal for bloggers to answer some questions about themselves, ask other people to participate as well, and visit the blogs of those people who were participating in the process and comment on those blogs.

I love the idea; but I’m not someone big on formality, as you know. Still, I wanted to play in my own way, so I’ve decided that I’m going to play with answering the 10 questions and inviting other people to write about the same thing on their blog, and if you’d like to link back to this blog and Kissie’s blog so we can come visit you to see what you’ve written. Or not; you can comment on what I write here and leave it at that, or you can answer your questions here, or you can just read and leave; that’s what freedom of expression is all about.

She did have one rule that I might end up breaking. She said that one should answer the questions with something that’s different than an answer you might have already given if you’ve addressed these questions in some fashion previously. Well, I have about 900 posts on this blog, and I have no idea what I’ve responded to before or how, so I’m not making any promises along those lines. That plus I’m writing this post two weeks in advance, so who knows where my mind will be by the time this is posted.

Okay, enough of that; let’s get to the questions, and please don’t forget to “like” this one and of course retweet!

1. If you could interview anyone on your blog (alive or dead) who would you choose and why?

Sure, let’s start off with the hardest question. I was going to cheat and list my top 5, but I’m going to play fair. But how does one do it? Do you pick a hero, someone important to history, or a family member who you’d love to glean information from? I decided to go with history and I’d pick Thomas Jefferson, the writer of the Declaration of Independence, the 3rd president of the United States, the guy who really could have abolished slavery and didn’t, the guy who pushed through the Louisiana Purchase, and probably one of the smartest guys to ever be president of this country.

2. What do you feel is your strength as a blogger?

I have a vivid imagination, and the only thing that stops me from writing more is time.

3. Can you share a little bit about yourself that you have not already mentioned on your blog?

I’m trying to think of what I’ve never revealed about myself on this blog that I’d even think of sharing with someone else, and it’s a hard one. I guess I’ll just say that I have a very finite set of principles that I believe many people would equate with what they believed those who believed in any religious principle might want to live by, yet I don’t have a religion, don’t believe in an entity of that sort, and I’m hoping I can figure out a way through all the science books I also read to stay alive forever. I think that’s going to be a losing proposition, however.

4. If you were forced to change the name of your blog, what would you change it to? Why?

Silly as this sounds, I’d change the name of the blog to I’m Just Saying, since that’s actually the expression I use all the time. lol

5. What do you think is the most fulfilling part of being a blogger?

The people who stop by for a brief chat and meeting new people by visiting their blogs as well.

6. What would you do with your last day if you found you had only one more day to live?

I’m gonna get a fly girl, gonna get some spank and drive off in a def OJ for a quick stop at a Chinese restaurant, then to a chocolate shop where I’m only going to eat chocolate and chocolate covered stuff while listening to Jackson Five and Michael Jackson music and writing that final blog post until it’s time to go.

7. You’ve been doing medical research for decades and have finally found a cure. What was it that you found a cure for and why did you choose this particular ailment?

I chose cancer. Yes, there are a host of things out there that can get you, but cancer is the only one that can strike everyone no matter whether they’ve lived a healthy life or not. No one is really sure where some of the cancers come from nor how they get them, and my dad had lung cancer as well, so it’s the one that gets my initial attention.

8. What is your most guilty pleasure?

Are you kidding me? Chocolate, and I don’t feel guilty about it one bit! lol

9. Answer only one. What is your favorite book, movie or TV show?

Star Trek, all of them.

10. What do you think is the very best smell in the world? The one smell that can take you back to a time and place of a very vivid memory in your past?

Chocolate; hmmm, seems I said that already. 🙂

Winter Wonderland
by Ginette FineArt

Blogging

Will Paying The Price Get It Done?

December 9, 2010 Mitch Mitchell 45 Comments

Last week I read an interesting post on a blog written by a lady named Jacqueline Gates titled The Price Is Right ~ But Will You Pay It? First, that’s the first time I’ve ever typed a squiggly line, and I didn’t even know I had that key until I went looking for it. Second, it’s an interesting article that also has an interesting, if long, video complimenting it.

by TheTruthAbout

If you don’t go check it out, the basic premise is that everything is attainable if you’re willing to pay the price for it. She talks about weight loss, being monetarily successful and something else that’s slipping my mind. In her view, we all have the capability to do and be these things if we’re willing to do what it takes to get there. The question now is twofold; one, do we believe it and is it really true?

Y’all know me; I’m of two minds. One, I believe that anyone can achieve anything if they can get beyond circumstances, whatever those circumstances are. Two, I believe there are some things that are unattainable, not because one doesn’t work hard enough for them but because, well, they’re just unattainable. In my comment on her post I mentioned that no matter how hard I work, even if I do the same thing 24/7, at this point in my life I won’t ever be the starting guard for the Los Angeles Lakers. But in my past… okay, let me have that pipe dream for a moment. 🙂

Based on my beliefs, question number one has limits to it. I used to be a pretty good piano player but I haven’t played in years now. If I started to practice every day for at least 20 hours, I might be able to get back to where I was. However, I couldn’t reach the level of Rubenstein even when I was playing between 6 – 8 hours a day in the past; would that really be attainable now, no matter how much I practiced? Sorry Charlie (who remembers old tuna commercials?), but it’s just not going to happen. But can I be pretty good, maybe even better than I was before? Sure.

So, not only are there limits, but there are modifications we might have to deal with. Can we all be rich? Absolutely. Can we all be Oprah rich; ain’t gonna happen. Do we need to be Oprah rich to be happy and content? Nope. Is it still a nice goal to shoot for, as long as we’re still realistic about our overall dreams? Yes.

Okay, on to question two, and I think I’ve already answered it. If it’s not always attainable, and thus not believable, then it’s obviously not true. At least not across the board. Let’s look at blogging, my favorite subject here, and talk about it a little bit.

Can any one of us be really successful at blogging? Since there’s lots of criteria, sure. But let’s look at two criteria in particular. One, can we all make money with our blogs; two, can we all get our blogs ranking high wherever we want them to rank high? Let’s take these in order.

We can all make money with our blogs. I’ve made money with this blog and my other two blogs as well. Have I made “big” money; that’s a much different question. I don’t think I’ve made $100 total with my blogs in the full existence I’ve had them, and one of my blogs is more than 5 years old. Actually, let me take that back; I haven’t made $200, since I did make some money when I accepted text ads early in 2009. I haven’t made any thing significant, though. Could I? Truthfully I don’t know. Since there are a few folks who’ve made it I could say “yes”, but since that number is less than the number of millionaires in the United States (which is actually a much higher number than you’d believe), I’d have to say probably not. Doesn’t mean I won’t try, but it’s highly unlikely.

So, number one says “no”. What about number two? This is one where I believe Ms. Gates rule on “price” is spot on. With this one I really do believe everyone can be really successful if they’re ready to pay the price. Ah, but what is that price?

Two weeks ago my blog finally cracked the magical 100,000 number on Alexa. I believe it cracked that figure because of the sweat equity I was putting into it. I’ve written a post a day for about a month; I even had two posts a day two weeks ago, though that second post was more about marketing. Tomorrow’s post will be my 900th post in just under 3 years. And I’ve visited lots of blogs and commented, shared, retweeted their posts and my posts, and really worked the community. In essence, I’ve been willing to pay the price to get to this number, and all without page rank (y’all don’t really want me to go there again, right?).

However, I know everyone can’t afford to do this. I work from home, so I have more freedom to diversify my work and my blogging. Not everyone can do this, so I have a small advantage. But this is where paying the price differs. I give up vacation time and time to just sit and watch a lot of TV or play video games for this. I might be missing something, but I don’t know. But y’all do, and if you enjoy doing what you do, then you’re not missing a thing. You’re paying the price in a different way; that’s okay.

In conclusion, we all pay the price for whatever we have. We can decide to pay the price for other things or continue paying the price and getting what we have. But paying the price for something else doesn’t necessarily equate into ultimate success. Yes, you’ll be more than you were, and that’s great. But trying to be more than what’s possible will leave you depressed. Do the best you can, achieve the best you can, and be happy with that. Now, get in there and blog!

Mailwasher Pro

Blogging

Blogging Step Seven – Staying Motivated

November 27, 2010 Mitch Mitchell 35 Comments

Seems it’s been a little while since I wrote my last “blogging step”. Of course, if you want to see the other steps you can click on the blogging tips at the top of this blog, one of the special pages I created to highlight when I write about blogging specifically.

In this case, it’s the topic of staying motivated. The one thing I hate seeing is a blog that was going along fine and suddenly there’s no more posts, or else a post once a week, once a month, etc. Actually, I don’t have a problem with those folks who only post once a week, but anything less frequent almost begs the question why you’re bothering.

There are usually 3 main reasons why people stop writing a blog:

1), they can’t think of what to say

2), they’re not getting much feedback and thus are discouraged

3), they’re tired

Let’s take this last one first. There are some people who have written for years, and they’re just plum tuckered out. I have that feeling every once in awhile. Maybe this blog is only about to celebrate its 3rd anniversary, but my other blog is more than 5 years old. I still have plenty to say, but you know, there are times when my mind just feels really tired. Some big time bloggers quit in 2010, though I can’t recall any names as I’m writing this. They announced it, then moved on. There’s really nothing to do with those folks except thank them for their service and try to move into their slot.

The next two are workable, though. Let’s start with not being able to think of what to say. To me, every day there’s a new topic of something to talk about. But this isn’t a niche blog. I’ve often cautioned people not to make their niche so finite that they have nothing to talk about anymore. Dead blogs are embarrassing, and blogs that only have a post every 3 to 6 months aren’t worth anyone’s time.

Almost any topic lends itself to something else one can write about. Almost, that is. Early this year I was writing a blog for a chiropractor in another state. I knew that if we stuck with just that I’d be out of topics within a week. That’s a topic where it probably takes a chiropractor to find new things to talk about that keeps it fresh. However, what I was allowed to do was write about controversial medical subjects as well as maladies people suffer that could be addressed by a chiropractor. This opened the world to many possibilities and I wrote about things that I’d heard about but never had a reason to research before. It was pretty fun, and it’s too bad it only lasted 3 months.

Also, there are no real rules in length of posts, and nothing saying you can’t divide a long post into two posts and link them to each other, which I’ve done with other blogs on occasion. No one is going to beat you up for that; it’s all about figuring out ways to be creative, both for yourself and for others. If you feel something, you’ll be able to express it and show it, and your readers will feel it as well.

Now, this brings us to the last point, which is getting feedback. You folks who visit here hear this over and over; blogging is a community. This isn’t Field of Dreams; if you build it, they’re not just going to come. We all need to show others that we care about them as much as we hope they care about us. Yes, blogging takes time, but it doesn’t necessarily take work.

It’s not work if you’re visiting blogs that offer something you’re interested in. There are wonderful writers out there writing on your topic, as well as off topics you might not have considered before. If you need to find blogs on your topic, go to Google, click on “more”, go down to blogs, type in your topic and you’re good to go.

Or join a blogging community of some sort to find blogs to read. I belong to both BloggerLuv and P50 Allied Bloggers. Not that I needed to join a community but it was both a fun thing to do and a way to expose my blog to some people I wouldn’t have met otherwise.

And, by the way, let me dispel this old saw you’ve probably heard. Just because a blog might not have any comments or no indication that it’s not well visited doesn’t mean it has no value to you. Every blog you want to comment on has value of some kind. One good comment can earn many more in return. You might even get someone to write a post thanking you for being one of their early commenters.

Remember, everything you see or do is a potential blog post, possibly on your main blog topic. Just be alert and willing to see things as a story unfolding before your eyes. And work on engaging with others; we all love that.

Blogging

W3 Total Cache

November 23, 2010 Mitch Mitchell 34 Comments

One day last week my blog finally crossed the top 100,000 mark per Alexa. Since I write these posts in advance, I’m not sure what it’s sitting at today, but the day after reaching that one goal it was back over 100,000 the next day; c’est la vie.

Cache Valley Sunset
by Jared Smith

Anyway, one of the things it had evaluated my site on was its loading speed, and it said my speed was less than 90% of the websites out there. Now I’m debating that one, but I do know that images can make a site load slower, as well as javascript things. So, based on a recommendation that was retweeted in a post from Kristi, I decided to try another one of these WordPress plugins to see if it would speed my site up some.

A long time ago I’d tried WP Super Cache and had nothing but problems from it, so I didn’t want to go that route again. This time I decided to try W3 Total Cache, the recommended plugin. As with all WordPress plugins, it was easy to load and activate; after that, well, easy isn’t part of the deal.

I’ll get this out of the way first; the plugin has yet to speed my blog up. I’m not going to say it’s loading slower, but I’m not seeing close the the type of results I thought I would. But I’m not sure why, and that’s my issue.

Like many other plugins, it comes with all these options of things you can do, but without any explanations of what all this stuff actually means. If you follow the link to the plugin site, you’ll see it lists all this stuff that the plugin can do; it doesn’t tell you what any of it means, or whether you should activate this or that and what the stuff that’s already checked means. I don’t consider myself a dumb guy, but sometimes this stuff is really confusing, and if it’s busting my brain then what’s it supposed to do to someone who knows nothing about technology?

I’m probably going to run it another week, and if it improves then I’ll be happy. If not, then I don’t see the point in keeping it around. Has anyone else worked with this and had really great results?

Follow up: a representative of the plugin saw this post on Twitter and sen me this link to another blog for instructions.

I'm Just Sharing

Category Archives: Blogging

Why I May Not Comment On Your Blog

A Networking Meme

Will Paying The Price Get It Done?

Blogging Step Seven – Staying Motivated

W3 Total Cache

Blogging, Social Media, Writing, Motivation and General Stuff