If you want to grow your blog into a lead generating machine for your business, you will need to have an open mind when it comes to feedback. This post explains why and what the pay-off is for you and your business if you get it right.
Black, white and many shades of grey
Very few things in life are truly binary, black or white, good or bad, right or wrong. With most things, there are many valid and equally correct opinions. For example, if you love the taste of honey and someone asks you what honey tastes like, you will say it tastes great and be telling the truth. If I hate the taste of honey and someone asks me what it tastes like, I will say it tastes awful and I will be telling the truth too. Those 2 different answers to the same question were both true and each opinion was valid.
As a blogger, if you fail to accept that there is more than one truth, your posts will read less like approachable, informed opinion and more like diktats. Equally, it is almost impossible to grow your blog into the business asset it should be, without embracing external feedback, even if it runs counter to what you currently believe.
Feedback helps you to improve
The most interesting, educational and compelling blog posts are often those, where people examine a topic from different perspectives. Even so, many bloggers are against the whole idea of people taking a counter opinion to their own. One blogger once commented to me that he deleted any comments that either disagreed with him or which disproved something he had stated. That’s one way to try and develop a blog, but I recommend another approach.
Last year, I wrote a post here about copyblogger, asking Sonia Simone and Brian Clark if they would add dates to their blog posts. Every post on copyblogger is published with no reference to the date. So, you could be reading a post that was a day old, or 6 years old. After writing the post, I did some research. I removed the dates from the posts on this blog and immediately figured out why they did it on copyblogger. It dramatically increased the number of times older posts were shared on social media and the number of page views per reader. As soon as the data was in, I wrote a new post, saying that I was wrong to ask for them to add dates to their post.
The lesson? My follow up post about removing dates from blog posts became the most read post on this site last year! This, despite my having to admit my initial thoughts were incorrect.
The most effective way to grow a successful, lead-generating blog, is to open your mind to feedback. Testing and measuring what you see, then using the results to make better decisions, is the foundation of all great marketing. Business blogging is no exception.
Hi Jim
Must admit, I like to see dates on posts.
May get you more views but confuses your readers.
“The most effective way to grow a successful, lead-generating blog, is to open your mind to feedback.”
Agreed.
There is so much to know about blogging and it changes all the time.
No way can you know everything.
“…asking Sonia Simone and Brian Clark” – you don’t mess about Jim, you go straight to the top. LOL
Hi Keith. Thanks for the feedback. If you read the follow-up post, I do explain that dates should only be removed form truly evergreen posts. This way, there shouldn’t be any confusion. For example, a great banana cake recipe is valid today, last year and in January 1950. I also advocate adding a date stamp to any posts, that contain time-sensitive information.
You can achieve almost the same impact, by simply moving the published date, to the foot of the post. I’m going to be doing that shortly, to measure the exact impact.
Good stuff Jim thanks for the info.
I noticed that several people I read regularly do not add dates and yet you can still get a sense that a post has been re-posted: how is this typically viewed in Soc Media world? When I see it, I think, on the one hand, “great, I may not have trawled back to find this” and on the other “cheap: have you run out of ideas?”.
Secondly, I think your point about relativism is a great one. We can both be right about our view of honey, or a post, comment etc even though those views may be opposing. I guess the thing to be careful of, is lack of conviction. Whilst not denying the rights of others to their views, you could be seen as not necessarily wholly convinced by your own take on things, if you are too quick to concede to opposing views?
Glenn: My friend, I am very glad you commented here. You are a superb example of a regular commenter, who often disagrees with what I write and is always happy to voice the opposing view or an opposing view – usually improving or expanding upon the original post.
Regarding reshares: I think you are referring to when the blogger reshares an older post? The data I looked at and referenced here, was reshares from readers, which increased enormously. Your point about how you feel negatively about bloggers who tweet their own stuff is interesting and (I assume) was not directed at me, as I publish new posts every day, across 3 blogs (so not exactly out of ideas
)
I think you are being extremely harsh here Glenn, on bloggers who reshare their older posts. In my experience, your opinion of them being “cheap” is a minority one.
Lack of conviction: Surely you’re not suggesting that confidently stating your position and then encouraging others to debate it, is a sign of a lack of conviction? In my opinion, it’s a sign of confidence in your position and ability. Yes, dropping your position at the first opposition shows a lack of thought and maybe confidence, but as expressed in the post, it’s (I believe) a positive.
But none of that matters, as I am right and you are wrong!
Thanks for the feedback, Glenn!
I prefer to see dates on blogs, ultimately all I need to do is check for comments to see when they were left and that gives me an idea of how old the blog post is so why leave off the date? I believe that if I write “ever green” content that reads well 1 year or 5 years from now the date shouldn’t really matter.
Hi Diane. yes, that’s a useful way to get a date for the post and indeed, it’s how I do it, if I decide I need a date.
As you may have noticed, I added dates back to this blog and am currently testing the difference.
I will report back with the findings as soon as I have enough data.
There are pros and cons to including dates on blog posts. In some ways the best option depends on the kind of content that you are producing. If it’s timely information it might be better to include the date, but if it’s going to be just as useful in a year as it is now, it might not be necessary.
Absolutely right, Nick. There’s no one-size-fits-all answer here.
Thanks as always for the comment.