Guy Kawasaki shares some ways to evangelize your blog from what he learned in his first 120 days of blogging. He has several great tips, many of which I would have employed when I launched From the 21st Floor. Two that stand out to me from his list of tops are:
- Think "book" not "diary." I totally agree with Guy on this one. But when I launched this site I wasn't quite thinking "book." I knew that I didn't want to make a diary. I have another site for that chit-chat babble. No, From the 21st Floor was going to be about highlighting my knowledge on topics and sharing it with you, the reader. It was also an outlet for me to publish my articles and create a professional presence. Taking this process thinking of every post similar to a "book" will only make this Web site better.
- Eat like a bird, poop like an elephant. Guy actually labels this one as Scoop Stuff, but his Japanese philosopher quote sounds better to me. To augment Guy's comment regarding to read the top fifty bloggers via Technorati and link to important news you find, I say read the top bloggers in your niche market. It could be the top fifty in Technorati, or it could be the top fifty Web designers/developers, or the top fifty knitting blogs. Don't just limit yourself to blogs either, but any Web site for that matter. I call this reading the beacons or the "information hubs." Information hubs are the bloggers who have way more time than I do to read a lot more feeds than I do. They seem to have their finger on the pulse of the profession you monitor. Thus when they pick up a trend, you'll know about it. Now they may be the "scoopers" because they are the ones monitoring the feeds, but if you may find something out of their feeds that is just as important that you can scoop.
The only thing on Guy's list that I would caution readers is regarding number three, Collect E-mail Addresses. I throw out a word of caution on this one in regards to blasting a message out to an acquired list of e-mail addresses. If you acquire them through meetings, business cares, etc. you should be fine with sending them an e-mail. If you harvest them off another blast message you may fall under some CAN-SPAM compliance issues. Finally, whenever you send out an e-mail blast, have a mechanism in place that will allow those individuals whom you have their e-mail address, but never really contact, to opt-out of future announcements. Sounds complicated, I know, but it is really best in the long run. You'll have a healthier relationship with those recipients. Remember, while we all give out our business cards at conferences, meetings, networking events, we tend to forget who we give them to, and the inbox is a very sensitive place. We don't want anymore unsolicited messages in there as the next person.
Finally, Guy mentions creating a blogroll, that is on my to-do list and his blog will surely be added.
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