Need Help? Just Ask!
I have a secret that I want to share with my readers. Do you want to draw traffic to your site, highlight your cause, perhaps bring attention to yourself?
If so, then just ask.
Yes, the benefit of having a blog or a website is that you don’t have to go it alone. In fact, the solitary blogger is an unsuccessful blogger. You need people to help your blog not only get noticed, but to thrive.
I regularly come across people who have given up or cut way back on their blogging because they’ve grown discouraged. It can be difficult enough to come up with a steady serving of interesting topics to write about, put those thoughts on paper (or computer screen), edit and more, but when you do all that and the response is negligible or non-existent, no wonder that some bloggers end up quitting.
But it doesn’t have to be that way.
I, too, have seen traffic come and go over the four years that I’ve been blogging. In fact, when I first set out to blog on the forerunner to this site (The Article Writer) I didn’t know enough about blogging to understand the importance of making it easy for people to comment. Without registering. Without needing my approval.
Once I figured things out (many, many months later) people began to leave comments, therefore I worked a little harder on my articles and traffic soon soared. I wish I knew then what I know about blogging now, but I can’t change the past. Certainly, I can learn from it!
Sure enough, you can join every conceivable social media site out there and hope that something will stick. I belong to scores of them, but I’m only active on three: Twitter, StumbleUpon and Facebook while maintaining some sort of presence on Digg, Reddit, MyBlogLog and elsewhere. Who has the time? I don’t – do you?
Even then, I don’t hesitate to ask for a favor from people I know especially those people whose sites I visit, tweets I resend, stumbles I share and wall notices I post to. I don’t keep a record of who does what but I know that there are people out there that I can count on and they know that they can count on me.
But, we still have to ask. Let us count the ways we can accomplish that task:
Send An Email – I don’t share my email with everyone, but it isn’t hard to discover one of my more than one dozen addresses. That’s right – I have a number of email accounts, most of which tie into Gmail. If someone has a legitimate request and they ask personally and politely, I’m good for a stumble, tweet or blog comment. I prefer not to get notified via email, but it is one way where people who know me can reach me.
Leave A Comment – You can raise your visibility by leaving a thoughtful and related comment on one of my blogs (and vice versa). Once we get to know and trust each other, then we’re much more likely to feel comfortable enough to ask for help. By the way, top commenters here get featured under my “Top Commentators” subheading on the sidebar, a value which will only increase when Google restores my lost PageRank soon (ahem!)
Direct Message – The occasional request for a retweet is welcome to my Twitter Direct Message page. If we’re following each other, more than likely I’m retweeting you already – something I enjoy doing. But don’t be afraid to ask and feel free to forward the occasional page to be stumbled too. Admittedly, I frequently miss what people write on my wall.
Reference Something That You Like – An important way to build goodwill in the blogosphere is to “shout out” an article you genuinely like by linking to it. I check trackbacks to my blogs and always approve those which appear naturally while deleting notifications where someone simply posts excerpts of what I wrote on their blog. This means that you get rewarded by gaining an easy link back to your blog – pretty neat, eh?
Finally, please forgive me.
I know that there is probably someone whom I’ve overlooked over the past several years and for that I apologize. I’m not always prompt in my replies and have been known to ignore requests that are unusual or unrelated.
Make your appeal personal and I’m likely to respond; broadcast your appeal and I may overlook it.
To your success!
Photo Credit: Jay Lopez
Tags: blogging, Facebook, Friends, requests, StumbleUpon, success, Twitter
SEO | Matthew C. Keegan, 9 Oct 09
By Lillie Ammann, October 9, 2009 @ 3:59 am
Matt,
I’m impressed that you can be active on three social networks. I have a presence at several but am not really active on any. I keep saying I’m going to get on Twitter, but I just never find the time.
.-= Lillie Ammann´s last blog ..Young Writers: Hurry to Enter New Voices =-.
By Matthew C. Keegan, October 9, 2009 @ 4:39 am
@Lillie Ammann
Well, Lillie, being “active” is loosely defined. I check in with Twitter for a few minutes here and there throughout the day and can say the same about StumbleUpon. As far as Facebook goes, I neglect that site a lot, stopping by on those occasions when prompted by a notice on my wall.
Time, as you indicated, is limited…not enough of it to justify further involvement at this point.
By LD Jackson, October 9, 2009 @ 6:28 am
Another great article, Matt.
I do Tweet my articles and I have a WordPress plugin that automatically publishes my blog articles on my Facebook page. Other than that, I visit those sites rarely. I do use Stumbleupon, as you are aware.
I really enjoy leaving comments on articles that I am interested in. Most of the time, I receive comment in return, but there are those who simply do not return the favor. I know of one blog where I was the top commenter, according to the sidebar, yet the author of that blog very rarely commented on Political Realities. That does take the incentive away somewhat.
I also think it is important to reference other blogs with trackbacks. That is a very good way to spread the attention between blogs that deserve it.
.-= LD Jackson´s last blog ..President Barack Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize =-.
By Matthew C. Keegan, October 9, 2009 @ 7:11 am
@LD Jackson
It certainly can be disheartening when people don’t reciprocate comments. I have, however, found it difficult to post to some blogs for the simple reason that these sites have obstacles in place to leaving comments.
For example, I am not a fan of Blogspot particularly when those sites require that I jump through various hoops just to get my comment published. I can see some restrictions for the first one or two comments, but if comments are moderated at all times, then I wonder if what I wrote is actually getting posted. I don’t have the time to check back to confirm.
Keep up you pace, Larry. I know that you are blogging more frequently and posting articles that are thought provoking and comment inviting.
By LD Jackson, October 9, 2009 @ 7:16 am
@Matthew C. Keegan
Yeah, I am not a fan of Blogspot as well. It takes an act of Congress to get a comment posted. That’s one thing that is very easy to do with WordPress. I moderate all first time commenters and certain key words. Other than that, the comments are posted right away.
.-= LD Jackson´s last blog ..President Barack Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize =-.
By Matthew C. Keegan, October 9, 2009 @ 10:47 am
@LD Jackson
That’s a good policy, Larry. I, too, monitor first time commenters and then leave it up to them after that.
By Katherine, October 9, 2009 @ 3:10 pm
This is an excellent post… fortunately I embarrass myself enough in public that I have plenty of things to write about. Oh wait, shouldn’t that be unfortunately?? I find twitter is hard when you follow a lot of people – but it does get some traffic.
.-= Katherine´s last blog ..Quick, It’s The Nun – STOP SMIRKING! =-.
By Matthew C. Keegan, October 9, 2009 @ 3:49 pm
@Katherine
LOL. That’s easy to do, Katherine!
I’ve done that a number of times, particularly when I’m tired. Its the human condition, but nothing worth losing sleep over.
By Jan from BetterSpines, October 11, 2009 @ 3:51 pm
Thanks Matt. As always clearly explained and easy to understand. I try to reciprocate comments, but sometimes it’s hard to do so. As you say, some sites don’t seem to have a “comment” button, or their selections of I.D.’s don’t include me. Or simply, their posts don’t inspire me to a response.
.-= Jan from BetterSpines´s last blog ..Chiropractic care and mesothelioma =-.
By Matthew C. Keegan, October 11, 2009 @ 4:36 pm
Jan, the last comment you made is particularly an important one — not inspired to comment. Sometimes, I wish people wouldn’t comment, especially those who are adding value to the thread. I’m sure that obtaining a back link is the reason why some people leave comments, but I don’t like to see that apart from a helpful response.
By mike, October 13, 2009 @ 4:28 am
Thank you Matt — not all blogs allow commentators to leave a message but you’re different. Thanks for sharing.