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10 tips to get people reading your blog

May 23rd, 2010 | Author:

TenI was thinking about this this morning as I did my usual catch-up on Google Reader. Here’s the post that got me thinking:
Imagining a mobile Moodle from iAlja by Alja Sulčič.

There are so many blog posts and so little time. So if you want to get your post read what can you do to increase your chances? Here are the things that appeal to me – i.e. get me to read the whole post not just skim and move on.

Subjects or titles

  1. Questions are good, especially if it is a question I an interested in finding the answer to.
  2. Numbers, like “21  ways to be more interactive in your online teaching”.
  3. Make sure you actually say what the post is about, unless you can write such interesting subject lines that get people curious enough to read on. Alja wrote about Moodle and as I use that a lot it got my attention.

Content

  1. Well obviously content has to be relevant to your readers.
  2. Don’t write a thesis, if you have THAT much to say write a number of posts, or write an article and post on your website. Alja points readers to scribed to read her conference paper.
  3. Include a picture to cue me  to what you are writing about so I can make a quick decision about whether to read further or not.
  4. Embed video. Alja put a video up on YouTube of her talk at the conference. Note YouTube only allows videos of 10 mins in length so you will have to split it or upload to somewhere else like TeacherTube or Vimeo.
  5. Link to other resources.
  6. Don’t just give the opening in your RSS give the whole post. Some will disagree but I only click through to read more if the opening really captures me. So if you only give the first bite, make this hook people.
  7. Finishing with a question is a good way to get comments from your readers.

So what would you include in your top ten tips?

Image: Wallyg

Posted in (e)Learning & (e)Teaching, Web 2.0 Applications
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  • http://www.ialja.com iAlja

    Thanks for the mention, Carol! And I certainly agree with your tips. The most important thing for me is to respect my readers' time, be brief and make it easy for people to scan content. Once you grab the attention, there are always other ways to provide more detail, so I try to keep my blog posts short and focused.

    And by the way, using bullet points or numbered lists like you did in your post can also be a great way to grab readers' attention. We all love top 10 lists with bullets – they're just so easy to read and digest :)



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