Recently, I received several direct messages from a blogger asking me to comment on his blog. He said that he'd do the same for me if I complied. This individual was fairly aggressive with his solicitations to the point where I became quite angry with the intrusions. I have a message for this blogger. Think about the other person's interests and needs before your own self-serving interests and you will probably get what you want and much more. This type of solicitation for blog comments is like cold calling for business. It's self serving, intrusive, and tends to drive people away. If you want people to comment on your blog, learn to give first. Here's how:
Make comments on other people's blogs and don't expect anything in return. Make sure your comments add value to the post. Comments like, "great post" are usually perceived as self serving spam in most cases. Explain why you feel that a post is great and you'll see that making value added comments will eventually will get more people to come to your blog. Many of them will also make comments.
Provide information of interest to the readers you want to attract to your blog. Good blog posts get comments from readers. Solicitation for comments does more to drive people away. Provide valuable information and see people make regular visits to your blog because the readers will see a benefit from visiting.
Link to other blogs that will interest your readers. Linking to other blogs relevant to your prospects does two things. One is that prospective clients will see your blog as a great resource. The second is that you're helping other bloggers get "link love". Bloggers love people linking to their blogs because it helps raise their visibility with blog ranking sites like Technorati. Higher blog rankings also help to drive new visitors to their sites. Give "link love" to other bloggers from your blog and see others link back. You'll then see more visitors coming to your blog as well.
Be an advocate for the clients you want to target. Different interest groups have different values and causes. Demonstrate support for these causes and you'll get attention and appreciation from these specific interest groups.
Survey your target markets and listen to what they say. Suppose that blogger had asked me about topics I'd be interested in reading and then posted an article around one of those topics. That would've shown interest in me as a person and would've improved his chances of getting me to comment on his blog.
Good blogging requires understanding of what the readers or customers want. That's also true in management and business development. Managers who listen and understand the interests of people who report to them are usually much more effective than managers who don't. Business development professionals who understand the needs of their clients also do better than self serving individuals. Bottom line is that demonstrating concern for others is a great way for people to build better relationships in all areas of life.
John P. Kreiss |
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