This is Day 4 of 31 Days to Build a Better Blog, a group project 60+ of us bloggers are doing together in an effort to help each other become better bloggers. You can read an overview here.
Today’s assignment is to spend some time on a successful blog in your niche. That sounds easy enough. But I think this is a lesson and assignment many bloggers are going to have a difficult time with for several reasons.
1) Some bloggers don’t know their niche. For some the issue is similar to Day 1 where you’re still trying to figure out what you’re blog is about and find focus. Others of you are probably bristling at the idea that your blog could be in a nitch because you don’t like to be labeled.
1.5 (Added 5 PM) Some bloggers don’t know what blogs are in their niche. If you don’t read other blogs that touch on the same topics you do, you may not know what blogs to analyze. A couple of places you can search for blogs by topic are Technorati.com and PostRank.com.
2) This sounds like copying. When some of you read the assignment, “Analyze a top blog in your niche” you heard “Watch what the popular people are doing and copy it.” This assignment is not about mindlessly copying anyone or losing your identity. While part of the assignment is to learn things you can incorporate into your own blogging. It’s just as important to identify how you’re blog is unique and how you’re going to differentiate yourself from other the blogs in your niche.
3) Golden nuggets are easy to miss. Chances are you’ve been to the top blogs in your niche. You know what they look like. You know what they write about. It’s going to be real easy to skim over this assignment and not find anything meaningful. When panning for gold, first you’ve got to dig, and second you’ve got to look real carefully to avoid missing the valuable nuggets.
Today’s lesson identifies some good elements to observe on other blogs – topics covered, posting frequency, which topics/posts are most popular, things you like & dislike about the design, etc. Here are some additional suggestions…
- What modules does the blog have in the sidebar(s)?
- Specifically, what features does it have to facilitate sharing and social networking?
- Read the comments. When people say they like a particular post, what specifically do they like about it?
Discussion
- What is your niche?
- What site(s) did you analyze?
- What did you notice about them that you may want to incorporate into your blog?
- How is your blog unique? How are you going to differentiate it from the rest of the pack?
Don’t forget, if you’ve posted a new post to your blog today, you’re welcome to include a link to it in your comments.
The Extra Mile
A few other things you can do to take your blog, other bloggers, and this project even further today…
- Reply & give other bloggers feedback on their analysis.
- When other bloggers include a link to a new article they’ve posted today, click, read, and comment on it.
- Check previous posts in the series for new comments.
- Tweet, share, & bookmark this post. (You could win a $25 gift card!)
163 Comments
this is a bit hard for me since I know a lot of blogs that deal heavily in the technical aspect of filmmaking or are extremely professional. SynaptcLight is really an account of my journey and thought regarding filmamking.
I'll have to say thathttp://philipbloom.co.uk/ is a seriously popular site in the niche I am in.
Things I noticed:
Lots of more videos using the equipment he Evangelizes
Lots of Advertizing
Definitely lots of stuff for filmmakers to benefit from in terms of reviews, tutorials
He also get very involved outside of his blog with the reviews and films he shots – this gives more credibility, respect and trust
What can I use/incorporate?
Well I can certainly get together with local filmmakers or people interest and get a partnership going where we can write reviews and technical articles – inviting more professional people to be involved – take it offline.
What makes Synaptic Light Different:
Filmmaking is not my job, it is a hobby (a bit more than that), I don't do it for money, I do most of it for church and I am documenting my progress and what I learn as I work my way to be better in my spare time.
Phillip–random question. How do you get your blog to preview the posts on your homepage??? I've thought about doing that on my website and then linking it to my blog but I am not sure of the html jargon.
~Lara
Phillip–random question. How do you get your blog to preview the posts on your homepage??? I've thought about doing that on my website and then linking it to my blog but I am not sure of the html jargon.
~Lara
it's a theme characteristic.
one of the benefits of self hosting – nice themes.
It's basically the engine behind the scenes that finds a certain string that indicates the cut-off where everything above is shown in the main page and all in the single page.
now sure if blogspot has a script you can use to emulate this
As Phillip says – it's a side benefit of using themes in WordPress. Your site has a unique style, feel and flavour that would be quite hard to replicate within wordpress – however WP gives so much more in terms of flexibility in the backend management, etc …
As an example of the unique aspect – your about page is a series of static images, yes? You could do that in WP as well but would it look as 'neat' …?
Me, I can't code (I ask my eldesyt to do that) so use what I can and WP makes that so easy.
Thanks, guys. I wondered if it was a WP thing. How difficult is it to switch from blogger to WP? It seems daunting when I think about it.
I did this sevreal years back – simply set up my WP as I wanted it then used the import functionality to drag in all my posts / comments / etc
I like this Phillip.
Whether just for this task or previously you've obviously considered what extra you can do. Take it offline would be an obvious step so long as geography allows. I think seeing extracts of stuff you've created / worked on would be excellent and how-to's always go down well (so I'm told).
yeah, geography – always a problem. I loved it at school; I hate it now – the world is smaller but the distances greater.
this is a bit hard for me since I know a lot of blogs that deal heavily in the technical aspect of filmmaking or are extremely professional. SynaptcLight is really an account of my journey and thought regarding filmamking.
I'll have to say thathttp://philipbloom.co.uk/ is a seriously popular site in the niche I am in.
Things I noticed:
Lots of more videos using the equipment he Evangelizes
Lots of Advertizing
Definitely lots of stuff for filmmakers to benefit from in terms of reviews, tutorials
He also get very involved outside of his blog with the reviews and films he shots – this gives more credibility, respect and trust
What can I use/incorporate?
Well I can certainly get together with local filmmakers or people interest and get a partnership going where we can write reviews and technical articles – inviting more professional people to be involved – take it offline.
What makes Synaptic Light Different:
Filmmaking is not my job, it is a hobby (a bit more than that), I don't do it for money, I do most of it for church and I am documenting my progress and what I learn as I work my way to be better in my spare time.
My new post for the day:http://campfirecowboyministries.com/2010/05/how-o…
I think my post disappeared (or I nested it somewhere). Typical for today.
My niche is Simple Cowboy Christianity.
Could only find a few blogs that fit my niche. Most were cowboy church blogs that were more announcements than blog.
I sure wish I could find that post!
Hey Kevin, it looks like we've been having some legit comments getting flagged as spam. I will be checking the "spam" comment a couple times a day and restoring those that are legit. You might also consider creating an account with the IntenseDebate commenting system. I think if you're logged in to IntenseDebate, that eliminates any chance of your comments getting caught in the spam filter.
My niche is Church Technology. In looking at other sites, I need to beef up my ability to offer subscriptions and include a widget or two on my site. I'm also looking into better category descriptors for my posts and the possibility of using a guest blogger.
My post for today: http://jerryfultz.wordpress.com/2010/05/06/tech-f…
My niche is Church Technology. In looking at other sites, I need to beef up my ability to offer subscriptions and include a widget or two on my site. I'm also looking into better category descriptors for my posts and the possibility of using a guest blogger.
My post for today: http://jerryfultz.wordpress.com/2010/05/06/tech-f…
I've been told Tags are better than categories. I honestly don't know but some SEO dude may help us out with an answer to this one.
one of the things I did on my blog was a complete overhaul of categories; I reduced them from a bucketful to a handful. Tags, they are not a bucketful to me – they are a boat load. If tags are more important then consistency of the tags you use should be important, hmmm – just thinking out load really
Stuart – I included you in my blogroll. Looking forward to keeping up with you.
Yea, I need to figure out the tag thing. Hopefully it will be an upcoming topic of discussion.
My niche in Christian growth/discipleship/pastors. I already posted my (almost) daily reads on my list post: http://junctionforjesus.blogspot.com/2010/05/6-bl…
What I really like about most of these is their content–a lot of good ideas and info for me as a Christian and pastor. I don't know that they are "top blogs" though.
Here are some that might be top blogs in my niche: http://www.ronniefloyd.com/blog/ — Pastor and a leader in the SBC. I like the format of his blog. http://alvinreid.com/archives/category/blog — Professor at SEBTS. Again, a great layout. Pictures and everything. http://www.perrynoble.com/ — I too think Noble's blog is a top one. He has a very clean layout. He uses a lot of lists also!
My blog is certainly not a top one, but I hope it is unique just 'cause it's me. Here's my post for today: Church, Love It or Hate IT —http://junctionforjesus.blogspot.com/2010/05/chur…
Well I didn't end up with the results I was looking for (answers to the questions above). I spent most of my time trying to navigate my way around sites like Technorati and I ended up with results for blogs that I wouldn't have expected to be at the top of my niche (genealogy, family history, organizing photos, preserving photos and memorabilia). The site that came up at the top of my genealogy and family history searches in Technorati was not a pretty website, but they had a ton of very informative posts (multiple posts every day) and a ton of badges and nice logo links on the side. I couldn't tell if the logo links were paid sponsors because the site didn't have any visible link or page to find out out to sponsor and they weren't AdSense. I didn't see any AdSense on the page. It looks like a free Blogger.com template. The site is:http://tracingthetribe.blogspot.com/.
Wow they've got things going down the whole right side of the blog. i'm not sure about the badges and such either, might be pictures somehow or something.
My niche seems to be that of "mommy blogger" who writes about family and faith. My blog is a little bit different, of course, because my family and choices about how I raise my family are different. I have my own unique perspective and spin on things.
I analyzedhttp://www.wearethatfamily.com
Some things I noticed that I would like to incorporate in my blog are regular, themed "columns" that people expect to see on certain days of the week, product recommendations, giveaways, and a focus on charity and giving, among other things. Some of these things I can incorporate immediately, and others will come as my blog grows and develops. I realize this is a process that will take some time.
My blog is unique because I am unique, my family is different, and the some of the choices my family makes are unique. In addition, my family deals with some issues that other families don't have to deal with, and that shapes my writing, my faith, and my writing about my faith. I believe that differentiating myself from the pack will happen as a natural result of my continued work on my writing and my blog. Of course, I will be on the lookout for ideas and methods to use too!
~Jennifer
Forgot to mention that my list post went up on my blog today.http://wp.me/pG2Wu-cX
Forgot to mention that my list post went up on my blog today.http://wp.me/pG2Wu-cX
Forgot to mention that my list post went up on my blog today.http://wp.me/pG2Wu-cX
That's cool what you want to write about and such. I like the "mommy blogger" aspect. Gives other moms a place to come and maybe find advice. Love it!
Good observation…thanks for the idea=) I too mommy blog
Thanks! I'm heading to your blog now!
~Jennifer
The great thing about human life is that we are all unique – but in a weird way we are also very alike.
OK, that aside, giveaways are good but as I found out you need the readership for it to work. Theming is also good but you need to be committed to keeping up with that.
Thanks, Stuart! I'm not rushing into doing any of these ideas now. They're things I'd like to incorporate as my blog grows and develops. I'm enjoying the process….
~Jennifer
Still working on reviewing a blog in my niche. The problem for me is in my main business I don't want to give any undo props to a company that is a competitor! ha!! So I'll review one later.
But since we're a loving family here is the post today from the blog I run for my pastorhttp://tomelmore.com/what-happens-in-the-margin/
Still working on reviewing a blog in my niche. The problem for me is in my main business I don't want to give any undo props to a company that is a competitor! ha!! So I'll review one later.
But since we're a loving family here is the post today from the blog I run for my pastorhttp://tomelmore.com/what-happens-in-the-margin/
I really like what you wrote about. I need to remember to put time in my schedule for God, and making that margin. Are you part of Lifechurch.tv? The Margin topic reminds me of the series they did, so just wondering. Thanks for blogging!
Thanks.. I'd take credit for it, but Tom wrote it.. I just made it look good!!! We are not a part of LifeChurch although we do follow them and are big fans!