I had quite an enlightening experience the other day. I was (I’m sure you’ll find this hard to imagine) talking to someone about what I had most recently read in the Mark Twain autobiography. I thought the content was entirely fascinating, of course, and well, there was no QUESTION that I was telling the story in a most engaging manner.
All of a sudden, the person I was talking to stopped me and said, “Um, are you doing a presentation? Is this a lecture?”
The comment was made lovingly, but it raised a good point. I had become so entirely involved in what I was saying that I had lost track of how long I had been raging on. That was live and in person.
When you’re blogging, you can’t see facial expressions of people who are reading. You can’t hear the tapping of fingers or the exclamations of “OK, geeze, let’s move on to something else!” That can be great for you on the blogging/writing side, but it can hurt you without you even noticing on the engagement side.
How can you avoid this problem?
It’s really hard to avoid becoming “preachy” when you are blogging. I think we’ve probably all encountered subjects where we are just getting to the crux of the issue at word 1,205. But without immediate feedback as we’re writing, how can we make sure we aren’t boring our readers to tears – or boring them to the point where they don’t come back?
Here are some ideas that seem to work well for me. Perhaps they’ll work well for you, too.
1. “Similar Posts:” If you have a WordPress blog, look for the “similar posts” plugin. Now, the real idea behind this plugin is that you can ensnare poor innocent readers into reading other posts of yours when they see you have written lots on a given subject. The real reason I like it though is I can get notices of when I’m maybe settling on a subject too often. For example, when I write my next Lincoln post (because you know I can’t resist) I’ll be able to tell really quickly if I did a post that was virtually the same.
2. Word Count: While I stray away from saying that blog posts should be a certain number of words, for my own site I know that I like to hit around the 800 word mark. This helps me know that if I’m just getting to the heart of my post at 500 words, I’ve probably gone on for too long about stuff that doesn’t really matter. I don’t like that and neither will you.
3. Visit as if you were a stranger: Sometimes I go to my site not through the administration panel but rather just to the site like you would see it. I skim around and read some of my posts to see how they are reading. I try to put myself in your shoes. If I’m writing about something that gets me fired up, I’ll read the post 2-3 times before hitting publish. It’s really important to remember that just because you’re super into something, not all of your readers will be. In fact, it’s possible none of your readers will be.
4. Make sure you’re not a parrot: One thing that drives me nuts as a reader is when I go to three or four sites and all of them have posts that are virtually carbon copies of each other. I don’t know if this is purely by chance or if it’s worked out that way, but when I see posts stacking up on a certain topic from a certain perspective, I will sometimes comment from the opposite point of view just to make sure that I can offer a fresh perspective. I think sometimes you appreciate getting a different opinion on things, and I like using my posts as a balance against a lot of similar posts. I’m weird that way, I guess!
Like I said, it can be really easy to fall into the trap of sounding preachy or angsty or mean or just generally icky. We don’t have someone standing over us (most likely) reading what we’re typing. But there are ways to make sure you don’t drive your readers nuts, and sometimes, we do like to avoid driving our readers nuts. Right?
What methods do you use to make sure you are avoiding the preachy spectrum of blogging? I’d love to hear your thoughts!
This is post #74 in the Engagement Series. If you think you might be missing posts, please feel free to hit that ole subscribe button. Thank you!
Image by Colin Adamson. http://www.sxc.hu/profile/Col6085
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Bruce Serven says
June 20, 2011 at 10:15 pmMargie,
On the subject of becoming too preachy: how does someone know when that is happening and how can they fix it? (you mentioned word length, but I’m not sure that’s the only determinant – what about tone or style, etc?)
It’s funny on the publishing part. We usually don’t/won’t know what resonates with people until we hit publish. Might as well just publish it and find out, eh? ;). I’ve seen things I thought were 500 word masterpieces fall upon deaf ears and seen things I thought were 1500 words of worthless drivel that people loved and liked/retweeted to death. One of my most recent pieces is a 2700 word article that people are eating up.
As it is though, I always end up rereading my stuff multiple times (even after publishing) and correcting (or expanding) things as I see them.
On the parrot part – I think it’s a lot of the sane ideas are on the minds of a lot of people. I don’t think there is a collusion or whatever going on. I’ve seen several topics that I’ve written down in my notebook to work on (without telling anyone else about) get published the next day by other people. Even obscure things that aren’t current events or trending topics related. It’s funny when that happens cuz you’re like ‘wow I just had that same idea yesterday and was putting together my research on it last night – weird cosmic deal to see some other blogger publish it this morning, beating me to it.’ For the most part, it seems to be chance.
Margie Clayman says
June 21, 2011 at 12:55 pmLike I said, I think one of the best things you can do is read the post as if you were totally new to it. Kind of hard to do, but reading it out loud helps if you have the opportunity. I try to imagine how I would feel if I found certain words or phrases in a blog post. How would I react? Granted, not everyone reacts the same way, but I try to steer clear from things that I would find offensive or otherwise icky.
Very true on your last point – sometimes you have a great idea and find that someone else did too – always kind of a bummer! 🙂
Thanks for your great comment!
Raul Colon says
June 21, 2011 at 1:43 pmOh my good Margie sounds like something that happens to me all of the time. People call me a parrot not because I Carbon copy articles but because I need to learn to talk less.
The same reason I set up my blog to share ideas.
On my side I have been trying to create content ahead of time to make sure it is right in line with many things I want to convey. This method of writing ahead and looking at my content a day or two later helps me see where I might be boring my audience.
Another thing I try to do when I go over a certain number of words its see how I can break it down. I have been using your method of a series of posts on Online Privacy I was going to write one but there was so much I have to say I had to break it down.
I also have @lucymfel and @ricklipsett which do quality control for my posts!
Margie Clayman says
June 23, 2011 at 4:47 pmQuality control is definitely important – it’s great when you can have a fresh pair of eyes look at your content. No matter how hard we try, we’re never going to catch everything in our own writing.
I don’t think people should call you a parrot, by the way. I want you to talk and write more more more 🙂
Annie Andre says
June 22, 2011 at 10:10 amOh my. I think i’m a preacher. I never thought about this AT ALL. I’ve gotten my posts down to around 8000 to 1500 words and i thought that was good.
But now that i thnk about it, i skim really long articles myself
I’m setting one of my next goal . “write a post and cut it down to 600 words.” . I’m going to try to do an outline of my article first to see if that will help to get as much concise information as i can into a shorter article. Then, if i need to expand it, make a second article as a follow up.
Wish me luck
Margie Clayman says
June 23, 2011 at 4:48 pmHi Annie,
There’s no right or wrong to this. If your audience likes that kind of content and is okay with it, and if it’s what you enjoy writing, then stick with it.
If you have doubts, however, you might want to give what you are suggesting a try. See if you can cut things into slightly smaller pieces.
Remember, part of the fun people have when they comment is adding to your story. So, maybe experiment with leaving some air there that other people could fill up. See if they fill it in the same way you would have in a longer post. Then let me know what you find out! 🙂