Saravanan Sahadevan

Do you really know your readers that well? Do you think they care about you? Well think again. The only reason a reader is going to stay at your site is to gain some knowledge.

Reality of social media is such. It’s a materialistic world and you get nothing if you do not give something. That’s basically a social media ethic. I would like to just point out a couple of things on photoblog’s and personal blogs. 

This article is intended for people who would like to increase their readership. If you are happy by just doing what you are doing currently, that’s fine. This is a suggestion for those who needs it. 

How is a blog different from a Photoblog?

The truth is, there is no difference. You are just mixing two things. A gallery and a blog merged, a photoblog is born. A blog is generally made up of a post that contains text, pictures or videos. Why do you want to do that, when you have social media tools such as Flickr? Flickr is a social tool for you to share moment’s of life with friends and the general public. You even have options to tag it or even receive comments. 

What would a general blog reader feel?

A general blog reader like me for instance, would not want to just see your life on your blog all the time. Over a period, I might get completely fed-up. Well, if it was a super star, then it is a different case. I would expect some great value on your blog that you could provide me. Pictures may inspire, but how long? I rather follow your flickr streams or your posterity streams to view your recent shots.  

A purpose of a blog is to make it your base. Drive people back and front to it. If you were to publish your life streams, we have Flickr, twitter, plurk, pownce…. endless. Send readers to those media streams and let the crowd of those streams find their way to your blog. Applies the same for returning crowds that you sent.

A blog is also your marketing tool. Of what you really are. Do not mess it up by stuffing up the “wrong things at the wrong place”. Did I make sense? Highlighting from time to time about your self, something really personal that you would like to share or grabbing a picture out of your flickr stream and to tell a story about it is all fine. You could do this 1 out of 10 post. It would even give a nice twist of lemon on your tea. But the idea of converting a blog completely into an image gallery, freaks me out. If you are being different on your images it’s okay. What I really would freak out would be, pictures of just your daily routine. A complete Flickr on a Blog. 

So what should a photoblog have?

A real photoblog would be, a blog’s plot that is driven by photo’s. Something related to a specific profession as your posterity. I would like to stress again, that I’m only saying it’s wrong to mix personal photo’s on a photoblog. A photoblog has a niche. Just like any other regular blog. You could be a skilled skyscraper photographer. You may want to publish your work as posterity. Now that’s what we call a photoblog. I hope you could now differentiate a real photoblog then a “personal photo photoblog”

The real important issue for personal bloggers?…

Well the point I’m stretching is that people want a value in reading materials.  Something they could ponder at. When we post a personal related post, try to at least provide a simple value to the reader. Content that would open eyes. That’s what we need. Opinions that matters. Some would say that no one care’s about our opinions, but it actually does if it’s eye opening. Are you conveying a hidden truth? Are you providing an extra tip ? This are questions to be asked when you give an opinion or simply write about your self. Do not brag about your self on what you know or what you do! 

Well I hope I made you to ponder or at least made some sense. You do not have to be formal on what you do. Blog on things that you know you can. Do not fake out things you don’t know or not to sure about. To be honest, I do write about my self at random but a rule I practice is to have a lesson in it or something to ponder at.

Now, if you were really into photoblogging or videoblogging and hence you have some really good skills, Do come back soon as I  would share some tips on growing your photoblog’s and videoblog’s authority. There is also another rule on the social web. “New Things Live”. Let’s see what we could actually try. The Aim is to keep things personal as you wish but to retain a value/knowledge on it while keeping readers on your mind. 

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Well generally, Politicians are very lucky bunch of folks. Why? Because they are a public icon. That makes it incredibly easy to be successful in social media terms. If they would run a blog, well their daily hits could be some of our day dreams. It’s true.

I would like to be tackling a little on why politicians should blog and what they should do or matter of fact should not. 

Who said politicians can’t talk? That’s what they do best, therefore content is never a chore for them. Constantly writing for the public simply gives a greater impression on them I would say. People’s view on them as well are quite different. For ordinary folks like us, no one cares about our personal life but politicians are more of a pop star. Everything they would to write or say counts!

Besides that, Organic traffic loves you! (politicians I mean). I guess it might be useful to any politician or “politician to be” to take my say into count. Coming back to Organic traffic. If you are a politician, your name would practically be on the top 10 of the search index. That’s the nature of search engine algorithms. Fame & Fortune hits the top!

Moving on, 5 Steps That Politicians Should Consider On The Social Web

• Join other social networks & profiles besides blogging. I can’t stress much more again on how important it is to participate on social networks.
• Monetize De Blog. Of course it wont be sufficent for their campaign but what about throwing it back to the public. In fact its safer, so that the public would not start rumoring on issues such as where the money goes etc… We don’t want to go to far. Well throw it back to the community and earn a deed. Seriously it’s more than a deed. (Politician’s, you know what I mean.)
• Socializing other aspects of a site. Blogs are to tackle issues and opinions as well on gaining a communities respond towards each piece of your content. What about your main stream community who would like to reach you? It’s pretty hard to tackle issues that fall on comments at times. Well one solution has already been said( Joining Social Networks). Another would be to create a social space, a Forum. There is nothing better than a forum or your own networking script(that’s good too) to directly gain from your mainstream community.
• New Media as an approach. Podcasting, Videocasting, Photo Sharing, you name it. But remember, being with the social web is not to only talk about your self but to give something towards the community at large. That’s what enriches your very own community. Use your skills and attract the minds of many by providing solutions and resources through audio’s and videos that would benefit your readers. Many political parties these day’s, use the social space by advertising campaign related commercials. I wont’ say its wrong but its rather not ethical.
• Remember, a blog is not a press statement! Loose the formality in you(politicians). Be as humanly as possible. Respond as how any ordinary person would do. Do not spam the social networks, for example twitter, only on your campaigns. That’s not what people would want to follow you for. Provide your very own updates on news & interest. Be personal.

Is there anything else that you could add? Throw it in on the comments. Let’s have a discussion. 

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Are you a social media addict? Do you blog or read them? Do you twitter? Have Facebook? Linked-In maybe? That’s enough to say, that you are at some point of an addict or becoming one. What is your daily online routine? What do you do first after waking up and login on to your PC/Mac?

Let’s look at things most people do, in fact mostly what I do as a daily routine in an order. 

Emails - My day starts basically out of the bed with a glance through over my mails before I head for some daily exercise or so. I have witness at least 70% of people whom I have met, that have this in common. I normally would, save some drafts of emails at the morning and would come back to it later. Most probably after a bath or so. 

Login on to MyBlogLog - This is essential. We come across ton’s of blogs everyday. And most blogs do have mybloglog as a community tool. You would want to let at least the author or people visiting the blog to know that you were present on a particular blog. It works well as a marketing tool as well. On the other hand, you do have a friendfeed like profile setup at mybloglog for people to reach you. 

RSS/Podcast - Next is to know what’s new. Of course I am going to skim through post’s and if it’s catchy or felt worthy, I would try to leave a comment on the blog post. Checking what’s the latest downloaded podcast or videos through iTunes or Miro would follow on.

Twitter  - Basically, engaging your self with twitter. This happens all day but normally starts once you are done with your RSS. People tend to use various methods to engaged themselves to twitter. May it be a desktop client, mobile client or the web. I personally use Twhirl. An easy to use desktop application for twitter. 

Login on to Personal IM’s - If you are normally hooked up with your desktop and the internet at all times, you might be having some instant messaging applications that connects you mostly with your family and close friends. 

Facebook & Facebook Email - This normally do happens at Mid day. Just before a lunch break or after. Going through mails and poking other friends probably. It’s based on your own time schedule. Would say that its more flexible then the rest.

Blog - Do you own a blog? Well as for me, its around this time after mid day, (evenings) when the sun is almost down, I tend to start developing contents. The more solid one’s. And having them scheduled for a later publish. 

Linked-In - I have seen many people at end of the day, checking in people whom they met (work/business) throughout the day. One of them who even blogged about it was Loic lemeur. Well, certainly it helps you to keep your business network organized.

There are many other services such as flickr, seesmic , youtube and so on. But the one’s listed above are commonly used basically by everyone as a daily routine. So does all this help your daily productivity? As for me, it sure has contributed somehow. Do you have anything else to add? Share it on. 

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It’s time for another of my weekly Friday post on Mannin Mainthargals. Well today, I’m just looking at some different angles on the whole picture of Mannin Mainthargals. Media Blogs. There are many new Mannin Mainthargal related media blogs born every 6 months once or so. But do all of them succeed? Im on a journey today to look into this issue in depth. 

First, lets look at some facts regarding Mannin Mainthargal Media & Niched Blogs.

• Small Niche - This niche chosen by many, in general terms is very small. It’s very narrow. When I say narrow, I am referring to readership.
• Breaking News Volume - There’s nothing much breaking everyday. Most to most valuable news breaks you could get maybe would be twice a month or slightly more.
• Industry Content - The Mannin Mainthargal Industry is very small. You cant expect to get information overload out of this industry at the moment. 

Lots of minds who run Double M media blogs/sites have a mindset that people from all over the world would be interested and therefore Double M’s would be exposed to such. That’s utterly wrong. So my primary focus of this post would be to find out how could media blogs enlarge and grow a solid readership. 

SEO & User Friendly - First do a check on your SEO status. Is your blog or site optimized to a substantial level? Make sure you’ve done all that. Have your RSS options shined. Promote subscriptions. Select a great free design if you are not ready for a custom design. 

Original Content - Do not repeat the same news over and over again. You may bore your readers in a long run. Since there are not much of news available, come up with reasonable original new contents. Develop articles on specific issues. A caution here is to develop contents that no other competitor has done in order to dominate the topic first. 

Forget about Audio Streaming - It’s no point having MP3’s on site or even having them streamed back on your site. There’s Imeem or Last.fm out there. Make use of them. This would promote your blog or site on a social media platform. There is more exposure there. Give links or us widgets that shows your playlist on those social audio networks. 

New Media - Coming up with original articles is fine but you have chosen a media rich niche. Its a new media trend running along. In order to be new and fresh, come up with new medias such as Podcasting and Video Shows. Let your news shine on videos. Gather a group of people and shoot occasionally. Forget about interviews or so. Make original contents. Trust me that’s what a reader would want. Be your own superstar. Talk to your subscribed community. Video post always has a reach in terms of Media. BTW, it does not need to be professional. Amateur videos are always the best. Same goes with podcasting with just a little general guideline would do. 

Blogging needs a lots of efforts and consistency. It’s a long term effort in business. Do not expect any gains much fast. It may take years but never give up. If you are prepared for that, you would be giving your readers a breeze already. Every subscriber is your jewel. They aspect to have at least something new to read on their readers everyday. And may it be good and original. I hope this simple guidelines should lead you in the right way. God Bless. 

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It is common for bloggers to feel over stressed and de-motivated when things don’t seem to be right. When I say things, I would mainly refer to statistics growth and readership. I do know how it does feel. Trust me I have experienced it. But I kind off found my way to motivate my self in order to post better. Just to share, here are some quick techniques that may help you if you are a blogger and currently de-motivated.

Love what we do - We may know this as most of us blog as a passion but not many practices much as said. Forget about negative feedbacks and do what you love best. Do keep going on. Blogging is a long term approach. May it take years. Keep reminding your self. Your goal will come soon if I blog harder. 

Forget Statistics - Don’t let the numbers hit your head. Let it be number of hits or page-views, your goal is to provide the internet space with something valuable. If you appreciate the effort made to get a post out, well sure would the blogosphere soon enough. 

Subscribers Amount - May it be 10 or 20, It doesn’t matter. Feel good with the 10 or 20 people who are following, reading and interested with you and your content. Treat every reader as your jewel. Trace out their favorites with Feedburner stat’s like I did in my recent post and find out what’s their choice of content. Focus on that particular type of content. It would be soon enough that your readership would increase. There will be always someone who would read your content at some point in time. 

Passion & Interest - Keep the flame burning in you. No matter what you blog about, do it with sincerity. As time go on, it will become a lifestyle on it’s own and I bet you would love it. I have started to love it. Remember, it’s all about time and patience 

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The term blogging is kind off too huge for ordinary folks. At the same time, the term micro-blogging is too small either. So what’s in between? Well that’ what Tumblr is all about. 

I have been recently seeing lots of sites running on Tumblr. And I must say, it’s pretty good for a free service although the world’s going free. All you have to do is to sign up for an account at Tumblr and begin posting immediately. Its more of a blog but just smaller. You get to post all those regular stuffs like videos & images. 

Most net show websites run Tumblr as it’s completely easy to maintain. You could get a domain name and point it to your Tumblr account. It’s a bit tricky but yet possible. More details regarding that could be found on the developers FAQ’s. 

On the other hand, the whole look and feel is customizable. CSS could be directly edited and yes you can even have advertisements such as Google’s Adsense, YPN, Widget-bucks and so on. One of the highlights from the Tumblr community would be, Jake & Amir. If you have never heard about this show, I would recommend you to watch it. Its funny & worth it. 

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