In this Behind the Blog, Regator is talking to Tyler Adams, the man behind WeblogCritic. Tyler’s writing focuses on reviewing well known and niche blogs as well as providing tips for new bloggers. He has been blogging for years, but this is his brand new blog and we’re looking behind the blog to see what makes him tick.
Why did you start blogging?
I started blogging before “blog” was a household word—well before people considered blogging as a profession. My first blog was created on LiveJournal in 2001. It was a nonsense collective of my teenage angst and ramblings. I found it entertaining that the things I wrote became public and that people could react to my thoughts and opinions. Looking back, it was really a tool to improve my writing skills and ability to keep people captivated in what I had to say.
Following that, I’ve had a few unsuccessful blogs. I think the failure of those blogs was caused by my lack of drive for the niche I had decided to talk about. But failure is a good tool for your succession and a marker for where you can fall if you’re not careful.
How would you describe weblogCritic and what do you want to achieve with the blog?
WeblogCritic is a blog about blogs. The vast majority of young people rely on blogs over printed press for news, reviews, tips and information, and it’s only fair that weblogs are scrutinized like other popular media outlets (e.g., newspapers or magazines). It is quite tricky to write an unbiased review of a blog because there are blogs with twenty staff writers slamming out thirty articles a day, then there are people like me—a single author writing for passion over profit. I make sure to give reviews based on the author’s ability to write and be captivating rather than popularity. On too many social services, like Digg and Delicious, people who don’t have massive amounts of traffic can never be showcased. So essentially, I want to give everyone a fair chance.
What three things must bloggers do, in your opinion, to create a great blog?
I use a three-point scale on my reviews, and I cannot stress enough that these points are the foundation of any successful blog:
1. Appearance is key. It’s the doormat; if I walked up to your house and you had some old tattered rag on your doorstep, I would be less inclined to enter, and I would create a pre-judgment on what kind of environment I’m putting myself in. It’s the same for web design. We naturally prejudge things and it’s essential that those first few moments are absorbed with pleasure rather than with some cumbersome and awkward design.
2. Be a good writer and storyteller. Regardless of what you’re writing about, it’s your job to enthrall the community. Too many times you see a really good story being discussed so poorly that your drive to read anything else by the author is stripped away. Be proud of your abilities and make sure that you’re blogging because it’s a fun outlet . . . not just a paycheck or two.
3. Community outreach grows your blog. It keeps readers coming back. If they know that they’re heard, and you as the author are easily accessible, it becomes more of a community than something like a newspaper or magazine.
What are your favorite types of blogs?
I like blogs that keep an even ratio of news and personal experience. Young blogs mostly—they’re not doing it for money, they’re doing to it share their ideas.
What advice would you give to someone just starting to blog?
Sleep on it—for weeks. Make sure that, if you’re planning to become a “professional” blogger, you’ve found a niche that you can truly relate to. Stay focused on that niche and branch out only when you’re willing to expand. If you don’t find a niche that you can write about every day and you write unrelated articles often, you’ll find that your readers become confused about what you’re trying to do. Assess where you want to take the blog, the mood you want to set. Do you want to run a review blog? An opinionated press? Create a good business model that you can personally stick to.
Where do you see the blogosphere in 20 years?
Every person born will be given a social security number and a blog . . . no, seriously. The medium is still so new that it’s hard to tell. Blogs hand people a proverbial microphones with which they can be a news anchor or an opinion writer. It’s fun, and it’s becoming a household activity that everyone knows about. It also has an infectious effect; when people see me write an article, they’re intrigued and they want to do the same. In 20 years we will have a new web, a new series of applications, and new tools that will help us gather and share information, but I don’t think blogging is going anywhere anytime soon.
