Written on September 23rd, 2004 at 07:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Blogging for Change (6) - Fear to Commitment
This is the last installment of a 6 part series on blogging that brings about lasting change. Before reading on you might like to Read the introduction here.
Stage 5 - Fear to Commitment
Depending upon the gravity of the topic you’re talking about, fear can play a part in asking people to take some action to bring about lasting change. Real and sustained change can be a scary thing for many people.
I even found when I invited people to engage in blogger idol (not really that scary a thing) that a few people emailed me to say that they’d like to participate, but they were worried about implications of doing so.
Your last task in bringing about lasting change is to help your reader move from fear of the change to commitment to it. It is time to ’seal the deal’.
Towards the end of your post you might want to reinforce the positives of what you’re asking people to consider. Give them a picture of what ‘might be’ if they take your words seriously. Reinforce the steps people can to follow to do what you’re asking, keep any processes as simple as possible and give people options to opt in a little bit or a lot. Give them a tangible way to respond - don’t just ask for change without giving a way forward.
When people do respond - follow them up with some encouraging words and support - keep them accountable to their decision but do so in a gracious and supportive way. If someone leaves a comment on your site for the first time or shoots you an email in response to a post, try to acknowledge them in some way - even if it is small acknowledgement. It is amazing how just a small acknowledgement of a first time reader can make them into a committed regular reader.
Concluding Words - So there you have it. Five tasks that bloggers might face if they desire to see their blogging bring about lasting change in their readers. As I said at the beginning of the series - this is a process I was taught as a public speaker. I’ve seen it’s effectiveness in that medium but I guess the jury is still out when it comes to blogging. I’m interested in your thoughts, comments, feedback and ideas. I’d like to adapt this if it needs it.
The steps in this process are:
1. Rejection to Attention
2. Indifference to Interest
3. Skepticism to Conviction
4. Procrastination to Desire
5. Fear to Commitment
Written on September 23rd, 2004 at 07:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Blogging for Change (5) - Procrastination to Desire
This is the 5th installment of a 6 part series on blogging that brings about lasting change. Before reading on you might like to Read the introduction here.
Stage 4 - Procrastination to Desire
You have gotten the attention of your readers, they are interested in what you are blogging about, they even see how it relates to them and how they can respond to the it, you are doing great! But now comes the challenge that stops many of us from responding to things that we ’should’ d0 - we procrastinate! We say, ‘well yes, that’s something that I should do - one day’.
You next task is breaking the cycle of procrastination and instilling desire in your readers to actually take some action - to make the change. If all you do is convince your reader you are only doing half the job. They will go to the next blog and soon forget what they’ve just been challenged about - your entry will end up just being another long forgotten entry that they once read.
If you want to create change in your readers you have to help create a desire within them to take some action, to make a change, to enter further on into a process. Actions speak louder than words!
Give your reader some way to respond to the issue at hand. This will vary depending upon what you’re writing about. You might ask them to leave a comment, to link up on their blog or to consider some other action. I often find asking a question (even if you know the answer) for people to respond to in comments is a good way of helping people to do something tangible with what you’ve written.
Inspire them, give them an incentive, show them the positive results of taking a hold of your invitation - do whatever you can to get them to take an Active part in the process you’re blogging about.
The full steps in this process are:
1. Rejection to Attention
2. Indifference to Interest
3. Skepticism to Conviction
4. Procrastination to Desire
5. Fear to Commitment
Written on September 23rd, 2004 at 07:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Blogging for Change (4) - Scepticism to Conviction
This is the 4th installment of a 6 part series on blogging that brings about lasting change. Before reading on you might like to Read the introduction here.
Stage 3 - Scepticism to Conviction
Having got the attention and peaked the interest of your reader it is now time to help them come to of place of conviction. Scepticism might have set in by now and your reader might be thinking ‘this is interesting - but it doesn’t really apply to me’. This is where you need to convince them that what you are writing is personally relevant for them and that they need to take some action.
This might be the lengthiest part of your post and where you present your main argument or points. Try to keep your key points down in number and make them simple and easy to remember. Consider using lists at this stage which break down your argument into bite sized portions.
In this stage of convincing your reader it may be helpful to:
- provide evidence and facts
- begin to reveal a suggested course of action
- talk about benefits of the course of action that you are suggesting
- give some ‘How to’ points if relevant
- invite readers to begin thinking about how they might respond
You are the lawyer convincing the jury. Show them why your topic is relevant to them (reinforce the need) and show what they can do about it. Lead them to a point where they see that the need you raised earlier is a need that they themselves have and that they feel empowered to do something about it.
I find that in this stage that being personal can be useful. To share something from your own experience gives your reader a sense that they are not alone in the issue. Talk of your own conviction and encourage them to join you in a response. In this way you do not present yourself as an expert but rather as a fellow traveller inviting your readers to journey with you.
The steps in this process are:
1. Rejection to Attention
2. Indifference to Interest
3. Skepticism to Conviction
4. Procrastination to Desire
5. Fear to Commitment
Written on September 23rd, 2004 at 07:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Blogging for Change (3) - Indifference to Interest
This is the third part of a 6 part series on blogging that brings about lasting change. Before reading on you might like to read the introduction here.
Stage 2 - Indifference to Interest
Your witty, controversial, intriguing title and first sentence has grabbed the attention of your reader. They have made a mini commitment to you and are considering reading past the first paragraph. You’ve won the first battle of taking them from ‘Rejection to Attention’ but their filtering system is still on and your second task is to take them from ‘Indifference to Interest’.
At this stage listeners have given you their attention, but are somewhat indifferent to you and what you have to say. They are reading, but things are hanging in the balance, they are waiting to see if what you have to say is going to be of any interest to them. Will it be relevant? Is what you have to say worth them giving the next few minutes of their time to or should they go back to the search engine and find something else more interesting to read.
Give them a need to read more. If you want to bring about lasting change in your reader it is essential that they feel what you are writing about is relevant to them and their world. Think about the websites that have impacted you most over the past few months - more often than not they will be sites that meet some need that you have (whether explicitly or not) - perhaps a need for information, entertainment, community, inspiration etc.
Make it clear early what need your post will meet in your reader and you increase your chances of them reading on and being influenced by what you have to say.
You might do this by:
- Share a need you personally have had - people feel less threatened when someone else opens up about something that they too face. This builds trust between you and your reader.
- Telling a story that your reader will relate to. Better still tell half a story that will be finished later that makes your reader want to know what happens.
- Make a big claim that will, if true, have an impact upon your reader.
- Ask questions that highlight a relevant problem or issue - don’t give all your answers away yet.
- Make your reader a little uncomfortable about the issue you are posting on. There is a fine line here - tread carefully.
This task is about making your reader think ‘I have to read the rest of this’. Bring them to a point of wanting to explore your topic more because it has relevance to their lives in some way.
The steps in this process are:
1. Rejection to Attention
2. Indifference to Interest
3. Skepticism to Conviction
4. Procrastination to Desire
5. Fear to Commitment
Written on September 23rd, 2004 at 07:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Blogging for Change (2) - Rejection to Attention
This is the second part of a 6 part series on blogging that brings about lasting change. Read the introduction here.
Stage 1 - Rejection to Attention
The first task of the blogger wanting to have a lasting influence on readers is to get their attention.
In today’s world the average person is bombarded with thousands of competing messages daily. As a result most people have pretty good internal filtering systems (or crap detectors) to help sift out the junk and find the worthwhile. In a sense most of your potential readers will be in some state of rejection to your blog whether consciously or subconsciously. If you don’t work hard to make your post attention grabbing you will not earn the right to say anything that will bring about change.
Keep this in mind as you blog. Put yourself in your reader’s shoes - What would grab your attention when it comes to the topic you are writing about? What would make you want to read more?
Titles and first sentences are important attention grabbers. They act as mini advertisements for your post on the front page of your blog, in search engines and news aggregators. Keep them simple, punchy, informative and get to the point.
Don’t fall for the temptation to trick your readers just for the sake of getting their attention. A title like Sex Tips on a post about your pet rabbit might get attention of your readers but it will not keep it - in fact it is likely to deepen their sense of rejection to your blog.
Some other things to try to gain attention in your title or first sentence or two might be to:
- Be a little controversial (be careful with this - don’t just be controversial for the sake of it unless you are willing to deal with the consequences)
- say something puzzling (but don’t keep your reader in the dark too long or you’ll frustrate them)
- make a claim (tell your reader the answer to a question that they might have)
- talk in terms that your potential readers will relate to (don’t be arrogant - be personable - be relatable)
- use humour (if you make someone smile or laugh you are part way through their filtering system).
- ask a question that draws your reader into your post and makes them want to respond
- intrigue your reader - tempt them by dangling something that will somehow draw them into your world.
Lastly make your entry Scannable and easy to read. If your entry looks like hard work to read you are unlikely to get many readers attention.
Work hard at getting the attention of your reader and you’ll be one step closer to having some lasting impact upon them.
The steps in this process are:
1. Rejection to Attention
2. Indifference to Interest
3. Skepticism to Conviction
4. Procrastination to Desire
5. Fear to Commitment
Written on September 23rd, 2004 at 07:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Blogging for Change
Why do Bloggers Blog?
Is there some underlying thread of motivation that we all share?
This is the introduction for a 6 part series on how to blog in a way that brings lasting change.
Each blogger writes for their own unique set of reasons and motivations. Some do so as a hobby, others to express their creativity, many to share their views, some as a therapeutic way of getting things off their chest and a few as a means of income. The combinations of reasons for blogging will be as many as their are bloggers. In my opinion this is good - as humans we are each unique and blogging should and does reflect this.
One of the underlying motivations of many (if not most) bloggers have is that they want to bring about change.
Perhaps a slightly different way of putting it is to say that we seek to have ‘influence’ through blogging. As I reflect upon this I suspect that it is a common thread of motivation that runs through most blogging genres. Lets consider a few:
- Political bloggers often seek to influence their readers minds on particular issues by arguing their points from their own political perspective.
- Business bloggers seek to bring about change in buying habits of their potential customers.
- Religious blogging seek to bring about change in the lives of individuals (and the world) through their posts on their take of spirituality.
- Techie bloggers seek to influence what us gadget obsessed readers spend our dollars on. In reviewing products they help shape our buying habits and bring about change of attitudes towards brands.
- Personal bloggers seek to influence the lives of their readers also - whether it by recommending books, movies or sharing their experiences of life in ways that challenge us to see the world in new ways. Even the jokes, polls and quizzes that permeate most personal blogs seek to bring about small changes as they entertain or make readers have a giggle.
Of course I’m making some gross generalizations here but the list of ways bloggers seek change or influence could go on. The change bloggers ranges from wanting to influence individual readers through to wanting to bring about change on a regional or global level. Some of us, if we’re honest, probably even blog because we seek change in ourselves and find the blogging process helps us think through our identity and lives.
For some bloggers the change or influence that they seek to bring about is explicit, spelt out and somewhat self serving, for others its subtle, unconscious and has no strings attatched.
So how can we be more effective influencers or change agents through our blogging? Over the next few days I’ll be writing a series of five posts on the topic of blogging that brings about lasting change. It is a simple communication tool that I was taught years ago in a public speaking class, that I have adapted to the medium of blogging, that goes through a process of 5 challenges that a communicator faces when attempting to bring about some sort of lasting change in their reader or listener. It is a tool that I’ve used extensively in preparation for speaking and teaching but also more recently in my blogging.
In adapting it to blogging it is not the perfect tool that will suddenly make our blogs A-list blogs that change the world - but I hope its of some help. Feel free to add your thoughts, suggestions and comments as we go along.
The five tasks in this process are:
1. Rejection to Attention
2. Indifference to Interest
3. Skepticism to Conviction
4. Procrastination to Desire
5. Fear to Commitment
Written on September 23rd, 2004 at 07:09 pm by Darren Rowse
How Blogs Work
How Blogs Work in 7 Easy Pieces is a great little piece that explains in easily understood language the steps of blogging and RSS. It even has pictures!
Written on September 23rd, 2004 at 07:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Blog Tip - Blog/RSS Promotion
So you’ve got a blog, it is looking good, the design is working and your content is stimulating - now you’d like to spread the word on what you have to offer, after all blogs are designed to be read! How should you get the word out?
Well you’ve probably already read my Blog Tips series (there is 45 tips listed there) - especially the Finding Readers mini series.
Your next port of call should be RSS Top55 - Best Blog Directory And RSS Submission Sites. This article has 55 (actually they are now 64) places where you can submit your blog’s URL and RSS feed. They range from search engine’s to blog specific engines, to blog directories, to blog review sites. It is the best collection of resources I’ve seen collated in the one place to date. Note that you’ll have to have an RSS feed for most of them to be of any use to you - if you don’t know about RSS check out this article on RSS for a great introduction.
To submit to all of them will take you an hour or so, but in my experience the key to being read is to try a multi-pronged approach - this approach has 64 approaches so it might be an hour well spent. RSS won’t guarantee you huge hits, but its an increasingly important part in the puzzle to having your thoughts read by others.
Written on September 23rd, 2004 at 07:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Well Designed Weblogs
Well-Designed Weblogs: An Introduction is a great series of posts about… you guessed it - Well designed Weblogs.
As part of the series are two volumes of well designed weblogs - aptly named Volume 1 and Volume 2 ( I wonder what they might call the third one?!).
Seriously - there are some beautifully designed blogs in the collection and some good advice in the introduction.
Written on September 23rd, 2004 at 07:09 pm by Darren Rowse
10 Ways To Make Money Blogging
10 Ways To Make Money Blogging is an article written by a blogger who is making a bit of money on the side of his hobby. Whilst I probably don’t see eye to on a political spectrum with John, he does speak some sense when it comes to blogging. His writing reminds me of my own post on Blogging for Dollars
John takes a look at a variety of methods that people use to make a dollar through blogs - here is his headings (you’ll have to head over to Right Wing News to get the meaty bits.
- Amazon
- Banner Ads
- Blog Ads
- Button Ads
- Donations
- Charging for Content
- Freelancing
- Fundraisers
- Popups/Popunders
- Text Ads
-
enternetusers Sponsors
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- When the blogging stops…
- Ecto Problems
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- Blogs Are Business Support Tools, Not Direct Money Makers
- Nellie Reaches her Goals
- Blogger Routines
- Helping Nellie
-
- When the blogging stops…
- Ecto Problems
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- Blogs Are Business Support Tools, Not Direct Money Makers
- Nellie Reaches her Goals
- Blogger Routines
- Helping Nellie
-
- When the blogging stops…
- Ecto Problems
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- Blogs Are Business Support Tools, Not Direct Money Makers
- Nellie Reaches her Goals
- Blogger Routines
- Helping Nellie
-
- When the blogging stops…
- Ecto Problems
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- Blogs Are Business Support Tools, Not Direct Money Makers
- Nellie Reaches her Goals
- Blogger Routines
- Helping Nellie
-
- When the blogging stops…
- Ecto Problems
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- ecto for Windows 1.5
- Blogs Are Business Support Tools, Not Direct Money Makers
- Nellie Reaches her Goals
- Blogger Routines
- Helping Nellie
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