Conrad Hees’ Blog

The other day, as I was pondering the mechanics of a really good blog, a question arose in my head that was so fascinating that I could not seem to shake it. The question was:

Is there a formula to figure out exactly what your readers want you to write?

Wouldn’t that be absolutely great? If you could figure out exactly what your readers wanted you to write, you could have hordes of raving fans coming back over and over again, devouring your latest articles and subscribing like crazy, couldn’t you?

Well, I have good news and bad news for you.

After deliberating on the question for quite some time, I determined the answer:

No.

Not quite what you were expecting from such an ambitious title, was it?

Well, I apologize if I mislead you. There is good news, though. Fortunately, while there is no exact formula for figuring out exactly what your readers want you to write about, there are several different factors that we can examine and use to formulate an educated guess about exactly what type of content your typical reader would like to read, as well as what type of article format (how-to, list, case study, etc.) they would like you to put it in. A pretty damn good educated guess, too, I might add.

This article is will outline and explain my tips for using certain factors to determine how to give your readers exactly what they want, time after time.

Read the rest of this entry »

Have you ever wondered exactly what thought process a new visitor goes through when deciding whether or not to subscribe to a blog?

As I clicked around the blogosphere recently, looking for a few new sites to add to my feedreader, I noticed a mental pattern showing up that was happening in my mind effortlessly each time I arrived at a new site. 

I noticed that as I looked at a new blog, there were several questions that I would ask myself automatically as I pondered whether to subscribe or not.  As I became aware of this series of questions, it occurred to me that every other reader was likely asking themselves the same exact things when deciding if they were willing to subscribe to a new blog.

Then, it suddenly came to me: if I can identify exactly what questions a new reader asks themselves when deciding to subscribe, and then give them the ‘answer’ that they want from me, I will be able to convert a much higher percentage of new visitors into subscribers.  Then, I naturally wanted to help my readers do the same, so I decided to write a post about it.

The purpose of this post is to help you understand exactly what a new visitor is asking themselves when deciding if they should subscribe to your blog, and how to answer those questions in a way that will help them decide in your favor.

The Burning Question

As bloggers and marketers, almost nothing can be more important to us than figuring out exactly how to get new visitors to commit to a relationship with our blogs.

Since it is free to subscribe to a blog feed, it should be relatively easy to get new subscribers, right?

Wrong.

The truth is that it is not free to subscribe to a new blog feed.  In fact, it is far from it.

The reality is that each time we subscribe to a new feed, we are making an investment of our time and attention.  And as smart and productive people, we expect a return on our investment.

In the new Attention Age, we are so flooded with information, that we must be more and more discerning about what content we choose to invest our time and attention in. 

Therefore, the main question that precedes all others in a potential subscriber’s mind is:  Read the rest of this entry »