What Makes a Blog Successful?

Asterisk wrote about what makes a successful blog summing it up quite nicely.

A successful blog (or blogger) is…Well written…Frequently updated…Consistent…Open…Responsive…Well designed…Aware of its audience…Varied in topic…Personal…Thick skinned…Honest…Accountable…Funny

The comments from readers are even more exciting, helping to fill in the blanks of what makes a successful blog. Here are a few highlights I really liked:

Succesful professionals make better authors…People tend to visit because of link or because of your name/reputation. They’ll stay for the content…It comes down to content more than reputation I think, but I may be wrong…to be able to almost live outside my own life while reading about someone elses’…

I’d replace “Frequently updated” with “Frequently updated whenever you have something worth saying”. There’s nothing more likely to get me to unsubscribe from a feed than a lot of posts which are basically the author thinking out loud — and not thinking very hard at that…

…What you define as worth saying depends entirely on the scope of the blog, which brings us onto “Varied in topic? I agree that a curve ball now and then can be fun, but, as a rule, I prefer a blog to stick to a well-defined (possibly broad) scope and to concentrate on something they’re uniquely/unusually knowledgable about within that scope…

…A couple of notes that I try to stick to as best I can: Add visual elements to your post. In addition to trying to engage your readers with intelligent content, it helps to throw in an image every once in a while to draw them in…

…Interesting blogs are written by people who write about things that interest them, does so eloquently, thoughtfully, with humor and insight.

…A successful blog needs to have substance. It doesn’t have to be about Important Stuff, but there should be some actual depth to the writing, even if it’s just personal anecdotes. I don’t care about the mundanities of most people’s lives, so the blogs I return to are the ones that write about more than whoever someone is dating or whatever club they went to last night. If you’re going to publish a diary to the world, make it worth reading.

…I think far too often we, or at least I, judge the success of my blog by analyzing the stats. I had to get out of the mindset that I was going to write the next big, groundbreaking article and get back to stuff I enjoy. I have found lately that writing about subjects I am passionate about benefits me more than anyone, and if others like it, that’s gravy baby…

…Quality matters a lot more than frequency.

…most importantly for me, my writings are challenged by my readers. This encourages me to think, to redirect my thoughts and consider possibilities that I would otherwise have missed. I find the process extremely rewarding.

…Varied in topic, but consistent in subject matter? I am so disappointed when I receive notice that one of my regularly read blogs has new content only to find that it is an entry completely off subject matter. A blog should read like a magazine in my opinion. If it deals with Web design and/or development, just cover those aspects.

…The blogs I like are the ones filled with personality and insight. Some blogs are full of great information, but very bland. You could read that person for 6 months and they’d still be like a stranger. They want their blog to be Professional, whereas I’d like to see something more personal, something to connect to.

…This very post is a great example of what I think makes a great blog: it offers a unique personal opinion on something that’s fairly universally interesting, it’s useful, well-thought-through and well written. My favorite blogs all do this consistently…

…Hmmm, you forgot 1 thing. A blog that meets all these criteria can still fail to attract a large audience, and that is the secret ingedient. Getting people to spread the word, link to you, pingback you, and leave comments. Problem is, no one likes a self promoting blogger. I’m still looking for a solution to this one.

…I think that originality is also a large factor in a successful blog. If blog B has the same links as blog A then there is no compulsion to stay with blog B.

…I agree with everything you said and I would like to add one, although I guess you could say this goes under good design. Make sure your site loads quickly. More than half of us are still on dial-up. I generally will not wait longer than a minute.

…First and foremost, content rules. Then, we all might also go back the design basics we struggled with when putting up our first HTML sites: Eschew goofy backgrounds and the distracting clutter of rasping colors, blinking text, bells, whistles and obnoxious music loops. Carefully choose a font that is pleasant and readable, and that conveys a sense of the mood your site is trying to achieve while suggesting a measure of classiness and believability.

Profanity or obscenity are never a substitute for cleverness.

LEARN TO SPELL AND PUNCTUATE.

…I always look for a unique voice or style that expresses ideas and emotions. I can tolerate some simple grammatical mistakes if they are honest and not due to laziness…

…The two things that will make me move on are lack of posting and lack of feedback. In the first instance I lose interest in the site. The second issue makes me wonder why comments or guestbooks are active. Once I feel ignored I lose interest in the site…

So this is what they are saying, but what about you? What are the elements that make a blog successful? How do you measure that success? Is it a feeling? Blog stats and traffic? Ad clicks? Income? And what are the elements that make a blog better than another one? What keeps you coming back to your favorite blogs?

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Copyright Lorelle VanFossen, the author of Blogging Tips, What Bloggers Won't Tell You About Blogging.