10 signs you are a naïve blogger
Everyday, many bloggers are making a lot of mistakes when it comes to blogging. However, these bloggers keep making such mistakes on a regular basis, while feeling proud, because they notice many other famous bloggers doing the same thing. Because of such mistakes, many bloggers tend to be naïve in the world of blogging, since they do not understand the concept of blogging, and the impact their blogging has on their blogs and the blogosphere. Making money through a blog does not guarantee that one is a professional or a mature blogger, so I believe it can be good for us to realize certain things that may make us naïve in our blogging efforts.
Following is a list of 10 signs of naïve bloggers that Ronald helped me create. These signs can be present in many people and do not guarantee that someone is naïve. However, if any of these points are the main focus of a blogger, or the focus of their obsession, then chances at that the blogger in question is more of a naïve blogger instead of a useful blogger, for the blog readers.
10 signs you are a naïve blogger
- Infatuated with Stats
Your blogging depends on checking your blog stats. If you get a lot of traffic on one day, your whole life seems happy. Otherwise, you feel depressed and may think that you are doing something wrong. For you, RSS feed subscriber count, site visitors, and similar numbers are more important than blogging or your blog content itself.
- Yearning for Comments
You write to get comments, even if what you write does not deserve any comments. You think about commentors not to appreciate them, but to get their comments on your site in order to get more comments on your site. You do not care if you get a useful or a useless comment; you are happy as long as you get a comment.
- Failure to Have a Back Bone
When you get criticized, you may feel like shutting down your blog. Just as in real life, there will always be people who may disagree with you. Same is the case with blogs; it is very easy to leave a comment that says “I think that’s stupid.” Be prepared; otherwise, you will not last long in the blogging world, which is fast becoming a very vicious, competitive place. You should probably figure out the Art of Reacting to Criticizing Comments, as you probably do not know how to react to criticizing comments.
- You are Blinded by Money Prospects
You blog for money without caring for readers. Period. You write in order to gain sponsors, and you write in order to gain readers who will click on ads. You value and thank sponsors more than your readers. Whether or not you actually ever earn money is a different thing, though you do not focus on what you offer to your readers. For you, the idea that you can try to make money signifies that you are on a noble path, and that you are a hard working person who wants to earn a living. The idea of making money blinds you with such a misconception.
- You Think You Will be Famous
Many bloggers simply focus on getting attention for the sake of getting attention, and if you are one of them, you will do many random, weird things, including posting random things to please people, just to try to be famous. You do not realize that being a real famous person means you do things naturally that result in someone noticing that you do those things, thus making you a famous person. You do not work on becoming famous. You work on doing important things that can make others believe that you are famous. You also do not realize that becoming famous does not mean you did something good; you could be doing relatively evil things, even in your own view, and getting attention. All you want is attention.
- You Think You Can Actually Make a Difference
We all want to do something in our lives, hopefully. Many people think that they can change the world or the blogosphere overnight. If you are such a person, you may be wanting to change things right away, without changing yourself first. Sure, it is not necessary to change yourself all the time, though if you do not know first hand what the change feels like, how can you expect to change the world, since you would not know how to achieve such a change. If your blogging relies on making a difference, you may be disappointed. Blogging in order to try to infuse an idea of a change in people is a much more realistic goal, as voluntary change is more permanent and more effective than an overnight, emotional, emotionally manipulated or forced change.
- You Think You Can Make People Change
It can be next to impossible to convince many people to stop drinking coffee. Yet, many people think that they can change the entire lives of others simply by giving them a lecture or two. Blogging in order to tell people that they are wrong and that they should change can be a sign that you do not know how human interaction works.
- You Blame Others for Your Blog Problems
If your site goes down, you blame your host. If the number of commentors you get on a regular basis goes down, you blame others for not linking to you enough. If your RSS feed subscriber base shrinks, you blame the blogging advice others give you. You never blame yourself. Every choice you make on your blog is your choice, so blaming others all the time for your blog problems is a very naïve thing to do. If someone forced you at gunpoint or threatened to do something, like shutting down your blog if you do not do what they say, then sure, go ahead and blame that someone. Otherwise, stop blaming and start thinking. Thinking while crying is better than crying and blaming someone else.
- You Rely on the Latest Blog Fad
If a famous blogger talks about it, you talk about it. If others are using the same gadget on their blogs, you want to use it on your blog too. You follow the trend simply because there is a trend to be followed. You do not follow things because they make sense. You follow things because you are naïve.
- You step on others to get ahead without realizing the political consequences
This may be surprising to you. If you use people for your own personal gain, you are probably a naïve blogger. You have to understand that using tactics to manipulate people may result in many people being blinded easily at the moment, but as time passes and new trends and views come to surface, more and more people will start realizing that you used them without appreciating them, or without giving them anything useful in return. You are naïve because you try to use people without realizing how such an action will be noticed by others. You simply want to use people and get away with it.
This list will surely help me focus on my blogging more. I hope such a list will help you also, by allowing you to identify similar traits not only in your own blogging style but also in others. Sometimes, a blogger may simply be naïve and may not want to hurt others intentionally. Other times, a blogger may be naïve because they want to use others and they do not think of any consequences.
What is your view on this? Do you agree or disagree with something? Can you think of more points that may be a signify someone being a naïve blogger?
Thank you for reading. 
(6 votes, average: 4.33 out of 5)
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( June 5th, 2007 at 1:35 am )
“If your site goes down, you blame your host.” Who should I blame then if my website is down, if not my host?
“Thinking while crying is better than crying and blaming someone else.” - wow, this is a very wise advice
I don’t quite agree with #10 point. I think in such a case the blogger is not naive at all, but is very well aware of his manipulative strategies, knows exactly what he wants and goes for it.
#9 also describes more people who can’t think for themselves rather than naive. Other than that, I agree with the rest
( June 5th, 2007 at 2:54 am )
Vivien-inspirationbit, thanks for commenting so quickly.
1 : Good question. What I was implying is that blaming the host will not do anything, as hosts do go down. One has to see if the host did everything possible to keep the site from going down, or to bring it up if the site did go down, and to communicate with the customer, the bloggers, during the whole process. Also, a blogger should keep backups or even make backup plans of things that can be done in case a host goes down. Blaming itself will not do anything, other than to explain to readers why they could not access the site, or to get compensation from the host. The blaming part itself can be turned into something different, like changing hosts.
2 : Thank you.
I am glad you like it. People think things like crying are very bad things. I think such things are only human; what one does while doing these human things is what is important and relevant.
3 : Regarding point # 10, that is a very good point. What I was also implying was people who do such things without covering their tracks, or without realizing how their actions will, sooner or later, come to light and how people will realize the real purpose of their actions. Being “manipulative” does describe such people, yes, and when such people manipulate others without thinking of consequences, they are probably naive in my view. Does that make more sense?
4 : You are right, point # 9 does describe people who cannot think for themselves and follow others rather than people who are 100% naive. In you view, can they also fall under the banner of “naiveness”, since they do not know what they are doing, and yet they think they may be doing the right thing?
Thanks Vivien for the comment and for letting me know which points you had different views on.
( June 5th, 2007 at 5:09 pm )
#11. You jam your tags with things that do not have meaning. This includes picking “hot words” from what technorati.com has in large print in their cloud. Also spamming the same word in different tenses to make those words appear more to web spiders. “Tag Jammers” are naive because because they do not see how jamming the sames words or using 20 words in their tags makes it harder for other to find what they were looking for.
I see your points in a number of ways. I’m trying to change some of the things that I was doing a year ago on mouseclone.com, before I started on 19incheswide.com. I’m doing my best to not jam tags for words that I might other wise list. Also I try to write shorter post, something that people can read and learn from in a short time, under 10 minutes, and try to keep my opinions brief.
Other than my lack of grammar and the inhability to be able to spell. I feel I have came a long way in blogging. I wish I got comments, maybe I explain myself well enough or maybe I just don’t write about things that people care about. I do enjoy looking at my stats page. At least I know that there are some people viewing what I’m writing and that makes me happy, but it doesn’t make me sad either if I don’t get any hit for a week.
All in all, I would say to any naive bloggers out there to just try and be more web friendly. Think about that you look at when you go to a website. I try not to include bells and whistles because they distract people from my content. People are there for the content, not for your advertising and not because you have a picture of yourself that changes every 5 seconds (my spacers), unless your are blogging about something that you created or something that you thought was cool, then a post about it is fine, just not in a side bar.
just my 2 cp worth.
( June 5th, 2007 at 5:32 pm )
Mark, thanks for coming and commenting, I really appreciate it.
I had not thought about tag jamming; that is a very interesting thing to know indeed! I have to watch out for that too. I am guessing it is the exact same as keyword spamming, only geared towards technorati?
Also, many bloggers do progress as time passes, and it is more than nice that you can identify the things you have changed while being on the journey of blogging. I like your mentality of enjoying stats, but not letting stats affect your mood negatively if they aren’t impressive.
That is a really good advice for naive bloggers. Bloggers simply need to think more and apply more common sense to everything, before they start following a trend or before they commit to something. Also, people are indeed coming to a site more for content, and not for looking at ads or irrelevant elements on a site that keep updating not because of usefulness, but because of being cool.
Thanks again Mark for this informative comment! I really appreciate it. I hope to read more of your views and comments.
( June 5th, 2007 at 9:47 pm )
I’m not certain all of these things are signs of a bad blogger, which is kind of how I read this. Getting comments is seen by many as a sign that a blog has value. It becomes a bit of a chicken or the egg situation. If no one leaves comments unless someone leaves comments there will be very few comments. I guess you can always ask friends to seed the ground but that is not really what I think most people are looking for.
There are so many blogs now that it seems hard for a new person to break into the crowd without a bit of self-promotion. I said this the other day - if you start from scratch every time you will never get to the level you need to be noticed. Just like starting a business. You can’t just open teh door and hope people find your store. You promote, you advertise, and you try to get your name mentioned until one day it starts to work. No one calls you naive they just see that you are inexperienced or new to the market.
I chose to start blogging as a way to open my doors to people who want to discuss business issues. It may be that the target audience is not out there. I will never know until I have been able to make myself visible (Everett Rogers’ rules for the adoption of innovation #1).
As for teasing Chris G. about drinking coffee - it’s a joke. Get over it. He found it funny. I did not force him to choose. I just suggested I would feel better if he used my donation for something other than coffee. (I hope you are rereading your #3 at this point.)
So let’s go down the list
I’ve been called worse
See response to #5
#1 - guilty - how do I know if I have readers?
#2 - guilty - feedback helps one improve
#3 - NOT guilty - but you are free to try
#4 - NOT guilty - Only Stephen King, JK Rowling, and John Grisham types make money writing
#5 - could happen - I could hook-up with Lindsay Lohan and my blog #s would skyrocket. (Hey there’s your gratuitous name drop)
#6 - guilty - I already have
#7 - guilty - See #6
#8 - NOT guilty - Not my system, not my fault, but in either case not anyone else’s business
#9 - NOT guilty - See #8
#10 - NOT guilty - I hope but maybe I have unintentionally. If I comment somewhere it is because I feel I have something to say. Isn’t that what blog comments are for? To comment on the post? If you don’t like the comment or it appears to be spam you can delete it.
#11 - Maybe now and again to make a point.
( June 5th, 2007 at 11:06 pm )
Roger Anderson, thanks for the comment. Wow, my response is going to be pretty long too.
I agree; I didn’t mean to imply that such points guarantee that someone is a bad blogger. I think such points, when taken too seriously or focused upon more than other things, can result in someone being very naive. Also, being naive does not mean a bad blogger, but a blogger who probably needs to learn a lot more about the blogging world. Of course, being naive or very mature is all relative too.
You are right; it is very hard these days to get into the top list, specially if one is a new blogger. You need to work on your blog. However, even if no one calls someone naive, the signs of naiveness are there. For example, take myself: I sometimes think I can really make a difference in both the blogosphere and many online people’s lives, in a very good and positive manner. I have already done a lot, according to many people and agencies, in the offline world, though in my own view I feel being naive as I am aiming for something which seems unreachable. Online also, I am succeeding on many levels, while doing even worse than failing on many other levels. Why can such a thing be naive? Because I am putting my hopes in something that depends entirely on other people’s willingness to change. Of course, such a labeling is relative. However, if I become obsessed with it, by only preaching to others and telling them that they are wrong and should improve, I have a problem on my hands.
Hmmm, I am not sure where Chris G and his coffee example came from. Can you elaborate a bit more please? I reread number # 3, and unfortunately could not figure out or remember what you were referring to. I apologize!
Regarding the list, thanks for breaking it down.
Here we go:
1 : What I meant was obsession. I know bloggers who will stop answering phone calls or even interact with bloggers that they linked to, if some of their posts do not bring in enough views. Finding out stats is fine; I do it almost every few hours. However, letting my blog stats affect my interaction with others negatively when others have no part in it, or even others directly, is something I consider to be bad.
2 : Again, feedback is good. However, focusing on the number of commentors, as many blogs today too, proves to be unfair to people who seldom leave comments, but when they do, their comments are of excellent quality and usefulness. For this point, I would consider blogs who reward top comments, regardless of the comment content, to be people who are probably naive.
3 : That is why I wrote my other post about reacting to criticizing comments. It can be a very hard thing to do.
4 : heh, good examples. What I meant were also prominent blogs that make money directly or indirectly. There are dozens of blogs that already make money through writing, since they put ads on their blogs or link via referral links.
5 : I was thinking more of a John Chow or someone similar clone/wannabe while also aiming only for the prospect of money or fame and not caring about the readers used along the way, or something similar, but good example!
6 & 7 : Very good. Many people never think that they can do enough good and they keep trying, so it’s good that you are already satisfied that you have done a lot. Like I said above, I have my own level of trying to make a difference, and my goals are a bit different. I know I haven’t done enough, since I see no major changes on many things and mentalities that I am focusing on. So far, everyone has their own relative opinion whether or not such goals are realistic, or whether I am being naive and wasting my time. I am giving my own example to give an idea on how a person, who falls under this point/category, may be acting like.
8 : Good point. As I explained to Vivien above, it was the point of simply blaming and not doing anything, and repeating the cycle and affecting others around us, that I was pointing to. If someone blames me for something I didn’t do, it becomes my business since I am being forced into a blaming game, and I do not like being blamed for something I didn’t even know existed.
9 : I use MyBlogLog because it brings in visitors, though almost everyday, multiple times during the day, I see my blog loading slowly or halting because of MyBlogLog/Yahoo servers taking a long time to load images.
10 : I should have explained this more. What I meant was using other people for business means. For example, I hire you to do some contract work and then in the middle, I simply cancel the entire contract, not paying you anything, and all your current work going to waste. I, in the beginning, rely on any friendship or trust I may have to make sure you sign or depend on no contract but a verbal agreement, allowing me to use you and then simply move on by saying “Sorry, next time.” Or, I come online and bug you from time to time, asking you to look at my post or vote for my site or rate my site, yet in return, I make promises to help your site but keep “forgetting.” Even making people comment a lot in order to give an illusion of a reward or some great content, and in the long run, not providing anything useful deliberately, is manipulation in my view. I was thinking something along those lines. Does that make sense? I was not referring to the concept of commenting at all; sorry if it sounded that way.
11 : I didn’t get this, sorry. Could you explain a bit more please?
Thanks again Roger. I am glad you took the time to point out those issues. I am rethinking about many points in this post already, in order to explain and elaborate them more some time.
( June 6th, 2007 at 1:00 am )
Eeeee.. My comment will be hella short compared to the previous ones, heh.
A few of them don’t apply to me very much (they would if my site was as successful and big as I’d like it to be, but I know it’s not because of the effort that I myself have not put in).
I think #1 and #2 everyone must think about… unless one’s blog is purely for their own diary, and do not care for comments or hits. They may have 0 hits, as it is just for them only. But I don’t know many sites that want no hits or commenters (or perhaps I just haven’t seen them, as if they do not care for hits or comments they may not interact with other sites). Do you know what I mean?
Well, I would like more hits and commenters, and expand my online network… but I don’t mind. I know I could achieve this, but I don’t because I know I will be one of the blogs that die and become in-active and no longer continues exchanging comments…
I think a couple of your other points are very valid for inspiration to create a great blog… as in, I want to create a great successful blog and on the way, I will also do/become this (well, not forget the ones who’ve helped you, but perhaps become famous or make a difference). Though one should not make a blog simply for that intent.
How about personal blogs, that blog daily (or once in a month) about really unnecessary things that you can’t comment much about, join billions of listings and link exchanges, don’t interact much with other web-owners and bloggers, and expect the readers, viewers and stats to roll in? I’ve seen a few of those… especially the geocities/piczo/myspace types. Piczo/Pizco whatever it is, was bigggg in my school recently… everyone made one, they all looked bad as they were drag and drop sites with tons of ads, and all the same content… about me, my friends, tons of links to other friends with the same thing.
( June 6th, 2007 at 2:39 pm )
Jess, I don’t think it’s that short, which is good!
Thanks for the comment.
I personally do not think you are a naive blogger. Yes, the first two points, stats and comments, are something almost everyone who wants almost any kind of traffic should think about. I know what you mean, yes.
Good point about not forgetting the ones you helped you [kind of what I was saying in the other post also], and you are right: for the benefit of the readers, one should not blog simply to become famous.
The personal blogs you described in your last paragraph; many bloggers fall into that kind of a category, even if they are not personal bloggers. I was not aware of Piczo until you mentioned it; it seems to have a lot of young high school students as its members. I am guessing it is a more concentrated, specialized version of Myspace? I am also guessing you do not use Piczo.
Thanks!
( June 7th, 2007 at 8:51 am )
I guess that I should feel totally guilty about this, but this is going to be truly, genuinely short!
Stats at #1 and the latest gadget at #9, when taken together, are possibly the clearset indicators of the extremely naive blogger.
That is, the blogger who puts the latest technorati gizmo (as an example) on their site because it seems that it is the thing that the ‘in’ bloggers are doing, despite the fact that said gizmo shows a grand total of three visitors a day!
That is very definitely sending out the wrong message, but it is amazing how many times you see it, often accompanied by a plaintiff message bemoaning a lack of visitors!
I’m never sure whether it would be cruel or kind to send a brief ‘take that down NOW’ message.
What do you think?
Steve
( June 7th, 2007 at 1:00 pm )
Steve, thanks for the reply. You don’t need to feel guilty at all.
Those two combinations of being obsessed with stats and latest gadgets do indeed signify trouble in many cases. I also wonder about stats being shown on blogs when there aren’t that many impressive stats to be shown, unless the bloggers in question are proud of whatever they may have.
Yes, I have seen people complaining about not getting enough visitors, and at the same time, they show the stats which clearly shows that a blog is not receiving any visitors. I wonder if such bloggers have a principle where they want to show the stats, and at the same time, they want to tell the world that their principle isn’t working, because of not having that many blog readers or commentors.
Well, sending such a message shouldn’t be cruel, if done politely, like “Maybe you can replace that with…” or “Maybe you can wait until you have a lot of visitors….“, or something similar. Some bloggers might feel offended, as they consider their sites to be very dear to them, even if they do not value the readers, and telling them to change their site in any manner may cause them to think you are showing off. Could that be a good thing to learn and practice: telling others politely how to change their blogs?
Thanks for the comment Steve, that was a good question. I really appreciate it.
( June 15th, 2007 at 6:59 am )
I’ve been thinking about a similar topic lately, not quite the same but related. It seems there is a very popular type of blog right now, one that seems to generate a lot of traffic right now and that is the blog about blogging. Or the blog about making money blogging, essentially problogger.com and its million copies.
This seems crazy. But it appears (at least from the outside) that the most successful topic to blog about is how to blog or how to make money blogging.
This seems immediately traffic self limiting.
I’m not sure how that specifically ties in, it just seems to.
( June 15th, 2007 at 7:00 am )
forgot to click the notify via email link.
( June 15th, 2007 at 10:09 pm )
Greg O’Byrne, thank you so much for visiting and for your comment. I am really grateful!
Yes, making money, blog traffic and talking about how bloggers can make more money or get more traffic is something that is getting a lot, if not the most, attention. It’s very funny: most people make money by talking about how people can make money. Isn’t that interesting? I like your use of “its million copies”; yes, more and more people daily are trying to copy ProBlogger. I am thinking everyone is under the illusion that if someone digs up gold at point x, someone else will also dig up gold at point y.
Now, there is nothing wrong with copying in certain manners that the original idea thinker approves of. However, copying because someone else’s idea works and one does not want to think of anything to sell, results only in copycats who earn a little bit every month and drooling at the prospect. No one is coming up with an actual product to sell, but just an illusion: you come to my site, I’ll tell you how to make money, I’ll make money.
One question: you said “This seems immediately traffic self limiting.” Could you explain a bit about this please? Thank you.
Yes, it does tie in, if I understand it correctly. Thanks Greg, again, I really appreciate your input on this!
Also, good thing you did that [to get notified by e-mail]. Sometimes I forget to do that and then months later I visit a site to find out someone had responded to me.
( June 18th, 2007 at 8:32 am )
By self limiting I mean that you are painting yourself into a niche that can only be “so” big. There might be bigger niches to focus on.
( June 18th, 2007 at 8:06 pm )
[edit: I had misspelled your name earlier; my apologies!]Greg, thanks for clarifying. Indeed, if one goes after a niche, I think it becomes really hard to give up that niche and aim for something else, for the sole reason of finding something bigger. I wonder if personal blogs and personal bloggers are exempt from this, maybe, as they can switch niches while still maintaining a unique person touch on things. What do you think?
( June 20th, 2007 at 1:32 pm )
Oops! My mistake, I misspelled your name, Greg, in the last comment. Sorry.
( March 10th, 2008 at 11:21 am )
I am glad I stumbled across your site! I have just begun 2 new blogs so I will have to bookmark this and keep it for reference