derick.in

Experience is the best teacher. But if you wait to experience everything and then learn, you are losing time, which is so valuable. So what to do? Learn from the experience of other people. So I am going to share some of my thoughts as a Stumbleupon user. So straight to the list.

1. Title does not match content. Everyone knows that to get a decent traffic from social bookmark sites, you have to write a very good title, that attracts people. They should click the title and come to your site. But when they come to your site, they should find it useful. They should get exactly what they wanted.
2. Take your readers for granted. If you think that you are smarter than your readers (yes, most of the visitors who come from Stumbleupon reads your content rather than just going through the page and then leaving to other sites), then you are gone. That is the start of your fall. DO NOT EVER TAKE YOUR VISITORS FOR GRANTED. If they have come to your web site and find good content, then they will come back and wait for your content.
3. Try to become what you are not. This is one of the widely discussed topics in recent blogs. This is very important. You should know what you are writing about. Do not write about something you are not familiar with. In case you are unfamiliar, do some homework and gain sound knowledge about the topic. Don’t write about a topic as an expert unless you are.
4. Offer stolen content or poor content. Although there are very less chances for a stolen content or poor content getting some fair amount of traffic, this type content will irritate your visitors. Think of a situation when the original author visits your page. He can report it to the search engines, and there are chances that you will get banned. Further, it will affect your credibility.
5. Float your landing page with Ads and widgets. I know people who fill their blog or web page with lot of ads and widgets. If your visitor see more ads than content, he will leave the site no matter what you write. Widgets are getting more and more popular today. But the fact is that they take time to load. So try to avoid filling your site with unnecessary widgets.
6. Have a bad theme. Whenever I think of themes, I remember some words I found in a popular blog ( sorry, I forgot the name of the blog) that your theme should look good for your visitor and not you. If your theme is not friendly, then there is no point in writing good content. If your theme hinders the readability of the blog, then it is time to change it.
7. Ask for a registration to view the content. Hey, are you blogging to collect email address and user info or to share your knowledge? This is one of the stupid things I have seen. I have seen so many sites like this. It is okay to ask them for email address for an email subscription. But in these days where everyone cares and talks about privacy, you may better offer feed subscription.

I feel that I could share some of my thoughts with you, which I think is useful. I would like to hear your opinion. Please feel free to comment or write to me. Contact information is given in the Contact Derick.