Jan
12
How to Write For New Readers
This is the first of a four part series on How to Blog Like Shakespeare. Stay tuned to see where the other parts are!:
- How to Write For New Readers
- How to Write For Regular Readers (at Remarkable Communication)
- How to Write For Expert Readers (at Productive Flourishing)
- How to Write For Three Audiences At The Same Time (at Copyblogger)
Whether you love or hate Shakespeare, you’ve got to respect the influence he’s had on Western literature. But today, we’re not going to sit back and respect what he’s done for Western literature – we’re going to see what we can learn from him about blogging.
One of the reasons that Shakespeare has been so influential is because his works are understandable at multiple levels; every mature reader can get something out of reading his works. This is no accident, though – he was first and foremost a playwright, so he had to craft his works so that people from the different levels of Elizabethan society would enjoy them. After all, they were paying to be entertained, not educated.
Shakespeare’s challenge, then, was to craft his work such that the uneducated, the educated, and the artists of the day would each get their money’s worth for a show.
While the differences between our readers are no longer drawn along lines of education, we still have three basic groups of readers that we have to think about: 1) new readers, 2) regular readers, and 3) readers who are experts in our areas. Our challenge, then, is Shakespeare’s: how can we write in such a way that each group gets rewarded for spending their valuable time and attention reading what we write?
We all write for new bloggers, so let’s start there today.
How to Write For New Readers
Every one of our readers is new to us when we start, but it’s easy to forget that our blog’s growth depends on a steady stream of new readers. To bring in new readers, we have to write approachable posts that don’t assume that they have some background knowledge of what we’re talking about.
The trick to writing for new readers is that they’re the least patient with our content. They might not know you from Adam, and unlike regular readers, they may not hold out long enough to get to the juicy part of our posts; they may also gloss over the subtlety in our writing. We have selectively conditioned blog readers to want to get the most value out of posts with the least amount of work and time, and it’s through that lens that a new reader views your blog.
The problem, of course, is that new readers only indirectly affect the growth of your blog. Having a high reader count plays a role for social proof, and new readers eventually become regular readers – the people who have a much more of a direct influence on the growth of your blog.
That said, writing for new readers is something you’ll always want to keep in the back of your mind because:
New Readers are the Easiest to Help
Since they’re new, sound content that helps them can give them a huge boost in their ability to do whatever they’re trying to do. Think about how much easier it is to teach someone how to add than it is to teach them calculus and how much more global benefit they get out of the foundational information than the really specialized information.
A simple way to help new readers is to give them suggestions and advice that 1) can be implemented quickly and 2) produces an immediate benefit. For instance, if you’re writing a post about how social media increases traffic, give your reader a quick action step that will increase traffic to her blog. Prompt her to compare her traffic stats before and after she implements the step so that she can see the effect – when she sees the difference, she’ll be happy, but she’ll also remember that you helped her.
New Readers Can Be the Easiest to Write For
The key word here is can – asking yourself simple questions about your area and explaining them is something that you can do pretty quickly if you’re in a pinch for content. However, sometimes we get so deep into our own area of expertise that we forget that other people don’t know what we know, and what we think is obvious and not worth talking about is not nearly so obvious and is worth talking about.
For instance, we bloggers often forget that people don’t know what RSS is since it’s something that we don’t think about often, so we say things like “subscribe to my RSS feed.” Apply the grandma test here, though: if you said that to her, would she have any idea what you’re talking about? When she hears “subscribe,” she probably thinks that she has to pay since you have to pay for most subscriptions. She also probably doesn’t know that the benefit of subscribing to your RSS feed is that she gets notified when you publish something new – for free.
Granted, you’re probably not writing for your grandma, but my point here is that something that’s so simple and obvious to you could probably bear to be explained. Answering “simple” questions or problems is easy to do, and don’t forget that sometimes people who aren’t new readers need to be reminded of obvious and simple things.
Let me be clear here: new readers may not know your area very well, but they’re not stupid. Your job is to provide value to smart people who don’t know as much as you do – not to show that you’re smarter than they are.
New Readers Help You Grow Your Blog
New readers present a great opportunity because they likely have friends that don’t read your blog, too, and it’s natural for people to share good stuff with their friends. If you’re consistently producing content that helps them, you’re fostering a win-win relationship between you and them: they win because they’re being helped, and you win because they’re likely to share your content with their friends.
Instead of thinking in terms of growing your blog one reader at a time, think about growing it one network at a time. Establishing a relationship with new readers is part of the way to establish access to their social network. The more access to hyperconnected networks you have, the easier it’ll be to grow and maintain the size of your blog.
Keep Bringing In New Readers
Every blog will reach a plateau if it doesn’t have people spreading its content, so one of your goals is to write approachable, helpful content that new readers learn from and want to share. You’ll reach a plateau because, for every new reader you gain, you’ll lose one. So, yes, you’ll always need to write for new readers if you want to grow your blog.
You don’t want content that people have to explain before they can share it, as that just puts up barriers to transmission. Ever seen one of those weird movies where you didn’t know how to explain it to someone besides saying that you liked it? Make it as easy as people to talk about your content as possible by writing in a way that’s approachable, useful, and relevant.
One of Shakespeare’s goals was to get as many people to pay to attend his plays, so he laced even the most serious of his works with comedy, romances, and action. The reason for this is obvious: everybody gets comedy, romances, and action, so people are entertained and will talk about the fact that they were entertained. Would Milton’s Paradise Lost be so lost upon many people if it weren’t so hard to get into and explain? I doubt it. As a Miltonesque writer myself, trust me: it’s more effective to write like Shakespeare.
That said, one of the non-secrets of Naomi’s success is that she’s both an incredible writer and an amazing storyteller. If she just had another boring business blog, she’d write information that was as boring as all the other business content out there. There are people who love that boring stuff – but I doubt you do. You’re here because she’s entertaining as hell, and, oh by the way, you learn about business while you’re laughing your fool ass off. That is, until she lets me guest post. (Just remember that it took her a while to find that voice.)
This is not a blog about blogging, so why should you care? The same principles that apply to writing for new readers applies to writing for new customers. And if you’ve been paying attention, you know how instrumental a blog can be for your business, so being a better blogger will help you grow your business.
In the next part of this series, we’ll talk about what regular readers want and discuss some ways to write for them.
Action Steps
- Find one topic on your blog and explain it in a way that people who aren’t familiar with it can understand it. Ask an 8-year old, your next door neighbor, or your grandma if they understand what you’re saying.
- Give a tip, suggestion, or advice that can be implemented by a new reader quickly. Make sure that they get nearly instant positive feedback for implementing your tips.
- Ask your readers to share your content with one of their friends.
About the Author: Charlie Gilkey writes about meaningful action, creativity, and entrepreneurship at Productive Flourishing. Follow him on Twitter to see how it does at the whole brevity thing.
(Okay, before I comment, I have to say that I love it that you’re “Dr Charlie” in the byline!)
I love this post, not just as a geeky English nerd who can imagine Shakespeare as the Zen Habits of his day…
I’m at the stage with my blog where I have some slightly longer-term readers, and quite a lot of newer ones. At the moment, I’m managing to keep both groups happy (I think!) but I suspect that, a year or two down the line, I’ll be watching the balance shift — and I’ll be trying to keep a foot in both camps.
One question — how do you offer quick tips without seeming a little patronising? In my latest piece, I had a “go and do this little thing” type tip for each section, but then I deleted them all when editing, because they felt a bit trite. This might be to do with my blogging style (and possibly my subject matter) — I tend to write long posts that put ideas out there, rather than ones which offer quick solutions.
Hey Ali,
You can present the tips as “Something you might not have gotten around to yet” rather than “Something you don’t know how to do”.
To use an example from my field, I know I should tweak my tags and titles for better SEO, but haven’t gotten around to it. I could read a quick tip on “5 minutes to slightly better SEO” and that would be worthwhile for me.
Catherine
The Dr. Charlie thing is all Naomi. Now I’ll really have to finish my Ph.D. this year or I’ll look even sillier than I normally do. (Thanks, Naomi! No, really.)
Quick question: did the tips I gave seem patronizing? Consider your own context. You’re a better blogger than I am, but did they give you something to think about? Hopefully, they weren’t patronizing, or I’m going to look really silly. See the paragraph above.
But I get where you’re coming from since we have similar styles. The trick I’ve learned is to distill the ideas into tangible, concrete things that show how the ideas make a difference. In that way, an Aha! might be even better than a tip…but an Aha! followed by a tip is even more awesome.
I also think you’ll like Part 2, How to Write For Regular Readers, and Part 4, How to Write For All of Your Audience at once. I’m building something up here. :p
This is a great example, Catherine. Thanks for helping out!
Thank you Charlie for monitoring my brain and knowing that I needed to read this now. :)
Thanks – I’m glad it was helpful. If you liked this one, you’ll definitely like the rest of the series, as they get even better.
That’s what i try in my blog — exactly to provide information for newbie in blogging by write all step that i do for my blog.
Aw heck, let’s quote Shakespeare: “Nothing can come of nothing: speak again.” — King Lear. No readership can come from giving people nothing. I might’ve been thinking about my posts as, well, posts, rather than exchanges. Thanks for this exchange. I look forward to the rest…
thanks, charlie. i’m a brand new blogger with 5 subscribers! WOOT! i was soo excited to see it. i’m really excited about finding a way to really help and inspire people and to find those quick hits that you talk about. i think the challenge would be keeping your readership, yes? wouldn’t they soon tired of that type of “low-hanging” fruit?
thanks so much for the post! great stuff!
Hey, we all had five readers once upon a time. And keep in mind that 5,000 readers is nothing to the bloggers at Copyblogger, ZenHabits, etc.
Yes, a segment of your readers will get tired of the low-hanging fruit, but that’s when you start helping them climb higher up the tree. Check out Part 2 for some ideas about how to do this.
Interesting approach for new readers; but quick question: In the post geared to new readers, is it cool to provide plenty of links to to older posts the new reader might find of interest? And if yes, should these links be at the end of the post or sprinkled throughout?
Thanks in advance for the help.
Alex
The short answer: yes.
The longer answer: Depending on the how long the post is, you’ll want to keep it to, say, 3-5 links, and another thing you might try is a related post plugin like YARRP. Plugins require some consistency in your categories and tags, but that’s a good thing for SEO and organization, anyway.
Very helpful post Charlie. I often find myself in this situation and assume I’m writing to other experts, but the real people that need to read my stuff probably don’t know what an RSS feed is or how to even get started.
I’m covering advanced stuff,and they’re still in phase 1. My only concern is how posts like this affect the veteran readers?
Only one way to find out.
Part 2 might help there, but keep in mind that people forget stuff, too. If you recommend 12 tips one month, the odds that people acted on all 12 is very, very low – so reminding them helps them all over again.
“You’ll reach a plateau because, for every new reader you gain, you’ll lose one” – That’s an interesting little thought, and after simmering on it for a good minute I figured it’s probably true.
Which lead me to my other thought… balancing this whole shebang can become a never ending nightmare. A creativity killer so be aware if you’re asking yourself shit like “oh, will this piss off this person or that person?”
Irrelevant!
Make it useful
Make it simple
Make it entertaining
Oh and follow those action steps… minus asking the grandma for an opinion on your blog if your writing is even remotely as colorful as mine. She’ll kick you ass.
Charlie, Charlie, Charlie. Please. My grandma has been dead 50 years and I’m one myself. I have my own business. I’ve worked at IBM, DEC, EMC and Lotus. I write website copy, I have an enewsletter, blah, blah. Good post . . . but I get so tired of people assuming that grandmas have no tech smarts. Or kick ass for colorful language. ;-) Where do you think the kids learned it?
“Grandma” here is a shorthand for a lot of people that helps them understand the idea better. Yes, you’re probably one of those badass grandmas that could drink me under a table, but you’re also an outlier.
And I’ve checked out your site enough to know that you’re rocking it because you’re an outlier rather than despite being an outlier.
Wana adopt me?
Thanks, Charlie. I probably couldn’t drink you under the table, but my favorite birthday card of all time was one from my daughter (now in her 40s) that said, “Thanks for the Attitude, Mom.”
Now my tech smarts just have to figure out why my avatar isn’t appearing anymore.
(signed)
The Badass Grandma
Hey Charlie,
Really a good post for New Bloggers ( Like me ).I will surely try to pen down these points through my future posts. Looking forward to more of such amazing work, and also looking forward to learn from it.
Thanks in advance for the help
Kunjal
Extremely informative article. Keep up the good work Charlie!
Dr. Charlie, I’ve read through all 4 parts of the series, and I love specifically this one and the one for regular readers! Definitely great tips for me and it gives me new ideas when I’m writing.
Already subscribed to your newsletter before looking at your “About” page. The point about “subscription” is a great point, since most people don’t use RSS (including myself). It’d be still important as more and more people are getting internet savvy, especially the next generation that is coming up after us.
I’ve used actions steps like yours in the past but decided to stop because I’d like to make it more informal. And sometimes I don’t because it’s not relevant to the topic, more like a thought-provoking post. Your post reminds me again to include action steps in the post somehow, since it’s actions that will determine someone’s success.
All the best to everyone!
Aged 12, at school I was introduced to Shakespeare via ‘The Tempest’, one of his more difficult plays, or so I am told. The experience effectively inoculated me against ever wanting to read his works again; as I was to discover at high school 4 years later, when ‘King Henry V, Part One’ was required reading for the UK School Certificate English Literature exam.
Actually, I was the only kid in the class to prefer the other required reading: the Middle English of Geoffrey Chaucer’s ‘Pardoner’s Tale’ and ‘Nun’s Priest’s Tale’. I soon latched onto the language (e.g. ’stywe’ = ‘brothel’) and much preferred Chaucer’s earthy style of writing to Shakespeare’s seemingly grandiose style.
Anyway, many thanks Dr Charlie; I shall take your excellent advice next time I put pen to paper (or rather knuckles to keyboard) for my readers old and new.