Saturday, January 3rd, 2009...4:39 pm

Why journalist bloggers should read other blogs and comment on them

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So you’ve started your blog, you’ve named it. Now you need to start reading. Yes, I said reading, not writing.

Now I don’t mean just sit there and read all day, but if you’re going to blog well you need to read news sites,  other blogs in your niche and techie blogs. And you need to engage in those sites by commenting and joining the conversation, particularly on the other blogs in your niche.

First, I’ll explain why you need to read so much and then why you need to comment.

Read, read, read

  • Read the news: This seems to go without saying that journalists would be news junkies. But often I find many journalists who haven’t even read the morning paper that they work for. That’s a shame. You need to be reading the major news sites, such as CNN and The New York Times; blogging news sites such as HuffingtonPost;  Romenesko, affiliated with the Poynter Institute; and your own newspaper’s Web site, regularly.  You can’t blog well if you’re in a tunnel and don’t know what’s happening in the world or in your community.
  • Read other blogs in your niche to see what the competition is doing. Fifteen years ago, when I covered City Hall in a small community, my newspaper had a feisty competing daily. (Actually, still does.) I would have been a fool not to read every day what the City Hall reporter from that newspaper was writing. Now if you’ve started in the newspaper business less than 10 years ago, it’s possible you’ve never worked in a two-newspaper town. But the premise is: You need to know what your competitor is doing to make sure you’re not missing something — either a whole story or key details. When you blog, your competition is other bloggers — both people who cover the same beat at other newspapers and blog about it and the quintessential nonjournalist blogger, typing away in his basement in his pajamas. Even though these blogs may originate outside your geographic area, the topics they cover may be relevant for your readers. (Plus if you know what other people are writing, you can link to their content, which will enrich your blog and help boost readership.) If you don’t know of blogs in your niche, type some keywords — education blogs — into Google; check out the Web sites of other newspapers; search on topical Web sites. ReadWriteWeb has 6 tips for finding the heavy-hitters in your niche.
  • Read techie blogs to learn the mechanics of blogging and SEO: I’m not trained in SEO, unless you include an hourlong session I took at work. But I’ve learned so much from reading blogging bloggers and listening to people way smarter than me. Techie bloggers (my term, by the way. Sorry if it offends.) aren’t journalists; they are people who know who to blog and understand how the blogosphere works. They get the value of linking and commenting and understand more technical stuff like trackbacks, referral traffic, monetizing. These are the experts in the field, who may make money off their blogs.  My must-reads: Darren Rowse, a blogging hobbyist turned pro who offers clear advice at ProBlogger and TwiTip.  ReadWriteWeb keeps me up to date with trends in technology and predicts where the Web is headed. Yan Susanto at Thou Shall Blog writes for beginning bloggers, and I can attest he doesn’t make you feel stupid if you ask him a super-basic question. I’m also a fan of KidTechGuru by teenage Xavier Lur, who blogs about emerging applications and explains things such as what’s twirl and how to use it. (Twirl is a way to use Twitter.)

Coment, comment, comment

  • Commenting helps you join the conversation: Blogging is a conversation, and you’ll get much more out of it if you engage. Imagine yourself at a party: How much fun would you have just sitting there listening and never saying a word or responding to a question. That’s why you need to connect. You share your ideas.  Other people read them and possibly respond to them. You may get ideas for your own blog through responses to your comments. And you’re part of the community, not just a voyeur.
  • Commenting can help you drive traffic to your blog: Technorati’s 2008 state of the blogosphere found that 77 percent of bloggers regularly use comments to attract traffic to their blogs. So if everyone is doing it, it must work, right? Well, sort of. If you comment on a blog, the blogger may check out your blog or even send you a thank you e-mail. Most times when you comment, you have to fill out a form that gives your name, e-mail and Web site, so the blogger can reach you. Other commenters also may click to your blog, especially if they like what you say (or hate it.) If you comment on blogs in your niche, you’re reaching out to an audience that’s likely to be interested in your blog. But it’s one tool of many, not the only tool, as Remarkablogger points out. There’s no guarantee bloggers or other commenters will connect to your blog, especially on sites that get hundreds of comments. But there’s a chance, especially if you’re among the first commenters on a blog post.
  • Comments will increase links to your blog, sort of: If you comment on a blog, it automatically links to your blog, giving you an incoming link in Google eyes (increasing your value.) Well, not always. As Thou Shall Blog explains better than I could: Your link will be indexed by Google only if the site supports DoFollow, but not if it’s a NoFollow site. The Blog Herald explains that if you have access to your blog stats, you can assess if you’re are getting referrals from comments. But some journalists who blog on their newspaper’s Web sites don’t have access to their stats. So what should you do? I’d say comment away and don’t worry too much about the NoFollow issue. Comments may help your ranking or not, but comments still have value in introducing people to your site and getting you to join the conversation. I wouldn’t spend my life commenting; I’d do it thoughfully and well. And whatever you do, don’t just spew out “great post” everywhere and say nothing more. Put thought into comments and say something.

You need to be part of your community — and by community I mean the larger world of your niche —  to write well about it. A favorite editor of mine used to have a sign in his office that read, “It’s the content, stupid.” That’s applies so well to blogging. Read good content, comment with good content,  write good content and use tools to reach readers.

My next post: What the heck is Technorati, and why should a journalist care?

– Gina

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