You task today in the 31 Days to Build a Better Blog challenge is to spend some time on a successful blog in your niche.
The purpose of this task is not to promote yourself on the blog – but rather to spend time watching, listening and observing how the blog operates with the goal of letting what you learn help shape your own blogging strategy.
There is a lot that a blogger can learn about spending time on other blogs (particularly those who are doing well). You can pick up all manner of ideas, strategies and tips both things that they do well that you might like to emulate but also things that they’re missing that could help you to differentiate yourself.
Here’s how I suggest you go about today’s task:
1. Identify a successful blog in your niche
You might already know of these sorts of blogs or you might need to do a little research.
If you’re not sure which one to choose head to Technorati’s top 100 blogs or Google Blog search and attempt to find a blog that is doing well on your topic. If you can’t find one that is exactly on your topic don’t stress too much – choosing a blog on a related topic will work too.
2. Take 15 minutes to do some analysis of the blog in some of the following areas
Content:
- What topics are they covering?
- What topics are they ignoring?
- What voice/style do they post in?
- How often are they posting?
- What level are they pitching their posts at (beginners, advanced etc)
Reader Engagement:
- What topics generate most conversation?
- What styles of posts seem to connect with readers best?
- What questions are readers asking in comments?
- What complaints do you see readers making in comments?
- What tools/mediums is the site using (eg: are they using Twitter, forums etc)
Design:
- What first impression does their design give?
- What have they done well? What have they done poorly?
- What Options do they give readers to subscribe?
Monetization:
if you’re attempting to make money from your blog this will be relevant as it will give you hints as to how you might make money:
- what advertisers are targeting this blog?
- what type of affiliate programs are they promoting?
Traffic:
You might also like to head to a site like Alexa or Compete to do some analysis of the blogs traffic levels. Is it growing, plateauing or shrinking. Alexa also gives some stats (not always accurate) on page views, time on site, sites linking in, bounce rate, where the audience is from (geographically), where people go on the site etc.
SEO:
If you have some competence in SEO you might like to check out how they’re doing in some of these areas:
- Who is linking to this blog? (use the link:www.blogurl.com command in Google to find out)
- What does their source code reveal about how they’ve set up their site
- If they have an open or unlocked stats package what can you learn from their stats? What pages are popular? Where does their incoming traffic come from?
Really the numbers of questions you could be asking is limitless but what you’re attempting to do with this exercise is to identify what is working well on the other site and what opportunities there might be to position your blog in ‘gaps’ that the blog is leaving.
When you do this type of analysis with a number of blogs in your niche you should begin to see some patterns emerging. Things that consistently work on blogs in your niche and things that perhaps you could do that nobody else is doing.
Two quick words of warning:
1. Don’t become Obsessed with what other Bloggers are Doing
A trap some bloggers fall into is spending so much time watching their ‘competitors’ that they spend less time actually building something of value of their own. This analysis is useful to do every now and again – but don’t let it become something that you do at the expense of other core activities on your own blog.
2. Don’t Copy – Be Unique
Another trap I see some bloggers doing is virtually replicating every aspect of another blog. While there’s a lot we can learn from others and lessons we can take from what others are doing – if you simply copy everything another blog does you don’t differentiate yourself and give potential readers no real reason to read you instead of others.
How did you go with your Analysis?
As usual – feel free to share what you learned from this task in comments below.
Join the 31 Days to Build a Better Blog Challenge
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Update – You can also share, discuss, and explore this Daily Task over at the forum: Day 4 – Analyze a Top Blog in your Niche
Want More?This task is a sample of one of the tasks in the 31 Days to Build a Better Blog Workbook – a downloadable resource designed to reinvigorate and revitalize blogs. Join over 14,000 other bloggers and Get your Copy Today. |
Funny, I just did a post last night about why I like to follow a particular blogger in my niche (weight loss). I wrote about it here:
http://tamikkarochelle.wordpress.com/2009/04/08/99-is-a-bitch-100-is-a-breeze/
The thing that I noticed about him is that he stays within only a few topics. (Reading older posts confirms this.) He consistently blogs about 3-4 times a week which I enjoy. (The challenge is assiting me in writing daily even if I don’t post daily.)
A thing of note: he doesn’t give real particulars of his diet. He has presented it in different posts, but it’s not a daily log of food. He even calls it “extreme”. That is where I would differ. I’d share particulars so that others can duplicate and I have a log of my actions.
The thing that sets him apart is that he has done something that few people have done or are willing to do. He fills the “dream” for many people in our niche: rapid weight loss.
He doesn’t whine either. I love that. I’ve found with many weight loss bloggers, there is a lot of pity partying. I know a lifestyle change is hard, so I work to write about my solution rather than my problem. We all know the problems already.
Task 1 to 3 done: http://www.se7en.org.za/2009/04/09/se7en-and-probloggers-31-dbbb but task 4 presents a bit of a challenge… I see all the best blogs in my niche have great design and easy access to past posts… I know that’s what I need… some way to make my archives quick and easy to get to… as for monetizing – I have no idea how to draw lovely sponsors to my blog!!! I approached two and the one said “we don’t advertise on the internet” and the second wanted to own my blog!!! So that’s what I am here to learn about!!!
I looked around and in my niche there are 2 types of top blogs.
The first is what people spend all day looking around the net and posting cool images and artworks that they find.
I don’t love the idea because I am doing my own work for myself and clients and don’t have time to search the internet for other peoples work. I don’t want to be another design magazine.
The second is that there is a group of bloggers working on the same subject. This seems to keep the blog fresh with images and inspiration.
To me this would be a great way to keep the blog fresh and exciting. But how do I go about getting people to join my blog?
Great article Darren.
This is something I really must do as I know other blogs are getting more comments and better conversions than mine.
Thnx darren for the inspiration and knowledge that u share to us, hm..after i read this article, i am very interest to join this cool program.
Regards
I couldn’t find a blog in my niche. At least nothing comparable.
What is actually great because I don’t get tempted to think about competition.
Thinking to much about your competition can withhold you from being creative for yourself. Look at the values you can create for yourself and so now and then take a look how other blogs are doing.
By looking around in the blogosphere in it’s whole, I recognize that I have to do a lot more with multimedia than I already do, like video and so on.
I found a successful blog (Technorati Top 100) in my niche and what I learned most from it was mainly concerning design.
The layout is clean, clear and simple – and looks ‘professional’. My blog looks messy and amateur in comparison.
Along with my posts I wanted to offer other fun/interesting/educational things on my blog to entertain readers.
But now I’m thinking I need to seriously overhaul how my blog looks.
Can anyone suggest a good-looking WP Theme that has parent/child page capability? (I had to change themes before because my previous theme didn’t have this – what a pain… I’m using Disciple now)
I’m really enjoying this challenge though – it’s really making me think about my blog and it’s… well… challenging!
Thanks Darren!
There are a lot of blogs in my niche, and there’s been some debate among them recently about what’s the best way to actually use an author’s blog.
My thoughts on the subject; namely that the best-beloved blogs are the ones that read like a journal rather than a selling tool; but the selling tool aspect doesn’t hurt, either. There probably is no “best way”, though there are several ways to do it wrong.
Great thoughts, again!
I also use Google Alerts to see what the competition is doing!
This is a great exercise, and something that I sort-of do regularly in that I’m always reading blogs in my niche (fashion, crafty businesses). I’ve noticed the best ones have tons of gorgeous pictures and offer the reader something – advice, where to buy cool stuff, or tutorials. I’ve been wanting to add tutorials to my blog forever so now I know I’ve really got to do it! I do have a slight advantage in that not many fashion bloggers care about the craft or indie business world, and vice versa. I’m sure there are opportunities for me to exploit the fact that I love both and try to blog about both “scenes”. Thanks Darren, I am learning a lot from this process!
I was surprised when I actually went about the process of contacting some of the leading bloggers in my field. They not only responded, but were very helpful and encouraging!
They provided me with information about their sites that frankly I’m shocked me.
Don’t be afraid to ask for help. Most big time bloggers love giving back to small and medium size blogs!
Hi Darren,
Well, this is one task that I have done multiple times over. My niche being technology and tips there are hundreds of better blogs to look at.
And learning from them I did make a few changes like add a RSS subscription button on the first page, add follow me on twitter links and much more.
I think a blogger must do this activity once in a while because for the ultimate success you need to aim at the top and see beyond it even.
Nice tip.
Best.
Shantanu.
http://www.threetipsaday.com
@threetips(twitter)
I have also a bit of trouble finding blogs in my niche “daily adventure” but I did find some adventure blogs, so I compared those.
It seems like I have a good start on my subscription options, but I need more ways to connect (Twitter, facebook, etc).
I like my theme, but had a few changes that I wanted to implement to make it a bit more user friendly… almost finished with my redesign, should be up over the weekend.
I need to spend some time focusing on getting more links. It seems as if every blog I review is better-linked than mine.
Take a moment and check out my blog… what are your impressions? I want to make it as good as possible and some feedback would be most beneficial.
http://adventure-some.com
Does anyone have any recommendations for healthy eating blogs by foodies that also happen to be scientists or have a science background?
I find that I don’t like many of the blogs because they talk about scientific studies without really knowing what they are talking about, which I think is really irresponsible.
I know of a few good ones, but would love to know if you have any favorites.
All I can say is wow. This bog is really getting my juices going. I must admit to being intimidated by the thought of a blog but as of day 4, i find that i’m coming around and even getting excited. (thanks to all of you.)
I made some good headway in the twitter area (vsberkeley) but I’ve still so much to learn.
I’ll be doing my day 4 assignment and submitting the result later tonight. So look for it.
Cheers,
BTW, anyone know of good blogs that speak against poverty and homelessness (and I’m not talking about the get rich quick schemes)?
Thanks again to all of you.
Interesting task. I’ve been reading lots of blogs in the arts and jewellery area recently as my blog is still fairly new, hence why I’m here! Interesting cross overs between the two areas when I analysed two top blogs which I might be able to incorporate into mine to bring a bit more cohesion. It’s quite clear I need to be brave and start showing my paintings in progress now. Thanks for this challenge, I’m enjoying it!
I have a lot more to analyze, but I’ve already found a lot of information.
Among them are a few things I already new I needed to improve upon (once I find the time) – more notable social networking/feed icons at the bottom of my post, logo and branding, and a better slot for the advertising space.
I have been doing some analyzing like this on my own, even before this post and have been working on improving my writing style mostly. Like I said, I have a lot more to look over and consider– basically the possibilities are endless with this extensive list you gave of examples and areas where I could improve.
I’m really enjoying this series–I do feel its really helping even by day 4!
A quick tip for all that have notice very nice designs of the top blogs. They probably didn’t start that way. Other than corporate blogs many start small – with simple designs and if they become popular and make a few bucks then they hire a designer to freshen up the look and make it Pop.
You can take a peak at your competitors start by using The Way Back Machine. It might show you where they came from, and where yours can go with some patience and hard work.
My number of readers grows daily. I don’t really follow any strategies, but I’m trying to stick for 1 post a day. What ever happens. This is for me a must. And I can see this in resulting steady growing traffic.
Even that my domain is French. I’m blogging in English… -:)
Hey Darren, from what I can tell, most of the sites that would be considered my competition in the Christian women’s genre are not getting very high page ranks. Does this mean my opportunity is greater in this area or that google doesn’t rank well in this area?
This is something that must be done more often! To actually see how those list posts are crowd magnets and so on. I’m planning to do this to several other sites too and hopefully learn something.
If you don’t know where to turn, http://www.alltop.com is a good resource for good blogs.
Another thing that struck me when it came to successful blogs was their locality – many of them cater to the audience from the same country or state the blogger is located in. Do all successful blogs have to start this way?
This is excellent advice! I especially like your point, “Don’t become Obsessed with what other Bloggers are Doing.”
I often find myself falling into this trap. I see myself doing more research than actual work on my own blog and I need to balance out the two.
I am just starting out and so I think focusing on the research at this point is good to help me shape my site(s), but I also need to begin focusing on building my own site(s) and understand that it will always be a work in progress and that I can’t plan every aspect out up front.
My field: Real estate in Central America
The top blogggers: http://www.revealrealestate.com/blog/5-real-estate-bloggers-in-central-america-you-should-follow
Why they are the best: They have a distinctive voice, they have credibility from direct experience in the field, they don’t just push out positive news but cover the ground objectively, they find a different angle to the news and they are timely – responding to what is new.
Darren,
I love the way you have set up this challenge.
It is all ready ‘doable’ albeit challenging
given my current other workload
and Easter coming up.
I so appreciate your love and care in this.
It truly speaks of a good heart!
Two of my three favorite bloggers combine exciting design, good writing, and a tasteful selection of affiliate links.
The third has all of the above except good design. His website leaves a devastating visual impression. Yet his writing gives me a rush of excitement & enthusiasm the articles of the other two haven’t matched. His words have touched my life in a special way.
Statistics & learning from external factors have their place but good writing inspired by joy & passion is what will really make a difference for us and our audience.
If your writing is a deliciously uplifting experience for you, everything else will take care of itself.
One step at a time.
Gently.
With dignity & self-respect.
Interesting idea.
I find that most of the really successful blogs are successful because they are able to not just write a blog, but also build a community. Readers not only read the blog, but read the comments and get to know other readers. They use the blog as a means to discuss, comment and argue over all sorts of issues.
One of the really successful horse blogs is fuglyhorseoftheday. She tends to write about controversial and heated subjects and ends up with a lot of lively discussion in her comments section!
Mary H.
http://stalecheerios.com/blog — a serial for positive animal training
i study my competition all the time. It looks like I can go toe to toe with any of them, but they’ve got several years on me whereas my blog isn’t even three months old yet. But I must be doing something right since My pr rank (5) means that even with my young blog I can and will succeed.
My niche: Economic/Financial Satire
My blog: http://www.gloombergnews.com
“top” blog I frequent: http://thereformedbroker.com
I think that in this entertainment niche, the reformed broker integrates pop culture with finance more than I do…
I need to work on this more and continue to spin the “real” economic news articles as I’ve been doing.
Question 31 DBBB participants (and Darren too):
What sorts of sites should I look at as far as personal/point of view/anecdotal blogs go… The main one I can think of is http://dooce.com/ but I’d love to check out other leaders in this “niche”.
Thanks!
Nadia P
Always good advice to monitor what other folks are doing to learn and grow, but be careful not to measure your success in relation to those around you. Be yourself, be unique, and the people will come. There are some SEO things you can do to get things flowing better – but once you have the groundwork laid out, you should be able to focus heavily on just putting out good, interesting, and relevant posts.
http://www.lifewithoutpants.com
My blog is on general aviation and I’ve been analyzing competive blogs and their traffic for over a month. Since my blog is meant to highlight my books and products–rather than to sell ads for other companies–I’m realizing that I need to change my focus from generating traffic to generating “the right traffic,” e.g., people who are most likely to buy my products. Time to redesign the site and change the focus on the posts.
I read other blogs in my niche and some that are similar daily. I know what I need to work on, as I have a critical eye for their work and mine!
That said I think I have a unique perspective and while I sometimes write posts inspired by other bloggers thoughts, I usually come up with what I want to talk about and use my own voice.
I know I’ll never copy anyone’s success, I just have to do what I feel is right and work hard on monetizing and producing good content and if I end up with a fraction of some of the big site’s readers I would be thrilled.
Again thank you for lesson number 4. Will give your insight more thought if I have already used those steps in my blogs. Sometimes with all the pointers, we miss on the most important ones. Thank you for the clarity.
Jason
http://www.internetmarketing.com-seemore.info/
i find myself trying to visit as many of the bloggers doing this challenge as possible, especially those who may be in my niche that are posting here. that’s been a little more difficult, but i’m finding some amazing people otherwise!
right now i’m scanning through alltop to find other blogs in my niche – it’s a great tool, if not mentioned already
Things I noticed about other blogs:
1. REALLY good content
2. A lot of inner linking
3. Contact Me form
4. Related Article Links
5. Post Titles that make you curious
6. A lot of list posts
7. Posting every 2-3 days
8. Guest posts
9. Giveaways
10. Series
11. Tags/Labels
12. Membership to other organizations/directories
13. Color
14. ReTweet/Digg Links
15. Humor
16. Headings- bold and color
Things I can do differently:
1. Writing from a Christian perspective as opposed to secular
2. List posts that aren’t just reasons but a step-by-step process
3. More humor!
4. Ask people to write guest posts
5. More series
6. Just keep going- I’m new but I’m doing well
I thought I had a real estate blog and after 3 months, discovered today that it is a neighborhood blog written by a real estate agent. What will I learn next?
Thanks, Darren, for the exercise to discover where I am and where I am headed.
My progress so far:
I re-wrote my “elevator” pitch and I think it tells alot now. This also helped me organize my links to other sites I enjoy looking at. I created a list post but I don’t know how successful that was or if I even did it right. Having a photography site where I post a photo a day and tell a little about it and myself, is not very condusive to a list. I sent a few links out to friends to a specific post and commented on a few other sites I have been looking at. I look at other photo blogs often to see what they are like and to compare other’s to mine. I am not quite sure how to find the top photography blogs. I am not having much luck with that. I have been noticing more views on my site but I think it is from these comments here! I will take them any way I can!
Thank you for all of your helpful tips and ideas.
I noticed yesterday in your comments, “the squeaky wheel does get the grease!”
I would like it if you could look at my site and let me know how I am doing, but I realize you are way too busy to do soand that is not possible.
Thank you!
I have been doing this for a few months now and believe it’s the best advice that can be given. The only stumbling block that I see is that we have to act on what we learn.
Time to get back to work on my photography blog!
This course is giving me the inspiration I need to take my blog to the next level.
Kevin’s Eclectic Photography Blog
One of the things that I’ve learned from studying the competition is that community is so important. Successful blogs in my niche always comment on other blogs and participate in forums in the same niche. I had a moderately successful blog last year, but I think it could have been more successful if I did these two things. Since I’ve started a new blog, I’ve incorporated these practices, and I have seen better results even though it’s still too early to tell since my blog is still new.
This is a great task. I’ve realised my blog is not really one of those avant garde fashion blogs, I’m just trying to keep it true to myself and my style. I will try and build something that is my own, it’s just taking a while to develop.
http://iwantyoutoknowit.blogspot.com/
Roy,
I am a health blogger too, writing about living with celiac disease, gluten intolerance and food allergies. Mine is such a niche that most blogs like mine are not in Alexa or top rankings.
It’s hard not to get caught up in what others are doing and get insecure! I try to just forge ahead and do what I do…
One thing I did when I started blogging (6 years ago) was to add a small image related to the post, in order to keep it from being all text. But when I say small, I mean 100×100 pixels, usually kept around 5KB so as not to burden people using dial-up modems.
Times have changed. This post here is an excellent example of a big, eye-catching, customized image.
it’s great post and very good ideas
thank you daren
My niche is music therapy. There are a few blogs out there (I have only found 5 so far) and all of us already have different specialities. But no one, yet, has “made it big”, so to speak. Maybe I can be first first? Hmmm…
When I started today’s assignment I thought that it would be pretty easy finding blogs in my niche of distance education. Most of the blogs that I came across were pretty spammy.
I wrote a post about it and will continue looking to see if I can find others in my niche that are doing similar things to what I am doing.
http://distancetips.com/2009/04/09/are-most-distance-education-blogs-nothing-more-than-splogs/
Done.
http://development.tobiasopdenbrouw.nl/post/2009/04/09/5-blogs-every-ASPNET-programmer-should-know-analyzed-(31-DBBB-4-method).aspx
I gave some love to codeclimber.net.nz cause I ran into it from BlogEngine.NET searches and on the 31-DBBB. And it’s valid.
4/4 for the challenges so far, thanks!
Nothing around exactly, but I did find one with a lot of similar themes
this person has been doing this stuff a very long time. But I picked up a couple of ideas. The whole process of not finding similar stuff actually galvanised me into learning a bit more about some “how to -” topics, adding a couple of gadgets to my site , and posting a prepared piece on Slovenia. I really must do something about links, and try not to worry too much about the shrouded mysteries of the many technical things others talk about.lol
I found one blog with in my niche, ( I’m not sure if thats good or bad) I also learned that my blog ranks 18,573,897 (the blog the question is out of how many). They rank 179,465. did see that they get very few comments (so I’m guessing that comments are not very important).