Blogging for Change (3) – Indifference to Interest

This is the third part of a 6 part series on blogging that brings about lasting change. Before reading on you might like to read the introduction here.

Stage 2 – Indifference to Interest

Your witty, controversial, intriguing title and first sentence has grabbed the attention of your reader. They have made a mini commitment to you and are considering reading past the first paragraph. You’ve won the first battle of taking them from ‘Rejection to Attention’ but their filtering system is still on and your second task is to take them from ‘Indifference to Interest’.

At this stage listeners have given you their attention, but are somewhat indifferent to you and what you have to say. They are reading, but things are hanging in the balance, they are waiting to see if what you have to say is going to be of any interest to them. Will it be relevant? Is what you have to say worth them giving the next few minutes of their time to or should they go back to the search engine and find something else more interesting to read.

Give them a need to read more. If you want to bring about lasting change in your reader it is essential that they feel what you are writing about is relevant to them and their world. Think about the websites that have impacted you most over the past few months – more often than not they will be sites that meet some need that you have (whether explicitly or not) – perhaps a need for information, entertainment, community, inspiration etc.

Make it clear early what need your post will meet in your reader and you increase your chances of them reading on and being influenced by what you have to say.

You might do this by:
– Share a need you personally have had – people feel less threatened when someone else opens up about something that they too face. This builds trust between you and your reader.
– Telling a story that your reader will relate to. Better still tell half a story that will be finished later that makes your reader want to know what happens.
– Make a big claim that will, if true, have an impact upon your reader.
– Ask questions that highlight a relevant problem or issue – don’t give all your answers away yet.
– Make your reader a little uncomfortable about the issue you are posting on. There is a fine line here – tread carefully.

This task is about making your reader think ‘I have to read the rest of this’. Bring them to a point of wanting to explore your topic more because it has relevance to their lives in some way.

The steps in this process are:

1. Rejection to Attention
2. Indifference to Interest
3. Skepticism to Conviction
4. Procrastination to Desire
5. Fear to Commitment