Earning and Protecting Your Reputation

Reputation is Everything! 

Whether or not your brand is relevant to your content, it will quickly develop one relevant attribute: a reputation. Everyone who reads your blog will come away with an impression, either good or bad. They will like it or not.

Surprisingly, that’s not the most important issue for your Blog Empire, because no reader, not even your most loyal, is going to like or agree with everything you say. The important issue is whether that reader believes your blog to be important.

If a reader does not find a blog important, they will probably not return even if they liked a story or two: there are simply too many other blogs to see.

If a reader finds your blog insightful, entertaining, and relevant, they will return even though they may disagree with your commentary or don’t like your layout.

In order to be a serious empire, your blog must exude seriousness.

That doesn’t mean your subject must be serious, but you must be serious about your subject. For political and technology blogs, that means accuracy and timeliness.

Rumors must be noted as such. Opinions must be noted as such. You can be a partisan – in fact, your theme may be a very partisan view of something - but you’ve got to be fair to your readers, who will form an opinion about your subject based on what you say.

• If your blog is an art blog, you’ve got to focus on quality.
• If your blog features model trains, entries about your daughter’s dance recital will lose readers.
• If your blog is a reference or news blog, you’ve got to be thorough.

Once your reputation is established, readers will come to your blog to see what you have to say because they will expect you to know more than them. If you miss the big story or are shown by later events to be completely off-the-wall when you said you were certain, they may not return.

Reputation is everything, so as you build your Blog Empire, remember what you want a reputation for and consistently strive to earn it.

Branding Idea Generator

In order to come up with a few brand ideas to choose from, we’re going to perform a little brainstorming session.

It will involve picking words that relate to you and your content or your interests, and matching them with other words. As an idea generator it will be worthwhile even if you have a name and image picked out. After all, almost any idea can be improved, but if yours is already the best, this little exercise should prove that, too.

Repeat your theme Here:

Blog Theme: My blog is known and respected as the best place on the internet to find: ____________ _______________ _______________ _______________

Now, take a look at your key, content-related words and write them here:

1)

2)

3)

4)

Write your personal nicknames (if applicable) or a couple words that describe you here:

1)

2)

3)

Write five words or the names of particular objects or subjects you enjoy writing, researching, or talking about here (they need not be related to your theme):

1)

2)

3)

4)

5)

Now, go online to dictionary.com and look each up in the thesaurus, picking out unique synonyms or words you like the sound of.

Write them on a separate sheet of paper (you should end up with at least 30 words).

For each of those words, write two words that are related, like “captain – ship, quarters” or “car – hot rod, spinning wheels.” Try not to be too obvious.

That’s a lot of words, some of which will be related to your content, and some not.

Now, just play with them and combine them however you like, noting those combinations which sound powerful or – even better – interesting.

Change a few words to interesting but similar words (e.g. “pillar” to “pillage”).

Write down a few phrases (even clichés) that the words appear in. Just have fun with them! Then grab a half dozen of your favorites and just let them stew in your mind.

By the time you’re through with this course, you’ll know which one you like best or whether you need to start the exercise over, and you may even have dreamed up matching artwork for a few of them.

Branding – Developing a Name and Image That Will Stick With People

A Blog Empire has many subjects but only one theme.

Every empire has a name. It may be regal enough that “Rome” says everything there is to say. It may try to ride off the success of others, as the “Holy Roman Empire” attempted in the Ninth Century.

Whatever name you choose, however, will establish your brand. It will be the name that people remember, and it will be with you forever. Think it’s not important? Just imagine what would happen to Coca-Cola if its name was changed tomorrow to Sparkie’s Soda. Would you still buy it even if it tasted the same? Would they still be the most popular cola in the world? Their name, built carefully for more than a century, is the most valuable asset they own. Your brand will do the same for your Blog Empire.

Need Brand Be Relevant to Content?

The question immediately arises whether your name needs to be descriptive of your content, and the answer is, unfortunately, “maybe.” Sometimes it helps, as no one going to Red State would expect anything other than GOP-friendly commentary. The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler is descriptive of both commentary and style. Post Secret says everything there is to say about the blog.

On the other hand, many successful blogs have names that are simply memorable. Little Green Footballs, with more than 100,000 visitors a day, is a political blog concerned with the War on Terror. BoingBoing describes itself as “a directory of wonderful things.” Both have memorable names; neither has a meaningful one.

Develop a Blog Theme

Every successful blog has a theme - the idea or subject your blog is about more than anything else - that makes it a go-to site in the minds of readers. In order to make your blog a success you must be able to contribute something unique, and that something is going to make up the theme of your blog.

It might be a comical take on the news. It might be in-depth tutorials for a certain software package. It might even be rumors you hear in your daily job as a top-level political analyst. It may be short stories or fascinating photographs. But you have to find that certain something that only you can contribute and that people want to read or see.

Your blog’s theme can be summed up by what you want you blog to be famous for, the one unique thing your blog presents or contributes.

Pick three or four key words that describe your content and your presentation of it, based on your skills, abilities, and knowledge (e.g. “satirical partisan political commentary” or “sentimental love poetry”).

Then complete your theme:

Blog Theme: My blog is known and respected as the best place on the internet to find: ______________ ________________ _____________ ____________

Assess Your Skills and Knowledge:

An Honest Self-Appraisal

Next, we’re going to examine some skills that are necessary in order to create certain types of blogs. Be as honest (even as harsh) as you can in your self-appraisal.

*Remember, if you really can’t write well, your readers are going to know. If you can create first-rate artwork, now is not the time to sell yourself short.

1. I can write: very well / pretty well / are you kidding?
2. My writing has been published by others: Y / N
3. My sense of humor can be described as: dry / sarcastic / ironic / witty / are you kidding?
4. I can write well in the following languages:_________________________________
5. I can program computers using the following languages:______________________
6. I have written computer programs that are in use by others: Y / N
7. I can create professional quality artwork: Y / N
8. I have used the following graphics packages:______________________________
9. I have taken the following arts or graphics classes:__________________________
10. My artwork is currently being used by others: Y / N

Extra Credit:

1. I’m consistently surprised that people ask my opinion about:___________________________________________
   I have a million stories about:___________________________________________
2. I know more than anyone else about:_____________________________________
3. People would pay for my knowledge about:________________________________

Now, look over all your answers and pick the category where most of them fit best:
__Artistic __Business __Hobby __News __Political __Rant
__Society/Culture __Spiritual __Other:______________

For example, if you are passionate about technology and know more than anyone else about RS-232 serial interfaces, then a technology blog may be the beginning of your Blog Empire. If you are fanatical about gun rights or racism or personal privacy, but can’t write, then a news or reference blog may be right up your alley. If your skills overlap multiple categories, that’s ok as well.

You may be able to create a category that no one else has tried! But pick your category carefully:

• The success of your blog empire is going to depend on whether you can consistently offer your readers the content that they will return again and again for.

Your mental health will depend upon whether you love it enough to stay the course.

What Do You Know?

Now that you know what you can build, let’s take a look at what you want to build.

The first step in that process is looking at who you are, what and who you know, and what you love. What do you have to offer the millions of potential readers who will join your Blog Empire while they sip their morning coffee?

To find out we’re going to answer the most important question for your future success: where you’re going to build your capitol, the headquarters of your own Blog Empire. Basically, we’re going to brainstorm and free associate.

There are no right answers, no wrong answers, and nothing is too crazy to write down at this point.

Remember, if you love it, someone else probably loves it, too.

Take out a blank sheet of paper and get a nice, tall drink. Then answer the following questions as best as you can. Some, like your age, may seem silly or irrelevant. Some you may simply not have an answer to. That’s perfectly all right. Just be as thorough as you can.

Question 1: Who are you? What is your age? What is your gender? What is your race? Are you religious? Are you a dazzling urbanite, a laid-back rural, or something in between? Do you think about these issues every day? Do they matter to you or to your friends? HOW do they matter? What languages do you speak? If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be? Try that last one again, honestly this time.

Question 2: What do you know? What and who do you know? Where have you gone to school? Where do you work and what do you do? In what areas are you an expert? Who else shares your love, your passion, your expertise? What work, education, or hobby-related areas could you be said to have a reputation? What do you have a reputation for?

Question 3: What do you want to know? When you log onto the internet, where is the first place you go? What are you looking for? What do you expect to find? How long does it take you to find it? Is everything in one place? How many sites do you visit before you’re satisfied? What do you WANT a reputation for?

Question 4: What are you passionate about? What makes your blood boil? What makes you jump up and click your heels? Have you ever written a letter to the editor? What was the subject? Did you check the paper every day for responses? What politicians or issues do you love enough to walk door-to-door for? Why? If you were king, what would be the first thing you’d do? If you won the lottery, what would be the first thing you’d buy?

Blog Empire Construction:

No one Need Blog Alone

If the idea of sifting the news 20 hours a day for blog material gives you the willies, don’t panic: get a partner. One of the most popular blog formats (or rather, the format of many popular blogs) is the multi-contributor blog. We mentioned the Volokh Conspiracy earlier; it’s written by several legal experts who contribute in their areas of expertise to the blog’s main theme.

National Review’s “Corner” follows a similar format: NR’s columnists answer reader mail and contribute quips and opinions, making the page a lively read.

Creating a multi-contributor blog means that you’ll be sharing your Blog Empire with co-regents, and as history illustrates, this has challenges of its own. But if you share a love of your subject with other experts, you’ll be doing your readers a favor by sharing divergent opinions with them.

A second possibility is to join a site that has multiple blogs on it, drawing traffic that may come to read others and stay to read you. A number of newspapers like the Lawrence Journal World feature a stable of bloggers on their site and may even feature some of their bloggers in print or on their paper’s front page online. For the blogger who wants to build an audience quickly, this may be an option.

Be aware, however, that writing under someone else’s banner means you will be giving up significant creative control: it may be a good starting place for you to build a name, but you’ll soon want to strike out on your own.

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