An Interview with ELLEN who’s been blogging since 2003, and
The Reign of Ellen where you’ll enter the Blogdom of Royalty.
Click her picture. See the blog that crowns readers Kings and Queens.
See you then!
–ME “Liz” Strauss
1.6 Thanks again, Indie
THANKS INDIE, for sharing your blog and yourself with us this week. The Synchronicity of Indeterminacy has so much that makes it a successful blog, but I’d say the key is the care and tending of a man named Indie. . . .
These are three of my favorite story links from The Synchronicity of Indeterminacy for pleasure reading this weekend.
Of course at Indie’s blog, there are hundreds more. If you have time, you might jump to the Index–it’s organized both by story and by week.
Made enough decisions this week? Try the Read Random button which will choose a story for you–one more cool detail about this memorable blog.
If you do get a chance to read a story or two, be sure to leave Indie a comment to let him know you were there.
Indie also suggests these sites for some other fun reads.
Retarius
Retarius was saved by its fans the search archives when the writer had decided to delete it. Also upon the announcement that the writer was quitting one fan organized a memorial in which his fans all contribued a post. The follow post was Indie’s contribution to that memorial.
Thanks again, Indie. It was great having you around. 🙂
–ME “Liz” Strauss
1.5 Indie’s Advice
Interview with Indie
His Blog: The Synchronicity of Indeterminacy
URL: indeterminacy.blogspot.com
Thing to note when you visit: the interactivity; the connection between Indie and his readers; the quality of the content; the special features and unique ideas
1.5 Indie’s Advice
We all have bad days we remember, blogging blunders–little or big–mistakes we wished never happened. At the time, they seemed huge and over time they became history. Indie talked about his blogging experiences–his mistakes, what he hopes to do, advice he got, and the advice he would give.
What do you think was the biggest mistake that you made?
The biggest mistake I made was posting a photo which I didn’t think worked well. But I won’t tell which one that was. Maybe someday I’ll go in and quietly replace it.
What change made the greatest improvement? What was the best advice you got?
The greatest improvement I made was based on feedback I received from one of the bloggers who found and supported me in my first months: Robyn Moondancer. She has since stopped blogging and is seldom in the Internet. She was the one who thought it would work if I started the weekend stories in which the visitors write the stories to the photo I post. At first I was skeptical. I thought people wouldn’t want to contribute; they would feel that they were competing with me or I with them. But it went over quite well, and some of my readers say it’s one of the things they like best about the blog.
In general, whenever I want to change something, I write to one of the people who visit my blog regularly. I feel that I am doing the blog in part for them as well as for myself. I value the feedback I receive and usually do what it tells me.
What do you wish you could do for your blog?
I need to spend time organizing my links. Over the last year I’ve come across many blogs and websites that I’ve found were creative and interesting. They deserved to be known about. This resulted over time in a long list of links. In the future I want to organize these in thematic sections so that anyone following a whim of what he/she would like to read next can benefit from what I’ve found.
What advice would you give a beginner?
I started by reading the documentation at Blogspot about how to blog and how to promote one’s blog. At the time I don’t think there was a definitive blog like Successful Blog, devoted to the idea of how to blog successfully. It’s still probably a good idea to read through the documentation at Blogspot, but I would now recommend following successful-blog.com.
I’d also advise beginning bloggers not to be discouraged when they do not receive a lot of visitors right off. It takes a while to build an audience.
Last but not least, be yourself. Don’t try to be something at your blog that you are not. Believe in what you blog about. Do not blog what you think other people want to hear, when it’s not “you.” Blog what you would want to read yourself, if you were the one visiting.
Anything else you think all bloggers should know? [Read more…]
1.4 Synchronicity in Statistics
Interview with Indie
His Blog: The Synchronicity of Indeterminacy
URL: indeterminacy.blogspot.com
His audience: persons from all walks of life who like to read quality fiction–bloggers, high school and college students, people in the creative arts, and people who work with language in their jobs–his blogroll reflects his audience
Thing to note when you visit: the interactivity; the connection between Indie and his readers; the quality of the content; the special features and unique ideas
1.4 Synchronicity in Numbers
Indie approaches his blog as a business as well as an art. He keeps track, as much as one can, of who’s coming and how they get there. In the world of writer’s blogs his numbers are high. His blog carries a Google Page Rank of 5. A generous spirit, Indie was willing to share his stats with us and generated a stat graph to go with them.
Indie, how do you keep track of the visitors who come by the blog?
I use a stat counter to gain an idea of how many people read my blog, but unfortunately I have no way of knowing how relevant these results are. My blog is syndicated which means it is possible for people to see the photograph and read the content without coming directly to the site. These are readers I know nothing about. Because blog-installed stat counters only count hits, there’s no way to tell how many people actually read it and how much they are interested in the content.
Sometimes a person will drift in via a Google search, and then spend a half an hour or longer clicking through the archives. I like to think they are reading the stories, although it’s quite possible that they’re merely glancing through the photos.
What do you do, and how much time do you spend on building up readership? Do you use traffic exchange services? How do you expand your own blog reading?
I don’t have as much time these days to visit all the blogs I like, so my chances to read and comment are sporadic. To let people know I’m out there, I occasionally enter my blog in the Blog Battles at Blog Explosion. But in general, I think that exchange services offer only superficial traffic. Lately BE has been heavy-handed about expelling blogs that discuss/evaluate other exchange programs. I’m beginning to wonder about them. (See the censorship of Sarahtampa .)
I sometimes come across wonderful blogs that quickly come into my favorites list. Two recent examples include shtikl.com and soulkin.com.
How many visitors stop by each day?
The stat counter I have currently registers roughly 150 to 250 page loads a day. Checking the last 100 page references I see that a third of these are referrals through search results. Another third come from links at other blogs or sites, and the remainder just show up somehow.
What percent do you think are repeat visitors each day?
My stat counter uses a cookie to record regular visitors, but I know that the system is not entirely accurate. Often I’ll check my statistics and notice a friend’s visit, but he/she doesn’t show up as a repeat visitor. My stats for last week fluctuated from 20-40 repeat visitors per day.
What is your most visited day of the week? Does readership change through the year?
Tuesday through Friday are about the same. Weekends and Mondays drop off slightly. I don’t know about changes specific to time of year. Traffic has increased slowly but surely since the time I began blogging. Daily readership drops off when I’m on vacation (not posting).
The most heavily visited days were March 4th (1521 unique visitors / 1973 page loads), followed by March 3rd (1161 unique visitors / 1637 page loads).
Someone had mentioned my blog at a portal– metafilter.com. The two posts of March 3rd received two comments from new visitors, one positive, one negative. And there was one guestbook entry. It’s interesting to note that out of over 2600 visitors only three left comments. Shows how hard it is to get people to comment? Or is it a general tendancy to lurk?
Can you point us to your most visited stories?
March 4th: Karla Had Just Been Kissed
March 3rd: Vance and Vera Invited an Inflatable Man
Indie knows the numbers and he knows that they’re not an exact reflection of what’s happening. The numbers are simply one more piece to the puzzle. They help us sort out the anamolies and focus in on the patterns over time., leading closer to a picture of who our readers might be.
What patterns do you see in your blog’s numbers?
–ME “Liz” Strauss
1.3 Audience Synchroncity
Interview with Indie
His Blog: The Synchronicity of Indeterminacy
URL: indeterminacy.blogspot.com
His audience: persons from all walks of life who like to read quality fiction–bloggers, high school and college students, people in the creative arts, and people who work with language in their jobs–his blogroll reflects his audience
Thing to note when you visit: the interactivity; the connection between Indie and his readers; the quality of the content; the special features and unique ideas
1.3 Audience Synchronicity
Indie has two English-language blogs and a Polish-language blog. Click the screen shot to see his satellite blog–Indeterminacies of Synchronicity. It’s this second blog that provides the venue for the feature that engages his audience in writing their own flash fiction stories each week. Each story posted there is rewarded with a link. The Polish-language blog offers translations of selected stories for a smaller segment of his audience.
Indie’s respect for his readers shows whenever he talks to or about them.
Indie, who is your audience?
I’ve been greatly surprised by the type of people reading my blog. In a nutshell I think of them as the blogging elite. I’ve received feedback from artists, musicians, authors, editors, stand-up comics, company CEO’s, psychotherapists, lawyers, professors and other high level professionals, many of them authors of intelligent blogs themselves. This is, for me, another sign of success. Not too long ago I noticed I had some referrals from an online university class in which the professor asked the students to analyze a flash fiction story of their choosing. He had included my URL as an example of flash fiction, a genre which I incidentally knew nothing about until long into the existence of my blog.
All this attention has been especially gratifying, but also intimidating. I hope I am able to keep up whatever it is that caught their interest.
How do your readers find out about you?
People have found me by accident, through links, random referrals, by word of mouth, using search engines and probably other ways I can’t imagine. I followed all the instructions for promoting one’s blog. I entered myself in all the directories and search engines, I use several traffic exchange programs, I comment at other blogs I find interesting (though these days I have hardly any time left for reading other blogs), I have a description and keywords list included in my blog template, which probably helps improve my search rank for various terms. Lately I’ve been presenting my blog at Blog Explosion’s blog battles. Also, many visitors seem to show up through image searches, which probably goes with the territory of having so many photo posts.
What do they like best about your site?
According to the feedback I receive, people like the idea of what I’m doing (pairing found photos with stories), even if they do not enjoy my writing. Others seem enthusiastic about the pace at which I post stories (five a week at the moment), as well as enjoying the stories. Others enjoy the interactivity or the fact that I try to answer all my comments. On weekends I post a photo without a story and invite my visitors to contribute their own story. I then post my take on the photo the Monday after. Those stories have all been collected at the companion blog indeterminacies.blogspot.com, including links to their respective authors. A few bloggers have been kind enough to write reviews about my project. I’ve linked to them on my front page, and would refer you to these for a feeling about what other people see in my blog.
Indie’s audience is made up of blogger readers from all walks of life. They could be the same people who read our blogs. It’s hard to miss Indie’s connection with his readers. I suspect that even with the great photos, stories, interactivity, and sense of community that the biggest attraction for readers is Indie.
What brings readers to your blog?
–ME “Liz” Strauss
1.2 Indeterminacy of Purpose
Interview with Indie
His Blog: The Synchronicity of Indeterminacy
URL: indeterminacy.blogspot.com
His initial purpose: to match photos with short fiction in a writer’s photo blog
Thing to note when you visit: the interactivity; the connection between Indie and his readers; the quality of the content; the special features and unique ideas
Indeterminacy of Purpose
Every one of us was a new blogger once. One day we’d never heard of a blog. The next day we had. That was the beginning.
In this part of the conversation, Indie shares how he decided to start a blog and determined what it’s form and purpose would be.
Indie, what made you start the blog? How did you decide on its purpose?
I first found out that blogs existed early in 2004 and had a vague wish to start my own. But I was uncertain as to what it could be. I thought the world could do without another online diary. At the same time I discovered the phenomenon of finding photos via file sharing programs. By summer I had further vague ideas of starting perhaps a photo blog with my own photography, or perhaps a short story, novella, or even a novel built around a series of photographs I had found via p2p. I’d written a few short stories before, but writing had never been a major part of my life. In fact, writing had always been such a painstaking process to me, I could not imagine writing anything longer than a few pages. Despite the verbose answers I am giving here, brevity of expression is one of the concepts I admire most.
My catalyst for beginning the blog was stumbling upon the site 10eastern.com, which had received lots of attention for it’s gallery presentations of found photos, as selected by the site’s proprietor. Until then I was skeptical about the acceptance of a blog which used found photos–photos which were sometimes unintentionally shared.
I greatly admire the stories of John Cage written for his Indeterminacy project, and all of a sudden I realized that the best way for me to do my project was not with a long story wrapped around a series of photographs, but daily one-minute short stories in the form and perhaps style of John Cage’s stories. I believed it would be possible for anyone to have at least one good idea per day. That’s how it all fell into place.
Blogging can keep us so involved day to day, that we forget to stop to see where we are. There was a reason we each started blogging. How has that purpose changed over time? Is our purpose still our guide, or have we lost sight of it?
Knowing the purpose of my blog makes it easier to make decisions about what belongs and what does not. I want to keep enough focus so that when readers return, they’ll know they’re on familiar ground.
My personal blog’s purpose is to offer readers a place to get away from the world, share a few stories, and wonder about things. What’s the purpose of your blog?
Like the bloggers who blog them, every blog needs a purpose in life.
–ME “Liz” Strauss