So an article from last month hit the front pages of Digg, Reddit, and del.icio.us over the last two days, and of course, brought in a large influx of visitors. The thing is, when a flood of traffic hits, all the minor issues on your site become magnified that much more. Here are 4 particularly pointed lessons to remember:
- Develop a Fail-Proof Proofreading Method - You may think that you're a good writer. You may have gotten high marks in collegiate English and won a few spelling bees in grade school. Your English professor may have even called your writing "refreshingly lucid." But you will make embarassing writing mistakes, and believe me, the community at large will point them out and often discredit all your content because of it. Yes, I know it's annoying when commentors go nuts about a spelling mistake, but don't bring it on yourself by being a lazy proofreader.
- Don't Take Things Personally - Truth is, unless you have moments when you speak ex cathedra, your writing only encompasses your finite knowledge. Which means that there are many people out there with more depth and breadth of knowledge than you. Some of these people will tell you that you're wrong, or that your advice doesn't apply to certain demographics or industries. And some people might just be looking for a good trolling. Whatever you do, don't let your feelings get hurt and try to argue with or appease everyone who disagrees. You simply shared what you found to be true and hopefully, many will find your writing helpful.
- Plan for the Traffic - It's easy to think, "I only get a few hundred visitors a day. I can install that toolbar/configure that plugin/add that section later." And then the traffic hits and you find that you missed out on the chance to better communicate to the large traffic payload, most of whom will not visit your site again. So although I'm a proponent of launching a site as soon as you can, make sure the essential features exist when you launch (i.e., those features you must have if the traffic should ever come).
- Be a Nice Guy - You are not a general or political candidate; in other words, bloggers shouldn't have defined enemies or rivals. You blog to help others and it should always come across that way. So when you get a scathing comment or email, first take point #2 into consideration, then wait a while to consider the comment, and finally, respond kindly. At the end of the day, you can't really stop people from hating what you write, but you can control your response (whoa...did I just channel Tony Robbins?).
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