Dear Scribnia Community,

We messed up on Monday.  A “community update” email went out on Monday way ahead of schedule.  The email template wasn’t completed before it went out which left out a very important feature, the “unsubscribe” option.

While you could still go in to your Scribnia preferences and change your notification settings, a few of you were upset that there was no simple unsubscribe link…and you’re right.  There should be one.

We created this email to keep you up to date with what’s going on amongst your network on Scribnia on a weekly basis.  We hope to share new writers that are added to the community, give you an update of writers recommended to you by us and by your friends, and allow you to stay engaged with the Scribnia community.

It went out with no warning, and for that we’re very sorry.  We really respect your time and would never want to abuse our contact privileges.

We’d send this message, and a notification about the new “Community Updates” as an email, but the last thing you probably want is another email, so hopefully this post will suffice.

If you have any questions, concerns, angry words, happy words (wishful thinking), just email me at David [at] Scribnia.com and I will assist you to the best of my ability.

Just a reminder, you can change your notification settings on Scribnia at anytime by logging in and visiting your preferences here.

Love,

The (vulnerable kitty feeling) Scribnia Team

K.I.S.S. or “Keep it simple, stupid” has become a cornerstone of blogging.  Readers’ attention spans are falling fast, and if you’re going to build an audience, you have to make your site is clear, concise and reduce as much noise as possible.

Photo cred: Don Solo

Here are some areas of your blog that you can simplify, without sacrificing value.  In fact, the key is to focus on value.

1. The Sidebar

Wow…you’ve got a lot of widgets over there.  A couple badges? Perhaps even an ad or two?  One thing that many bloggers do is PACK as much as they can into that sidebar.  Sometimes, the sidebar runs lower on the page than the content itself!

Now widgets, badges and ads are great, but too much of anything great can spoil their value really fast.  Think about what you’re adding to your sidebar.  Does it benefit the reader? How is it helping you?  Is it effective?  Perhaps, instead of having 6 small adds, you can use 1 or 2 bigger ads, or just focus on the ads that work best.

If you win a contest or something, it’s great to feature the badge on your site.  After a few months, that badge might not be very relevant anymore.  Keep your sidebar up to date.

2. The Toolbar

This depends on your blog and what you use it for.  For businesses, they tend to need more pages in their toolbar.  For the average blogger, you probably don’t need that many.

Do you have an about page for you and another one for your blog? Can you combine that into one?  You can put multiple things in a page as long as you make it organized and easy to read.

Which pages are the most important?  If there are 10 pages to look through, will that hurt readers ability to find the pages they need?

3. The Comments

Comments are getting busier and busier lately.  Now we have twitter feeds in there, information about the commenter, facebook shares, and more.  There’s a certain level of functionality that you should use in your comments, and then there’s too much.

The comments section can be one of the most vital aspects of your blog.  Make sure it’s easy for readers to browse through the comments and get an idea of the conversation without being distracted by too much information.

I really like the balance that disqus provides.

4. The Content

Some say brevity is king.  Others find more value in longer posts.  There is no “magic” length for blog posting.  You can be extremely successful writing really short but thought provoking posts like Carlos Miceli does, or you can write really long and thorough posts like Olivier Blanchard does.

When you’re writing about something that you’re passionate about, it can be very easy to write “too much”.  It might seem necessary to you, but to the reader, it can be repetitive or unfocused.

Copyblogger had a great post discussing how to avoid taking tangents when writing blog posts.

So take a look at your site.  Is there anywhere where you can simplify things?  Can you find any cluttered areas that are taking away from the valuable content you’re providing?

How else can you simplify your blog?

This post is part of the Guest Blog Grand Tour over at Life Without Pants – an epic two-month journey of over 50 guest posts. Want to learn more about Matt Cheuvront and see how far the rabbit hole goes? Subscribe to the Life Without Pants RSS feed and keep in touch!

Photo cred: Scott Kinmartin

When it came to reading, as a kid, I always looked for the easy way out. Every time we had assigned reading – the first thing to do was to go check the local video store in hopes that someone else hadn’t already rented the movie. I must have watched the 1998 adaptation of Great Expectations starring Ethan Hawke & Gwyneth Paltrow (which in hindsight had very few similarities to the Dickens classic) at least 10 times throughout high school.

Call me lazy – because that’s exactly what I was.

Blogging has allowed those kids who were always looking for the easy way out when it came to reading the ability to digest information in small bites. We no longer have to read an 800 page Dickens novel at a time, with our lovely Google Reader, we can read about 50 completely different topics with the click of a mouse – then comment, discuss, and interact with other like-minded readers.

But here comes video – doing what it can to bring us back to those lazy childhood days; although this time, it might not be such a bad thing.

Video blogging is on the rise. From the top down, video is being used as THE new way to share thoughts and ideas. If you take a look through the Archives of Life Without Pants, you’ll see I’ve done a lot with video over the past several months. The question is, does video ENHANCE traditional

blogging, or will it be responsible for its slow and painful demise?

I asked that question to some folks in my Twitter community, and got some interesting responses. The general consensus? Video lowers barriers, allows for the targeting of wider audiences, easy sharing, and can act to thoroughly enhance a blogging experience. But video blogging is not without its obstacles.

So I turn the question to you. What obstacles and challenges do you see with “vlogging”? How do you use video on your own blog or website? Do you think video will be responsible for the death of traditional blogging?

Style. (Photo cred: Fabio Trifoni)

Guest posting is an amazing resource for bloggers.  You can tap into an entirely new audience, build up relationships with other bloggers and force yourself to approach new and unfamiliar topics (great post on guest blogging).

The question is though, when posting on someone else’s blog, do you maintain the style you use with your audience?  Or do you change your style to appeal to the new audience that you are speaking to?

What if you’re asked to guest post somewhere for your expertise, but your style doesn’t fit the blog and it’s audience? Do you change it them?

When I guest author a post at Mashable, there is no way I can write the post the same way I write on my blog.  It’s just not suitable for that site and that audience.  It takes a great deal of work for me to alter how I organize and approach a subject for a new audience, but in the end it’s a more effective post, given the audience.

For those of you who are set on mainaining your style, what if you’re asked to alter your style by the blogger you’re guest posting for?  How do you approach that situation?

I know I know, it’s been a little quiet around here lately. Just think of it as the quiet before the storm as we’re working up a sweat behind the scenes to make Scribnia bigger and better after listening to your feedback. There are a lot of updates coming your way that we think you’ll really dig.

Of course, we can’t do anything without asking you first, so we’re asking for your thoughts again. We need a sweet tagline! Either vote for your favorite of the three options below, or if you think you’ve got something better, submit your own tagline…

Photo cred: "capn madd matt"

Some blogs like to keep everything consistent and unvaried.  They create the same type of post over and over again with different topics.  If that works for you (and it does for many) then great.  This tends to work better for entertainment type blogs where people come to your blog for one reason, and you give it to them.  Many other blogs incorporate a mix of “post types” though.  On my personal blog, I try to use a variety of post types that serve different purposes.  Here’s my blogging mix:

• Informational: If I’m especially comfortable with a tool or concept, I’ll share my expertise.  I like to post tips on how to use tools like twitter or just provide information on marketing/pr processes if I feel comfortable enough with them.  These posts are usually organized into numbered or bulleted lists…kind of like this one!
  • Stats: High traffic, High comment #, Low conversation. Low community building.
    
• Thought-provoking: I consider these to be the most valuable. There are a couple different ways to provoke thoughtful insights from your readers.  These can be their own types of posts, or can be combined into one thought-provoking post (example from my blog)
  1. Open Ended Questions: Ask a question about something that hasn’t been discussed very often.  If you ask the right one (not easy) you’ll can spark a great deal of conversation in your community.  These posts tend to be very short, as you’re not providing your insight, you’re just asking for your reader’s insight.  If you give them all the answers, they’ll have nothing to add.
  2. Opinion: Feel strongly about a topic? Share your thoughts. Take a stance.  These posts can be powerful.  You may draw in some criticism, but that’s what blogging is all about.  Stir up the pot and you’ll catch people’s attention
  • Stats: High traffic. High comment #. High conversation. High community building.
    
• Guest Posts: This is something I need to have more of on my blog, but it’s still part of my mix.  Guest posts are amazing for a number of reasons.  One reason is that it allows you to tap into an entirely new community.  When someone guest posts on your blog, they’ll share the post with their community, and bring in a load of new eyes to your blog.  Another reason is it changes things up a bit. Gives your readers a chance to hear from a new voice.  Lastly, the blogosphere is a community, we’re here to share, contribute and collaborate.  Every blogger should be engaging and cooperating with other bloggers.
  • Stats: High traffic. Comments and conversation depend on the blogger/post. High community building.
    
• Feature Others: Again, blogging is about the community.  I share the people who inspire me whether it be through a recommendation type post where I share why you should connect with these people, or it’s in the form of interviews.  Sharing the people that contribute to you and your community is a great way to return the favor.
  • Stats: Medium traffic. Low comments. Low conversation. High community building.
• Interviews: There are many ideas I have for blog posts that I think would be valuable to my community, but I’m just not knowledgeable in the topic.  You can bring in a guest blogger who is knowledgeable on that topic, or you can just reach out to that person to interview them.  There’s no shame in bringing in someone who can provide a greater insight into a topic.  Interviews are a great way not only to bring more value to your readers, but to create relationships with other high profile bloggers.
  • Stats: Medium traffic. Medium comments. Low conversation. High community building.

So that’s my blogging mix.  There’s probably some stuff I’m forgetting but that’s the bulk of it.  There are a lot of other types of posts/media you can include in your blog.  What’s your blogging mix?

Did I tell you we had a load of fun new features coming your way or what? The myScribes feature is now live! With myScribes, you can now check out the content of the Scribnia authors and bloggers right on the site.  You can visit myScribes daily to see your favorite authors’ most recent work, or take a look at the content from newly discovered authors.

Just click on the myScribes link in your toolbar and if you haven’t subscribed to any authors yet, you’ll find the quick directions for “How do I use myScribes?

We’re consistently working to provide you with the most accurate recommendations possible.  myScribes also allows you to give individual posts and articles a thumbs up or down. We then use that information to provide you with better recommendations in the future.

As always, any feedback or thoughts are more than welcome. Drop us a comment or share with us on twitter (@Scribnia).

Happy Reading!

Hello fellow Scribes. Hope you’re enjoying the new ScribUp feature! Looks like a lot of you have been using the feature so far and that’s awesome. We really hope it becomes a valuable method to recommend your favorite authors in the twittersphere while also increasing their ranking on Scribnia.

Now that you’ve had a chance to toy around with the tool a bit, to really kick things off, we’re launching the ScribUp contest today…here’s how it will go:

The contest will start NOW and go until this coming Sunday (June 28th) night at midnight.

Anyone signed up as an author on Scribnia is included in the contest.

The author with the most ScribUps by Sunday at midnight will be featured as Author of the Day on Monday (29th), regardless of how many reviews you have.


It doesn’t matter if you’ve been featured already, if you have the most ScribUps, you’ll win the contest and will be featured again.

Rules: No spamming #ScribUps…you can ScribUp someone as much as you like, but it will only count once per person.

…annnd that’s the only rule. So let the games begin! Get out there and start sharing your favorite authors…and hey, I can’t win but that doesn’t mean you can’t give me some love too