This post provides the following:
- A summary of the results of our recent Reader Survey.
- What I plan to do as a result of the survey.
Survey Results
At the time of this writing, 10 people have filled out the survey. I had hoped to have at least 20 responses, but based on the rate that they have come in, I do not expect much more than 10. Regardless, I very much appreciate the input from all of you who did complete the survey.
People who used the suggestion portion of the form were generally very complimentary. Two left their names, which gives me a chance to thank them publicly for their kind remarks: thank you Alexey and Tim.
A quick summary follows:
- Most of the responders said that 3-4 posts per week is about right for them, while two would like to have 5-7.
- Also, most said they prefer a mix of Life/Time Management articles with Technical articles.
- The results were pretty evenly split among those wanting to see more Thought/Essay-type articles and those wanting to see more Tutorial-type articles. Again, it appears that most are happy with a mix, although the balance of the mix may be in question.
One comment was somewhat negative and the reader is certainly welcome to contact me directly, if desired, to elaborate more. My guess is that he/she would be better served with a blog that has an almost exclusively technical focus. I do not plan for this blog to be that way.
What I Plan To Do As a Result of the Survey
The survey results, plus the fact that next week is the one-year anniversary of this blog, have caused me to do a bit of soul-searching. Specifically, I have had to ask myself what do I expect to get out of this blog?
I can tell you that, at least in the back of my mind, I have been thinking I would develop this blog into one that could “compete with” the likes of ZenHabits, and one that might even grab some of Lifehacker’s traffic. To that end, I have, for the most part, tried to treat the blog a bit like a business, putting in regular hours and trying to maintain a posting schedule on topics that I thought would be of interest to you.
Well, I have failed at that. I failed for a few reasons:
- Having an unrealistic “expectation” to begin with.
- Not being consistent in providing quality, useful content.
- Not putting in the time required to accomplish the feat I had in mind.
There are probably other reasons, too. Probably lots of them.
But, I know that after almost a year, this blog still has only 200 subscribers. I am grateful for those 200, to be sure. Frankly, I don’t think I have deserved the 200 of you who have subscribed.
Yet, despite my spectacular lack of success with this blog, I do still enjoy some aspects of blogging. But, I have come to the conclusion that I would enjoy it even more if I treated it just as a hobby, and not as a business or quasi-business.
So, that’s where my head is right now. I’m thinking that, as a hobby, where I don’t wake up everyday worrying about what my stats are or what to write, that I will write 2-4 articles a week, most weeks anyway, with a mix of topics. I would expect that, on average, I will write more about personal development topics than technical ones (my interest in gadgets has declined considerably over the past year). But, there will be some technical articles from time to time. There may be an occasional week in which I do not write at all, and there may be some weeks in which I write two articles per day.
Hence, it could work out that many of you will continue to find topics here of interest to you. I sure hope you do. I will miss you if you go. But, I owe it to you to tell you “where my head is at” and that you might be seeing some changes in the blog.
I do hope to see more of you commenting on articles. To me, the comments add so much value. So often you folks know so much that can be shared with others, and can add key points to the articles. To me that has been one of the greatest failings of this blog: that I have not enticed more of you to comment on articles. Chalk that up to me not knowing how to motivate you to comment … my interest in having your comments has been there since my very first blog article.
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