12 tips on creating a successful blog on xanga
Having blogged here on xanga for quite a while, I have seen many up and coming bloggers come and go. From the days of the infamous Bianca Broussard to the recent departure of a few xanga users who call themselves "xanga celebrities," I can recall having conversations with at least four people during the past year who had the aspirations to become "xanga celebrities" someday. There are many people who wish to build a successful xanga site that generates an enormous amount of hits, but often, these people will either take the wrong approach or stop blogging on xanga early on when they realize that eprops are, for the most part, meaningless. Here are 12 tips on becoming a better blogger on xanga, and I hope that you will find them useful.
Before reading anything below, what does success mean to you? Think about this for a while. Some people gauge success based on the amount of eprops that they receive. Some people gauge success based on their ranking on the Featured Content list; on the other hand, others think that they are successful if they are able to qualify for that list. Some people believe that anyone who calls him or herself a "xanga celebrity" is successful. And, some people think that they will be successful if they can just get a few people to write to them often. Nonetheless, here are my 12 tips on becoming a better blogger on xanga.
Be ready to take criticism. Regardless of how well you present yourself to people, you will always receive negative comments. You can write the best blog entries on xanga and still receive harsh comments for your work. Just keep this quote in mind: "Pay no attention to what the critics say; no statue has ever been erected to a critic."
Be unique/original. If possible, try to come up with something that is original to xanga. Think about the things that people would want to read about. The problem, however, is that you probably don't know what people are interested in reading about. But with more than two million blogrings on xanga, it's nearly impossible to not find people who would be interested in reading your blogs. You could write about anything and everything; you could write about animals, sports, art, music, food, photography, etc. The selections are nearly endless. As an example, here's a xanga blog that is based on Korean Cooking.
If you're making a layout/icon/quote site, keep in mind that there are MANY xanga sites that provide people with layouts, icons, and quotes. Think of ways that will make your layout/icon/quote site stand out from the thousands of other sites that already exist. Perhaps you can make layouts based on movies, animals, Japanese dramas, etc.
Become a premium member. If your blog often qualifies for the Featured Content listing, signing up for the premium service is paramount - it will generate many more hits to your blog. That, and it really seems that many people can't be bothered to click on the "Xanga Classic Sites" tab. It's also slightly easier to qualify for Featured Content on the premium circuit but difficult to achieve a higher rank. You should also keep in mind that despite what many people say, xanga premium is not at all expensive. Xanga premium is only $25 per year, which works out to about 7 cents per day. Who doesn't have 7 cents? I spend much more than $25 on lunch every week.
However, I would only recommend the premium service if you're planning to blog on a regular basis. If you're only going to blog once per month, for example, you might think that it's a better idea to remain on the classic circuit.
Don't attack people/groups of people. There are always people on xanga who leave negative comments on random sites for cheap entertainment.
Although writing negative comments to people will definitely attract attention from people, there are repercussions to be faced for such cowardly acts. There may not be any physical repercussions to be faced, but it's not too hard for a person to trace your IP address and use it to uncover personal details about yourself. You definitely wouldn't want people to know your home address or your phone number, right? And you probably wouldn't want the FBI to knock on your door. Such cases do happen, so don't be stupid and let it happen to you.
Most importantly, you should remember that there is always a real person behind the username and the blog entries.
Don't be discouraged. We all know that success doesn't happen overnight, but we also know that it can possibly be achieved overtime with hard work and patience. Although success is never guaranteed, you will have a chance at succeeding as long as you continue to try. On the other hand, if you stop trying, then you have absolutely no chance of succeeding. This is true for many things in life. Just keep trying again and again, and think about it - what's the worst thing that can happen to you? One of two things will happen: you'll either succeed eventually or you'll become frustrated and quit forever. And if you do the latter, then you wouldn't care about it anymore!
Don't single people out. I know that a majority of people on xanga are teenagers, but I have seen many examples of people who will not even write back to their readers because of their age. Some have gone as far as banning every single person under the age of 18 from their sites. Don't ever assume that people are only as smart as their age. I have talked to 12 year olds who behaved more maturely than some of the adults that I've seen on xanga. Similarly, there are many people who treat "emo kids" and "teeny boppers" on xanga harshly and manage to receive many eprops for it. Unless you're trying to create a xanga site that is based on comedy or something, please don't follow their example. I have seen very few people speak out against this practice, but it is evident that many of us on xanga do not care about these kind of rants. By singling out certain groups of people, you are also limiting your potential to succeed.
Luckily I have no reason to single people out based on age! I'm still a schoolboy, after all.
Image is not everything. As long as the text on your blog entries is readable, there's no need to worry about the appearance of your blog. Having a good layout will help as long as it's not too overdone, but if the layout is overdone, it can be detrimental. If you take a look at the sites of "xanga celebrities," you'll see that none of them have flashy layouts. Content is far more important than the way your blog looks.
Timing is everything. How often will you be writing? Every day? Every other day? Every week? If you can afford to blog every single day, that's great, but many people can't make that kind of commitment. Whether this means having to spend less time on academic, athletic, or social activities, sacrifices will probably have to be made. If you can't blog every day, on what days will you blog? Because there are a lot less people on xanga during weekdays (school and work comes to mind), it is often easier to qualify for the Featured Content list on a weekday. And that is true. You could compare the Featured Content list of any weekday to that of either Saturday or Sunday. However, if you were to qualify for the list during the weekend, you'd receive more hits because more people are on xanga during those days. The days that you blog will also dictate the future readership of your blog. For instance, if I were to blog exclusively on Friday mornings as opposed to, say, Tuesday mornings, I'd have significantly different new readers reading my blog because they happened to come across my blog that day. I guess that you can say that timing is really based on luck!
Think of a good username. It's a well known fact that having a provocative username can attract attention from people. Although xanga used to allow people to change their usernames, this is no longer allowed. Think about how terrible it would be to throw away all of the hard work that is associated with your username. Choose it wisely!
Fortunately, even if your username happens to be awkward and largely incoherent (apreci8_1337hax0r), it may not count against you if you can find ways to make up for it.
Try not to think about popularity. You probably won't be blogging on xanga for long if your reason for being here is to become popular. Don't blog for popularity and certainly don't blog with the hopes that people will recognize you as a "xanga celebrity" one day.
Who is reading it? Think about the people who will be reading your blogs. Think about the kind of people that you want to be reading your blogs. If your blog is entirely about sports, you probably want your readers to be people who are also into sports so that they can give you a proper response. You wouldn't, for example, want your readers to be people who fight to the death for animal rights and argue that American footballs are made out of pigskin. You also have to remember that most people blog on xanga for the sole purpose of writing to their friends. Inevitably, you will receive comments from people who "just don't get it" and find it odd that anyone would want to blog on xanga for an entirely different purpose.
Write well. Writing well is always a plus, but out of all these tips, I sincerely believe that this is the least important of them all. While some people are gifted with the ability to have their way with words, you simply don't have to be a good writer to be a successful blogger on xanga. You only need to write well enough to get your point across, which more or less has anything to do with how many words you misspell or grammatical mistakes you make. Ignore people who complain about your style of writing; after all, it's your blog and you can do whatever you want with it.
Alright, so these are my 12 tips on becoming a better blogger on xanga. Remember that everyone does different things to succeed and that there isn't a definite path that you have to follow. It's really up to you to decide what's important and what isn't. Some of you will find these tips to be useful; others will just laugh at them and dismiss me as a person who shouldn't be giving people advice.
Anyway, this guide to better blogging is dedicated to anyone and everyone who aspires to build a successful xanga site. Let me know if you think that these tips are useful or not.
January 15, 2006
