* Note: This post is a bit of fun with a (not very) subtle message woven through it. It's not intended to be a serious piece of journalism, it's no personal development gem and it's certainly no scientific review of the art of blogging. I absolutely acknowledge that I am a novice blogger... but even novices can make observations and have opinions. For my non-Australian friends it's probably pertinent for me to share with you that many Aussies are given to frequent bouts of tongue-in-cheek communication.
This article is what we would colloquially call, a piss take.


So I've been living in the blogosphere pretty solidly for a few months now; clearly still a novice with much to learn but... I keep coming across this statistic:
"there are 55 million blog sites".
Now admittedly I've only reviewed 54 million of them but I think after much exploration and quality research, I've un-earthed many of the secrets of creating a truly crap site.

You don't get this type of quality information every day so you best print it out, highlight the numerous good bits and put it on the fridge (where all valuable information is kept). Even if you're not a blogger at the moment, file this in your really-important-stuff file because when you decide to develop your own crap blog, this will give the edge; a running start.
An unfair advantage.
Call it an ergogenic (performance enhancing) post.

Here we go; pens at the ready.

Step One
Always use numerical titles for your posts like:

"Ten steps to......."
"The top seven reasons for...."
"Eight reasons to ....."
"100 ways to...."

Titles like this show the reader that 1) you know lots of stuff (very important) and 2) you can count (never trust people who can't count).

Step Two
Avoid original content and thought, at all costs.
If you do have an original idea for your blog... ignore it.
Regularly steal from others, change a few words and call it your own.
See what most other bloggers are doing.... and do that.
Why be an innovator when you can be an imitator?

Step Three
Call your blog something weird, ambiguous, mysterious and kind of ... stupid.
Creepy even.
That way readers will be so distracted and confused by your ridiculous blog name that they won't notice the crap content on your site.

Step Four.
Definitely don't have a point of difference for your site.
Do your best to make it indistinguishable from all the other crap.
If possible, make it look and sound like all the others.

Step Five
Take no risks.
Be safe.
Don't have an opinion.
Don't get off the fence and definitely don't hurt anyone's feelings.
Don't be controversial and absolutely don't disagree with any of the experts.
Rather than write about what you passionately believe in, compromise your standards and values regularly and write about anything that people will read.

Step Six
Do your best to find an obscure, niche market and create a blog for it.
If it can be in some little-known language; even better.

Step Seven
Write on things that you really don't know about, understand or have any experience in.
For example, if you've never run a successful business, then you would naturally have a blog called something like "Business Success with Jimmy".
Don't let the fact that you have no practical experience or real understanding of the subject matter hold you back.
That whole 'successful track record' thing is so over-rated.

Step Eight
Have heaps of ridiculous crap on your site.
Not only heaps of crap posts but also millions of ads, weird little things that walk across your screen, flashing stuff, noises, and heaps of you-tube videos which take four hours to down-load and buffer (whatever that means).
You should have so much crap on your site (especially your home page) that people struggle to find your daily post. If they find it within five minutes, you're not trying hard enough.

Step Nine
1) Don't have an about section.... or if you do
2) Be as vague and evasive as possible.

People love the whole mystery thing.
Readers don't really want to connect with the blog author.
Obscurity is cool.
If you do feel compelled to write about yourself, lie and exaggerate.

Step Ten
Write really short, infrequent posts (preferably less than fifty words) and talk about nothing in particular. If you post every day people will think your boring and predictable.
Also, talk about your cat or dog using that special name you have for them; if you can weave the name 'Pooky' into your post, you'll definite get extra points on the Crap-O-Meter.

Good luck.

* 'Personal Development Craig' will be back tomorrow.

Labels: motivation, personal development, self help