I said, there’s an interview coming in the blog and now it is here. As a part of the Blog Commenting series, I decided to interview Caroline Middlebrook in this blog. She is very famous for her blog commenting and has got mentioned for doing it in many big blogs like problogger, entrepreneurs journey, and more.
Without further ado, let’s move to the interview and I’m glad to have Caroline Middlebrook here with us in the blog.
Ram: Hi Caroline, Firstly can you give a short introduction about yourself
and how you came into the blogging field?
Caroline: My background is in software development and until September 2007 I was employed as a programmer in a broadcasting company. However, employment is not for me and I longed to be self employed again. I also knew it was possible to make money online so I quit my job with a dream of becoming an entrepreneur and started the blog as a way of documenting the journey.
Ram: It is good to hear that many people are moving from the 9-5 day job to online work. You have been famous for your blog at Caroline Middlebrook. Did you expect the quick success?
Caroline: At the very beginning I picked up around 100 initial subscribers from the Thirty Day Challenge that I took part in and I did expect this as I timed the launch of the blog for maximum exposure from the 30DC. However, I didn’t expect the growth that followed – I think the biggest surprise was being featured on posts by Yaro Starak and Darren Rowse within the same week. This really got me started and its been a lot easier from that point on so now I expect the growth to continue as its much easier once you’ve got to the stage that I’m at now.
Ram: It is not easy to get a back link from those blogging experts and you would have been really happy to have achieved that. Great going! Your feed reader shows 1518 now. Surely there would have been a lot of hard work. Other than that who would you point out to as the main reason for this increase?
Caroline: There have been several key factors. Firstly the two things I mentioned above, secondly I launched my Twitter Guide with quite a bang and this got featured on Lifehacker and the Delicious home page which both brought in a lot of traffic. I’ve had immense success with StumbleUpon and the recent release of my ebook has also brought in a lot of publicity, especially when big guys like Shoemoney blogged about it.
Ram: Wow! You have got links from many big blogs which surely is something not all bloggers get. Let’s move over to blog commenting. You are really know for the blog commenting and you have had success with that too. Can you please tell more on that?
Caroline: Well its a strategy that I just grew gradually – it wasn’t planned in any way. After my first month online I realised I was spending a ton of time reading so I had to find a way to streamline it. I had so many blogs in my feed reader that I just coudn’t keep up so I started trying to find ways to optimise it and I just blogged about the process. I had no idea what that post would do for me!
Ram: It indeed was a unique method to get traffic. But not many people looked upon that as a source for traffic. It would be great if you can offer few tips to follow when commenting on blogs.
Caroline: The most important factor is to be absolutely genuine when you post a comment. If you can’t think of anything to say then don’t comment or you end up as other one of those “great post!” people. I actually delete those comments from my own blog. There are other tips that I go onto in the post such as trying to be early to comment, looking out for blogs that use the Top Commentator plugin and so on but the most important factor is the quality of the comment itself. It has to be interesting or people won’t click through. You have to compell other readers to ask “who is this Caroline person who has written that comment?”. If you don’t do that, the whole exercise is a waste of time.
Ram: Very strong point, Caroline. I have to agree on that. A comment has to urge the readers to give a click. Before ending this interview, let me ask you one more question. What would be your one best tip to become a successful blogger and earn a living online? Please share it with our readers.
Caroline: Be genuine – offer value, don’t bullshit people, have your own voice, be yourself. I see people trying to force themselves to blog and that just won’t work because it comes through in the writing as forced and it turns people off. The only way people will respond to you by subscribing and commenting is for you to resonate with your readers in the words you write. Your spelling doesn’t matter, your blog design doesn’t matter – what really matters is that you have something to say and you just get out there and say it!
Solid advice there, Caroline. Thanks for spending your time in answering my questions. I really appreciate it. I wish you success in your life and I hope you will achieve more in blogging.
Hope you all liked the interview. Please make sure to post a comment and share your view on the interview.
