Bill Hobbs has a post about instalanches and Dean Esmay comments on the generally minimal long-term effects of getting a link from Glenn Reynolds. Along with Mr. Esmay, I too share the Commissar's view: instalanches are overrated and don't lead to many new frequent readers. (Although getting linked in Mr. Reynold's sidebar may have; I get hits from there every day.)
As Mr. Esmay wrote, I get more pleasure from being read and linked to by my regulars than from an ephemeral glance by the Instapundit. When a fellow third-tier blogger links to me it's usually to something I'm proud of having written that I put a decent amount of thought into. When Mr. Reynolds links to me it's usually for something inconsequential. For example, he never took notice of the Spherewide Short Story Symposium (or number two) despite all the excellent contributions by many writers. He's never linked to any of the opinion pieces I've written, or really to anything that's my own creation. I don't even email him anymore because I've gathered that he's not interested in the types of things I do -- which is fine, lots of people aren't.
Mr. Reynold's and I have a bit of a love/hate relationship. He's always got interesting links, but I hate reading them because they taint my posts for the rest of the day. I don't want to just comment on stories he finds, but once I've read them it's hard to divert my attention. So I generally avoid Instapundit unless I've read everything else and can't think of anything else to do.
So I don't count on links from the major leagues to promote my blog. What I do instead is comment frequently (more or less) on the sites I read and like and go out of my way to find new blogs I haven't heard of and comment on their posts. That's one of my favorite uses of NZ Bear's blog Ecosystem. I remember how happy I was to get comments, readers, and links when I was starting out, so I go down into the reptiles and amphibians and find recently-updated blogs with interesting things to say. I leave a comment or two -- maybe post a link on my site -- and I'll frequently get a link and some comments in return. I think this type of intimate exposure is far more valuable than an occasional instalanche, plus I get to find all sorts of great new writers.
Anyway, your mileage may vary; this is the most effective plan I've been able to come up with, since I have no plans to move to Tennessee (the blogger-heartland of America).
Michael, you deserve readership, no question about it. Here are my conclusions about how best to get it.
1. Be visible in other heavily traveled places. Make frequent visits to popular interactive fora. Comment at others' sites. Be intelligent, pungent, and original. Keep it up.
2. Write about what people want to read about. Don't concern yourself with marginal topics of interest only to a few. Put your efforts into the subjects people are talking about -- but with your own twist.
3. Persist. Endurance -- and frequent posting -- gradually wins readers.
4. Hold frequent contests with large cash prizes. I haven't tried this yet myself, but it certainly sounds good.
The Palace is nearing six years old. When I opened it, we were just one more Web voice crying in the wilderness. Today we get an average of 70,000 readers and 266,000 page loads each month. Yes, Professor Reynolds gets more traffic -- but all things in their time.
All my best,
Fran
I know what you mean about the 'johnny come lately' feeling. The Hell with it.
You're not gonna be 'first' on anything, whether IP gets there before you, or someone else.
There's no problem in "piling on" a popular topic, if it interests you. That's why Blogdex et al track such things. It's almost your civic duty to 'pile on' a topic that you like.
No one can 'taint' your posts. On the other hand, no one would want to blog nothing but 'IP scraps,' which I am sure you're a long way from.
Check out my post on how Instapundit "taints links." Mine were first, however.
http://www.indcjournal.com/
Good comments above, but I have a comment to
> Write about what people want to read about
I think this depends on the purpose of your blog. I write my blog for my own amusement so I have stuff in there ranging from politics to movie reviews. People who like the latter may not care about the former, and vice versa. So my entries aren't really so much about writing what my readers may want to see, but writing about what interests me, and maybe my readers will like it, maybe they won't.
But I hope that my interests are wide and diverse enough that at least they come back from time to time to see what else I have to say.
I'll be the first to admit, I don't know too much about blogging. I stumbled onto Master of None one day becausse of dancing robots and have been a reader since. I haven't ventured onto other bloggers' pages yet although I'm curious. However, if you're not that crazy about Instapundit, why do you have a link to him?
FP: I think you're spot on.
Bill: I think it's probably just a coincidence :)
DM: I pretty much do the same thing.
Petra: I don't dislike Instapundit! It's a love/hate thing.
I like that "large cash prize" thing.
Your comment about getting Instatraffic from Glenn's sidebar posts bothers me - in that it's true, and that Glenn, being a member of the Rocky Top Brigade, doesn't list the membership in his sidebar like most of the rest of us do. Plus he never participates in the our bi-weekly roundup of post promotions (The Volunteer Tailgate Party) although on rare occasions he'll link to one. But he still accepts the claim to be a founding member and still being a member.
Oh, and hey there are plenty of worthwhile bloggers in Tennessee (Knoxville, especially)! Our Motto: "Tennessee, Land of 1,000 Climates"
Barry: I can't get drawn into RTB politics! You for'ners better handle that yourselves.
I usually do visit Master of None via the sidebar link from Instapundit. IP is the first place I check for breaking news, and as it's frequently updated it's generally where I go when I just want a quick blog buzz fix at work.
I'm not surprised that many Instalancheing visitors don't come back again. There've been many times when a link has led me to a new blog that I like a lot. I bookmark it with the intention of coming back, and I might even leave a comment or two, but more likely than not I'll forget where it was and only return by a happy accident. The same thing happens with other types of sites, but the nature of blogs makes the problem more obvious.
Using an RSS aggregator or some better link-management would help, I suppose, but truth be told I'm probably near my threshold of regularly read blogs already. Fortunately for me, yours is one of them.
BC: There are too many links on Insty's bar, I couldn't use it as a base point even if I wanted to. I'm glad you like Master of None though! Thanks!
I blogged and blogged. I averaged between 30 and 40 hits per day for six months. I picked up a few links from here and there, but nothing really seemed to bump me up. Then in January I took off like a rocket. Relatively speaking, anyway. I'm currently at 400-500 per day and quite happy with it.
On "Write about what people want to read about": That's okay if your primary goal is to increase traffic. I like to see traffic increase, but I like writing about what I want to write about even more. I'd say that it should really be "Don't write about what people don't want to read about". At least not too much. Even more off-putting than unpopular subjects is poor spelling and grammar. If you don't proof-read, at least use a spellchecker. (I use ieSpell - simple and free)
But I totally agree with #4. Michael should definitely run more contests with large cash prizes.