Comments on: Run a First Time Reader Audit on Your Blog

By: Jojo

Jojo — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 03:46:39 +0000

…. I wish I can pull you aside so you can do the browsing and clicking for me :]]

By: Zarek

Zarek — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 01:15:06 +0000

Hi Darren,

Good tip ,
I just made some changes based on this…

http://www.nichec.com/

Thanks!

Zarek hu

By: Paul Mcparland

Paul Mcparland — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 04:11:04 +0000

Great article, there are a lot of good tips here. I am going to start the New Year going through your ideas one by one!

By: Magneto

Magneto — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 12:03:35 +0000

Nice tip. I have done a course on user interfaces and this sort thing came under User Study. But an important thing to keep in mind is that if the user is aware that his/her actions are being watched they would act differently than they normally do. It would be more effective if you use a tool like Camtasia to record the actions and then view it later.

By: Surender

Surender — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 18:09:50 +0000

Dareen,
Surprise.So valuable post like a guide book.I am following your guide and getting more users on my tech blog.
Thanks again.
Meet me at http://www.iboozi.com

By: p@r@noid

p@r@noid — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 02:23:11 +0000

thanx for the info…!!!!

well…..i wish if one day i can be a blogger like you..!!!

http://virgintech.blogspot.com

By: steve Garfield

steve Garfield — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 16:00:19 +0000

Hi Darren,

I posted this step on my blog and got a few great comments. I just made some changes based on the feedback…

http://offonatangent.blogspot.com/

Thanks!
–Steve
http://stevegarfield.com

By: Tranquility HQ

Tranquility HQ — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 13:50:07 +0000

Y.S. has a great idea. For those of us new to the blogging playing field and for those of us striving for continuous improvement – I would be grateful and also willing to be involved in peer review. Maybe even a great idea to write an article about peer review and ask for specific comments about the site. I might add this idea to my list of ‘Articles to write’.

By: Ryan McLean

Ryan McLean — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 15:34:39 +0000

Great post,
I am setting myself the goal of 31 days to a better blog

By: Amy

Amy — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 23:51:53 +0000

Great tip. Can’t wait to try it out!

By: Y. S.

Y. S. — Tue, 25 Dec 2007 16:14:21 +0000

As always, you made a great point.

Can you run this on your blog? I mean make an exclusive page for reviewing and first impressions of blogs? Because friends and family aren’t professionals. I’d rather hear from professionals.

By: HairySwede

HairySwede — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 20:08:23 +0000

Never would have thought of this! It makes perfect sense though to read it. Thanks for the tip.

By: HP van Duuren

HP van Duuren — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 20:11:56 +0000

Yes, it’s really useful to get feedback. Recently made some improvements to my blog, because of some of the feedback I received. Now I have several way’s people can give feedback, by placing comments, sign my guestbook, or write in the ‘Shoutbox’ there is also a ‘Life Chat’ and a ‘Poll’
Your welcome on my blog to take a look and let me know what you think.

All the Best,
HPvD.

By: Los

Los — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 20:56:03 +0000

Great post, I actually posted it as a blog.

By: Gema

Gema — Tue, 14 Aug 2007 14:22:47 +0000

First Time Reader Audit (Result)

Bad English, it doesn’t mean a rock band. That is a comment from my first time readers about my blog :) I ask my friends to open my blog in front of me and watch their activity in this blog and make some evaluation. I ask their review, comment and suggest. You was right; I got much valuable review from them. I list evaluation conclusion on my blog.

By: Alex Miller

Alex Miller — Sun, 05 Aug 2007 05:40:43 +0000

My “First Time Reader” keeps telling my they were impressed by the cleanliness of my blog, how easy it was to read. They were not interested in the content, as it is not relevant to them, more interest in the layout, design and personal pages….

Here are the repsonses…

* What were their first impressions? CLEAR, CLEAN LINES, EASY TO READ
* What did they first think your blog was about when they arrived at it? BORING I.T. SHIT AND WORK STUFF THAT DOESN’T INTEREST ME
* Did they find it easy to read/navigate/understand? VERY
* What did they ‘feel’ when they first arrived at your blog? IMPRESSED
* What suggestions do they have on how you could improve your blog? NO SUGGESTIONS
* What questions do they have having surfed your blog? ARE YOU A NERD?
* What words would they use to describe the design? CLEAN
* What are the main things that they remember about your blog 10 minutes later? THE BLUE, THE CLEAN LINES, THE LINKS AND WHO AM I PAGE

By: Charles

Charles — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 11:49:47 +0000

again great tip! will try this on my “new” site which is in development stage, so great moment to make it more user friendly…

By: Michele Martin

Michele Martin — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 10:27:05 +0000

Great tip! I’ve actually committed to doing each of the 31 exercises and blogging about the results daily and have challenged bloggers who read my blog to join me in going through these exercises. Several have already taken me up on it. And the process of writing up my results is really forcing me to think things through. Thanks Darren–I’m already seeing an increase in community!

By: Wendy

Wendy — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 07:37:57 +0000

I learned that people have very short attention spans!!

By: Eric

Eric — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 04:10:44 +0000

I have a new blog I just started and today I had a friend surf my blog. Here’s what I found out.

- The user (friend) never really scrolled down the page. He pretty much just looked at the first post and what links were in the left and right nav

- I’m not sure the user understood exactly what the site was about, nor how to use it (Not into blogs)

- I have a content block on my site called “essentials” which was empty because I was going to place pillar articles there. Unfortunately, the articles are not done. The user kept trying to click on this block of content to reveal its contents. After talking with him a bit, he was looking for essentials on “How to use the site”. This got me thinking, maybe I need a page explaining what the site is about and how to best use it.

- Lastly, my site is about recommending fun online applications. I noticed the user would click away from my site and play with the site I was recommending. The user spent a good 5 minutes just testing out the application. Not sure if this is good or bad, but it took a while before the user went back to my site (actually I had to nudge him back)