Written on April 30th, 2009 at 09:04 pm by Darren Rowse
Ask a Question: 10 Reasons Why Questions Work & 12 Tips on How to Ask Them [Day 25: 31DBBB]
Today’s task in the 31 Days to Build a Better Blog Challengeis to ask your readers a question.
10 Reasons to ask Your Readers Questions
Asking readers questions is a fantastic way to grow you blog for a number of reasons – here are 10.
- It gives readers a sense of community and participation – there’s nothing like coming to a blog where readers are interacting to give a blog a sense of being alive.
- It increases Blog Stickiness – people are more likely to return to a blog that they’ve contributed something to
- Question posts don’t take a whole lot of effort to write (although can take some moderation)
- Question posts are fantastic for helping you to gauge where your readers are at on certain topics.
- Getting reader responses can fuel future post ideas for your blog
- They open up opportunities for followup posts as you summarize the answers, pick up conversations and even answer the question yourself etc.
- Well worded questions can often rank well in search engines. Pick a question that people are going to be asking when they search the web for answers and optimize your page for that question and you could rank quite well.
- They can be great for generating incoming links to your blog as other bloggers pick up the conversation on their own blogs.
- When a reader comments it gives you means to enter into conversation with that person (either by responding with a comment and/or via email). In the early days of a blog it can especially be good to do this as those few readers you have can help to spread word of your blog into their network.
- Reader answers can sometimes be used as actual posts. I’ve promoted the comments people have made on my blog to actual blog posts (with a few extra comments of my own and giving credit to the comment leaver of course).
Some bloggers resist writing question posts because they are scared that nobody will answer the question. This can certainly be a little disheartening – but if you construct the post well and include your own answer to the question then at least there is something there of value even if the conversation doesn’t emerge.
Remember that only around 1% of blog readers tend to leave comments – so if you don’t get a lot of responses it doesn’t mean that no one is reading your blog – keep trying.
12 Tips for Asking Your Readers Questions on Your Blog
When it comes to asking your readers questions there are no real rules as to the type of questions and how you should go about it. However, here are 12 tips that I’ve found helpful:
- Keep the question relevant to Your Blog’s Topic
- Ask a question that builds on a previous post – for example, on DPS I wrote a post about the pros and cons of shooting in RAW vs JPEG. The post was quite popular so I followed it up with a post asking readers what they shot in.
- Ask questions that are answerable (this might sound dumb but sometimes questions are so hard to answer that people don’t)
- Ask questions that readers will want to know the answer to – so ask a question on a hot topic which you think readers will want to have insight into what others think or do.
- Suggest to your readers some possible answers – I find that when I give some options to choose between that it can help a discussion get going.
- Sometimes either/or questions (where there are only two answers to choose from) can be great for generating a debate – they are easy to answer and a great way to help train your readers to comment (the RAW/JPEG question post answered above is an example of this).
- You may like to try using a Poll tool to give your readers a way to vote on a number of options
- Controversial questions can be a great way to get a conversation going – but be aware readers could get fired up.
- Be willing to share your own answer – but if you’re confident you’ll get people responding you might want to consider holding off on your own answer and do it in a follow up post (this means 2 posts instead of 1 but also means you won’t skew your reader’s answers)
- Do you have a frequently asked question that you don’t know how to answer? Ask your readers for their opinion – you might learn something. I often use ‘community workshop’ type questions where I simply pose a question and ask readers for advice on the topic – the comments section really becomes the resource (see examples below).
- Sometimes more personal (yet on topic) questions can be worth asking. For example don’t just ask what people ‘think’ about some sort of theoretical question – but ask them what they ‘do’ or about their own lives. For example a while back I asked readers to tell me what their favorite lens was at DPS – it was a question answered by over 200 people – at the time it was my most commented upon post.
- Follow up your question posts with summaries of answers – if you get a lot of responses it can be well worth your time to collate the answers in a new post. This shows your readers that you value their answers but also creates an interesting post. For example – with the question post on what readers favorite lenses were I wrote a summary of popular DSLR lenses. The response from these two posts was fantastic as many readers not only had a say on a topic but enjoyed reading what others were doing.
Having all that in mind – your homework for today is to go back to your blog/s and ask a question of your readers.
Once you’ve done that, come back to this post and share the link with us so we can check it out and see how you’ve approached it.
PS – Some Examples of Question Posts I use ‘reader questions’ regularly on my photography site. In fact they are among the most popular posts on the blog in terms of page views and in terms of generating comments.
Following are a few ‘reader question’ posts that I’ve run on DPS – I hope that in sharing them you’ll get some ideas for different types of questions to ask:
- Which Digital Camera Manufacturer is Best? – a question that there really is no one answer to and which caused some real debate. I followed it up with a summary post – Best Digital Camera Manufacturers.
- Win a Prize By Telling us About Your Digital Camera – in this instance I offered a prize for people to answer the question (they answered in the DPS forum).
- What Digital Camera Do You Use? – another question aimed at getting readers to share their own experiences of gear that they use. This gave me valuable data on the type of reader I had but also provided me with great data for a follow up post.
- What Shooting Mode do you Shoot in Most? – asking this question then gave me an opportunity to link to posts that I’d previously written on the topic at the bottom of the post. I also followed it up with some posts on the same topic as the question itself really opened up a topic that some of my readers hadn’t explored much before.
- How Would You Photograph a Funeral? – this is a ‘community workshop’ type post where I posed a question from a reader and let my readers give their advice and tips. I find these question posts particularly effective as they not only answer a reader’s question but the answers from the community become a fantastic resource. Other examples of this include ‘How to Photograph Grandma‘ and ‘How do I Photograph Kids?‘
- Share Your Best Shot Ever – this post simply asked readers to share a link to their best photograph. It gave readers a chance to show off their work a little – it was very popular.
Want More?This task is a sample of one of the tasks in the 31 Days to Build a Better Blog Workbook – a downloadable resource designed to reinvigorate and revitalize blogs. Join over 14,000 other bloggers and Get your Copy Today. |
83 Responses to “Ask a Question: 10 Reasons Why Questions Work & 12 Tips on How to Ask Them [Day 25: 31DBBB]” - Add Yours
Chetan
April 30th, 2009 9:09 pm
The best part about questioning I like is that it gives the readers a sense of community. People love to be in community. Asking questions or even running contests based on some questions can be really fruitful.
Lee
April 30th, 2009 9:13 pm
Darren have you ever asked a question that led to a flame war? If so, how did you handle the resulting comments?
Miracel
April 30th, 2009 9:26 pm
You read my thoughts, Darren. That is my greatest fear that no one would respond to my question. But I will try to rise up to the challenge and hopefully there will be people who will respond.
Baker @ ManVsDebt
April 30th, 2009 9:33 pm
I’ve had some awesome respond from asking questions like this. I really wasn’t aware of what I was doing until reading this article. For me, it’s just a natural way to get people involved.
I have a decent amount of titles that are based around a question. One thing I always try to do, regardless of title, is to ask questions at the very end to help to try stimulate comments. I really do think it has helped make people more comfortable contributing.
I’d also like to say that I’ve networked with a lot of other bloggers through this challenge. Whether they came to my blog first or I discovered them, it’s such an awesome experience. Thanks for the opportunity to network with so many cool people!
Stephanie @ Faithful Follower Of Christ
April 30th, 2009 9:46 pm
I love the responses I get when I ask readers questions. Often times I find out some very interesting things when I do, and I find that it helps me to connect with them more. It also helps me in getting comments with more depth to them, instead of just “Great post!”
Matthew
April 30th, 2009 9:51 pm
I actually asked my readers a question just last Friday! Unfortunately, I only got one response and I had to chase down a friend for that. :(
I think that maybe I asked too hard of a question (item number 3), or two many questions in one post.
What do you think?
http://adventure-some.com/personal/dear-readers/
Fred
April 30th, 2009 9:53 pm
Now, that comes handy and solves my problem:
With the growing popularity of TheTrimTab, I receive inquiries from readers that would like to participate in our conference call (The Bucky Call) that studies Bucky Fuller’s Critical Path for one hour every week.
Point in case is how can we open what is now a small discussion group of 15 persons from 8 countries to a larger audience of maybe hundreds?
Obviously, it will have to become something else – what is less obvious, is what will it become?
I intend to open the discussion by outlining several directions we could take and ask readers to help enrich the possibilities and possibly contribute to what technology could be used to make this call accessible to all.
Thank you Darren, this “ask a question” suggestion come just at the right moment for me.
Joel
April 30th, 2009 10:02 pm
I asked a question on Twitter last night for the specific purpose of collecting the responses and posting them. So I did a follow-up post on my blog this morning.
Why Do You Teach: In 140 Characters
Bradford Shimp
April 30th, 2009 10:12 pm
Wow – easiest post I have ever written. Now I need to make sure I get some responses. I plan to directly ask for feedback from some of my Twitter network to get the ball rolling.
My question post is – Do You Have a Salesperson? – http://digg.com/u126Oc
If you have a business, I would love it if you came and commented.
Vicki@collegeparentcentral
April 30th, 2009 10:37 pm
Another great task for the day! We’ve definitely been busy with the homework this month. But you’ve found just the right size “chunk” of work for each day – a doable task. I really like, in this post, that you’ve asked us to do something, given us suggestions about how to do it, and then given us examples. It’s clear that this is a good thing to do – and clear how to go about it.
Asking questions on my blog forces me to think about what my readers may want to know – and what they already know that they can share. It helps me put the focus back on the readers – not only what I know. Getting them engaged is so key to success.
Guess I’d better get to work!
Samuel
April 30th, 2009 10:42 pm
I love asking questions on my blog as I really love the discussions. The only thing that makes me hesitate is the possibility that a question goes unanswered and makes my blog look like it has no active readers. :)
I’m now getting a number of comments each day so I shall definitely give this a whirl. :)
Thanks,
Sam
Darren Rowse
April 30th, 2009 10:45 pm
Lee – have had a few ‘robust’ discussions on my blogs but nothing too bad. I think the main thing is just to be on top of it and to model the way you want your readers to interact with each other. If you write in a polite and useful way you tend to attract that kind of comment.
Alison
April 30th, 2009 10:52 pm
My post for today: Have you or would you move in relatives.
http://newlifeasnewwife.blogspot.com/2009/04/uncle-jesse-vs-uncle-scott.html
I try to ask question regularly. Sometimes I get responses, other times I don’t. For me, it’s a matter of finding better questions to ask that relate to my readers.
Thanks for the post today Darren
Lee
April 30th, 2009 10:53 pm
@Darren
The most successful post I ever had asked a polite question and started well.
However, after a hundred or so comments it became very personal between the readers so I ended up deleting the entire post, such was my annoyance with the situation.
I guess in future the best advice would probably be to lock the comments down if it happens again?
Sharon Hurley Hall
April 30th, 2009 11:02 pm
I have tried this a couple of times, but often find that I get more response to opinion pieces. Anyway, here’s mine: Has Recession Been Good For Your Writing Business?
Sorry, please delete previous version – link was faulty.
Aidil TipsGoda
April 30th, 2009 11:11 pm
What a coincidence.I posted a discussion topic on how technologies affected our dating/relationship habits and ask my readers questions.
http://www.tipsgoda.com/2009/04/technologies-keep-you-close-with-one.html
Personally i like post that involve me to ask questions because it gives me a lot of interactions with my readers
Roy Schwartz
April 30th, 2009 11:18 pm
Never asked a question before on the blog. Started now with a question about, what else, swine flu:
http://bit.ly/dR3mz
Shane - Inspiring Your Success
April 30th, 2009 11:23 pm
I always ask questions on every poist but people rarely answer… any suggestions?
VisaLittleboy
April 30th, 2009 11:56 pm
Hi Darren,
I also had a question post on my blog few days ago talking about “Stress” (http://visablogging.blogspot.com/2009/04/what-you-do-when-you-stress.html), but no people answer my post yet!
May be the post is not interested by the readers or what wrong with it?
Should I continue writing question posts more?
RhondaL
May 1st, 2009 12:05 am
I asked a question on mine a few months ago: “Is there anything you would like to see here?”
I did add that I wasn’t out of ideas because I didn’t want to give the impression that I was running out of steam (and so was the blog.)
But I got no replies. My blog doesn’t get a lot of comments anyway. I suspect that my readers are a passive lot.
Kevin @ The Money Hawk
May 1st, 2009 12:16 am
Do you recommend asking questions even if you don’t have a lot of readers/reader participation yet?
I don’t want to look stupid asking a question and getting like 2 responses.
I think lots of people come to my blog for the information but just don’t feel the need to comment.
Miguel Wickert | Simply Blog
May 1st, 2009 12:17 am
Wuz UP everyone!
Still behind but trying to catch up as I’m also going through final exams this week. After today’s exam, I’ll be ready for the next day! Excellent work everyone, I’ve seen a number of sites and interaction in the forums. You guys are really being helpful. Continue on and all the best!
-Mig
Mario
May 1st, 2009 12:18 am
I just asked a “very simple” question: What would you like to do today?
I’m really curious.
Here’s the post: http://mario-live.com/blog/2009/04/today/
Andi
May 1st, 2009 12:41 am
This is something I do frequently,, and you’re right, it can be very scary waiting to see if people will respond! http://budurl.com/8yd4
Karenne Sylvester
May 1st, 2009 1:05 am
Great tip again, thanks Darren.
My question is based on a question I read in a forum, disagreed with and wanted to know what others thought regarding what’s been happening to the range and usage of good vocabulary today that everyone’s using twitter and facebook:
http://kalinago.blogspot.com/2009/04/in-age-of-twitter-and-facebook-whats.html
Mario
May 1st, 2009 1:25 am
@Andi,
You don’t have to be scared because you have one!
Mrs Green
May 1st, 2009 1:28 am
Brilliant and so timely Darren; thank you – I put up a question on my blog this morning about recycling. I asked people to complete the following sentence
“The one thing from holding me back from recycling more is…”
I would love it please, if some of you would come along and leave your answer :)
You can find it here:
http://myzerowaste.com/2009/04/just-thirty-seconds-of-your-time/
Matthew – I took a look at your question and your site. You’ve asked a VERY open ended question for a relatively new site and I think it’s too broad.
Your question isn’t even a question if you take it literally – you’ve asked “where do you want this site to go?” Well, I’d like it to go to Hawaii please, if I’m going to answer literally – see what I mean?
i would narrow it down to give choices or would ask what the most helpful / interesting post on the site has been or would you like to see more ….. and then give choices
You’ve then gone to ask 4 more questions after your original non-question and have completely lost the theme of what you were originally (not) asking.
Confused?
So are your readers LOL!
Not being picky; just trying to help …
Try it again, with one very simple question and see how you get on :)
ITrush
May 1st, 2009 1:41 am
I love the tips for asking readers a question.. thanks for sharing Darren and hopefully I can implement it right away.
Nichelle
May 1st, 2009 1:48 am
My question about competitive dance: http://danceadvantage.net/2009/04/30/pros-cons-dance-competition/
siobhan curious
May 1st, 2009 2:05 am
Darren:
I was totally inspired by this tip. I immediately dashed off a post about a question that’s been bugging me – why is President Obama threatening to increase in-school hours; will this really benefit children? I posted it to both my regular WordPress blog
http://siobhancurious.wordpress.com/2009/04/30/will-more-school-make-us-better-people/#comment-1317
and my blog at OpenSalon.
http://open.salon.com/blog/siobhan_curious/2009/04/30/the_most_important_skill_we_learn_in_school#post_comments
The WordPress blog has been quiet, but the post immediately popped up on the OpenSalon cover and the discussion has been very lively! So thanks for the inspiration. I will do this question thing more regularly from now on.
Michael Grills
May 1st, 2009 2:43 am
Ok,
So I mixed a list with a question.
http://arthub.ca/2009/04/30/my-top-4-favorite-blogs-that-help-artists-and-illustrators/
Its my favorite blogs. And I am sure most of you have the same list. But I want to share the love.
Terry
May 1st, 2009 3:00 am
Last month I wrote a “Places to Think” article on my blog. If this lesson was earlier I would have titled it –
Where do you do your most productive thinking?
http://terrysthinking.wordpress.com/2009/03/09/places-to-think/
Thanks for making me think about this!
So Darren, where do you do your most productive thinking?
Bumbles
May 1st, 2009 3:20 am
Well, coincidentally we did a post last night for today that is filled with questions. However, the responses aren’t exactly what we had hoped. Either our readers aren’t getting the point that we truly do want their input on the topics or they don’t really care. To be fair, we may have asked too many questions – but the meme for which the post was created is structured for that length. I would love to know what all of you think.
http://thebumblesblog.blogspot.com/2009/04/on-blogging-suggestion-box.html
Sam
May 1st, 2009 3:52 am
Here’s my post. A question or probably a few questions that everyone can answer:
http://trendycellular.com/blog/do-you-text-and-drive/
Make Money Online
May 1st, 2009 4:59 am
This type of posts always lead to lot of reader involvement. Everyone is excited to answer. However we need some traffic to ask a question.
John Murch
May 1st, 2009 5:27 am
Awesome Idea to encourage dialog. Just posted my question: “What startup would you start today?”
http://www.johnmurch.com/2009/04/30/what-startup-would-you-start-today/
Matthew
May 1st, 2009 5:34 am
@Mrs Green
Thanks for the response, that wasn’t too harsh (indeed, it was what I suspected). I will go back and re-frame the question in a more direct/answerable form.
Ricardo Bueno
May 1st, 2009 6:16 am
My question to my readers today is: is it ok to take a blogging break?
http://www.ribeezie.com/ribeezie/2009/04/is-it-ok-to-take-a-blogging-break.html
It’s been my experience that sometimes it’s easier to elicit a response from readers when you place a poll into your post. In my case I’ve been using Polldaddy.com which has been great so far.
Other times, it’s a matter of asking the right/relevant question. I take questions that readers ask me via Twitter, email or anywhere else and turn that into a post.
Karen McAllister
May 1st, 2009 6:27 am
Another great post, Darren. Helped me come up with today’s post on a newsy event here in Tampa Bay: IKEA’s grand opening next week. I asked why would you camp out to shop for furniture (as people typically do before IKEA openings).
http://blogs.tampabay.com/talk/2009/04/what-makes-you-an-ikea-fanatic-or-hater.html
Jackie
May 1st, 2009 7:32 am
Terrific post Darren. These pointers will surely get me into putting new stuff on my blog; maybe starting this question posts would really be interesting.
thank you very much.
Ark Lady
May 1st, 2009 7:42 am
Funny, I needed something simple to do as a task and this fit the bill!
Although I am waiting on the comments now. Yesterday, I did manage to get some good ones in conjunction with a rant I did.
Most of my posts I felt are opinion pieces but I vented and found others jumped in to share their opinions as well.
Interesting…
Schalk Neethling
May 1st, 2009 7:50 am
Nice suggestion that I try and do ever so often. Here is my latest: http://www.opensourcereleasefeed.com/article/show/windows-7-freeish-will-you-upgrade-or-switch-anyway
Tony
May 1st, 2009 8:25 am
I just want to say, WOW where does the time go? It’s already 25 days on this 31 DBBB post and it seems just like yesterday Darren just started this. A friend of mine told me about Pro Blogger a few months ago, I have and still will keep getting my tips and stuff from pro blogger. Darren as usual keep up the good work!! I wish I was as good as you.
Tony
Laura Simmons
May 1st, 2009 8:56 am
I really like this one. It has many possibilities and could be used as a tool to make your blog more effective as well as more interactive and therefore more popular.
Mario
May 1st, 2009 9:31 am
@Tony
Totally agree with you. I wish I was as good as Darren also.
I consider to stop blogging.
ezFreeSamples.com
May 1st, 2009 12:08 pm
I am going to have to come up with some questions to ask my viewers, but I do not really know what kind of questions do you ask for a freebies blog?
http://www.ezfreesamples.com
any ideas?
Joel
May 1st, 2009 12:09 pm
As I posted above, I posted a question on Twitter and my blog about Why Do You Teach?
After I got home and wrapped everything up tonight, I posted the results:
Why I Teach: Twitter Poll
You may notice that I closed comments on the original post and sent readers to the results post so that they can continue the discussion there.
By the way, thanks to all of you who came from this post and added your comments or tweets!
Joel
May 1st, 2009 12:13 pm
Oh yeah, to those of you who are starting to get traffic on your blog and yet still aren’t getting comments, I think we’ve all been there.
Just hang in there, respond to the comments you do get, and email those who comment thanking them for it. You might also want to suggest another post of yours that you’d like to hear their thoughts on.
Especially in the early days, establishing a relationship with the readers is key. If you can get a few hardcore fans, make them famous on your blog, some of their readers will come on over. Start small, and remember most blogs don’t start out getting dozens of comments a day for over a year of miserable existence.
Use the small time to really capitalize on what you can do, find your blogging voice, and start to build an incredible resource!
jenna
May 1st, 2009 12:52 pm
I am so busy that I’m actually only up to Day 8 so far and I’m only reading each email/post as I have time to do it. I had to skip ahead and read this one though because I just asked a question on my blog yesterday. It was more of an “invitation to dscuss” but the same concept.
There are 33 comments on it so far, which is very gratifying!
“Let’s talk about the benefits to ourselves, our families and society that we have personally experienced from having our pets in our lives.”
http://jennaandsnickers.com/2009/04/benefit-companion-animals-society/
Becki
May 1st, 2009 1:18 pm
I asked, “What is Your Biggest Leadership Challenge in This Economy?”
I wonder what other leaders are facing and what they are doing to deal with the added distractions.
I don’t have a lot of readers or people who comment, so I’m curious to see what level of response I get.
http://blog.beckitrue.com/http:/blog.beckitrue.com/2009/04/30/what-is-your-biggest-leadership-challenge-in-this-economy/
venkat
May 1st, 2009 3:37 pm
It’s always good to ask questions which gives interaction of readers with others as they share their views.As questions also give usefull info from readers which even blog authors don’t know.
Robyn
May 1st, 2009 5:20 pm
I used this task to find people to respond.
hopefully I will recieve helpful comments
http://outbackselfhelp.blogspot.com/2009/05/what-would-you-ask-before-coming-to.html
BizMind
May 1st, 2009 6:33 pm
I’m way behind now. Though, I try to catch up. Since most of my visitors are interested in business, I choose to post a question of what business development courses they would like to take if they lack business know-how.
Entrepreneur-minded people can post comments in my post. Here’s the page to go:
http://entrebankph.com/what-business-skills-development-courses-you-would-like-to-take/
Janet Bianchini
May 1st, 2009 7:38 pm
I have asked 2 questions recently which have had no comments and this has got me down somewhat. So for today’s task, I have tried to rephrase the 2 questions by following Darren’s tips. My questions were:
1) Is there more to life than Twitter?
2) Do you think it is a good idea for the summer G8 Summit to be held in Aquila?
Janet’s Abruzzo Edublog – http:civitaquana.blogspot.com
Avish Parashar
May 1st, 2009 9:18 pm
Interesting, I have resisted this for that exact reason: with a low subscriber base I have always been afraid that i would post a question and no one would respond. But I am up for trying again:
Question: What’s your big “Ding”? http://www.avishparashar.blogspot.com/ Thanks!
(A “ding” is an unexpected interruption or annoyance. Readers of my blog know this, and I explain it in the post too)
Thanks!
Avish
MJ Doyle
May 2nd, 2009 12:07 am
It’s funny that this came up today because I just tried asking a question in a post I wrote two days ago (I remember reading about the benefit on this blog a while back). No comments yet, but here’s what I did:
http://www.sosyourlife.com/invite-opportunity-organizing-paper-clutter-part-1/
Megan
May 2nd, 2009 12:10 am
Lately, I’ve been trying to ask questions in my posts to try to get readers more involved. the most recent was about whether they make their own granola or buy it and what recipes they use or brands they buy.
http://megan-deliciousdishings.blogspot.com/2009/05/henriettas-table-granola.html
Wojciech @ Fiscal Fizzle
May 2nd, 2009 12:28 am
I asked a question last night about whether it’s better for one or both parents to work when you have a baby. It’s brought out a lot of first-time commenters. Awesome assignment.
http://www.fiscalfizzle.com/2009/04/readers-weigh-in-is-it-better-for-one-or-both-parents-to-work/
Clay Hebert
May 2nd, 2009 1:20 am
Great assignment, Darren. Now that Tropicana relented and almost all the cartons are back to the original design, I asked readers what they thought.
<a href=”http://dailysense.com/?p=568″ DailySense.com: A branding mistake, corrected
Clay Hebert
May 2nd, 2009 1:24 am
Sorry – link corrected:
DailySense.com: A branding mistake, corrected
Jackie
May 2nd, 2009 2:59 am
Definitely questions makes our blogs dynamic. And people love that, I know I would. So thanks for that lesson.
Jackie
http://www.internetmarketing.com-seemore.info/
Lynn
May 2nd, 2009 4:38 am
I’ve fallen off the wagon a bit with the challenges, but I hope to go back to the others sometime, and I did do this one. My question is here:
http://infantbibliophile.blogspot.com/2009/05/help-me-give-my-google-reader-new-life.html
Lynn at Chronicle of an Infant Bibliophile
R Kumar
May 2nd, 2009 7:09 pm
This activity is sure to increase the interactivity of a blog. Most of the blogs have a one-way delivery system where the blogger keeps on writing about things that he feels are valuable and the readers can choose to read the post or, browse away if that does not interest them. But in a blog post like the one that you have asked us to write, the readers will have a choice of expressing themselves, consequently giving the blogger information on what to write next and what is it that the readers want to read.
I was always scared of a post returning no comments and hence was reluctant in an interactive kind of a post, because that would demoralize me. But once I started getting some comments in my blog, I gained the confidence to do it. But the right way of doing it is to keep doing it with a bit of tweak here and there, each time you do it and check the performance of the post based on the number of visits to the blog and not the comments.
BeatlesTrivia
May 3rd, 2009 12:54 am
Every single post on my blog is a question! A trivia question, more specifically. The only thing is, I’m not asking for visitors to answer them. The answers are provided along with some additional info. The question format does seem to help with search engine queries when people type in a question similar to what I have asked. So #7 in your 10 Reasons list is especially fitting for my blog.
Seslichat
May 3rd, 2009 2:12 am
thkans
Angel Taylor
May 3rd, 2009 3:56 am
This is a good idea, I hadn’t thought about doing this but it is a wonderful way to get your readers involved. I will definitly try this out on my own blog. Thanks
Leisa Watkins
May 3rd, 2009 4:04 am
I was working on a question post when I got your assignment. It did take me several days to finish however, due to problems with the poll plug-in I tried.
I took my most popular post
Top 100 Best Novels Of All Time – A Compilation of the Best Books and created a poll around it
asking my readers to tell me what there 10 favorite novels from the list were. (
Readers Choice Poll: What is the Best Novel of All Time?) I also created
another post asking them which books they think should be on the list.
Giovanni
May 3rd, 2009 11:42 pm
You are totally right.
One of the first things I did with my blog is setting up a post page asking a question to my readers and.
The best part of it is that I am redirecting my subscribers to that page so that they can answer to my question.
What do I get? The answers are a mix of personal and buseness and allow me to get a good connection with my readers.
Thanks for this article.
Karen Chaffee
May 4th, 2009 3:55 am
I have asked readers questions at the end of each post for a while now. I genuinely like to know their point of view. And yes, it gets the reader to interact!
http://www.peacefulwmn9.com
Maddie Grant
May 4th, 2009 6:47 am
I actually don’t do this often enough, and I now have started a little list in draft of things I might want to ask people. But I did ask my Yapstars (Young Association Professionals) to tell me their story over on Yapstar.org, and that has turned out to be really really awesome.
Ecommerce Help - Tyrone Shum
May 4th, 2009 9:17 pm
To be truthful, I haven’t tried asking questions to my readers. Actually, I merely depend on their comments, feedbacks or suggestions on whether I should do this or that. Although, I will like to do so, since interaction and giving your readers a hint of apprecitation is always valuable if you want to obtain a user-friendly site and a site that is always frequented by visitors due to you being friendly. Apart from this, asking also brings about comments even a few on your first time.
Elena
May 5th, 2009 2:55 am
One thing I’ve learned from reading this is that a question has to be well thought out. If not, then you do run the risk of not having comments. Mine being a new blog has been very difficult to get any comments. In fact, I am surprised when I do get them. Still, the examples here are instrumental in making your blog more multi-dimensional. Have a great day.
Wayne
May 5th, 2009 10:21 am
I use questions in my travel blog almost every day. This, I have found is a good way to encourage people to respond with their comments.
Here’s a blog on “What to do in Sedona?” I used with a great amount of success: http://www.traveltothewest.com/?p=1174
I also did a current blog using current events – swine flu – and its effect on travel on another blog: http://www.traveltothewest.com/?p=1312
I would appreciate any comments you all have with these two.
Thank you,
Wayne
elizof
May 5th, 2009 8:55 pm
I pose questions to my blog readers all the time and the challenge is getting them to actually respond to the questions. I have taken quite a lot of the tips I have learned here and applied them to the way I write my blogs. I now leave out the tendency to answer questions on every facet of my topic. This is something I must admit I used to do a lot but no longer do… I agree that asking questions and leaving room in the blog for thought and opinion is a great way to make people think and respond… Would love to hear from you!
Thanks Darren.
Viviana
May 6th, 2009 1:27 am
I try to ask questions in a lot of my posts to get interaction with my readers but I must be doing something wrong as I don’t get many responses or comments.
This is my most recent post which does ask a question – any feedback would be greatly appreciated!
http://www.theleantimes.com/?p=556
Sam sall
May 6th, 2009 4:06 am
Hi,
In my post for this task is asked about what make you submit a post to social network service like digg it
http://www.speechstarter.com/when-do-you-dig-it/
العاب شمس
May 6th, 2009 9:15 am
Great post Dareen , I’m grateful to you , thanks a lot.
mas-aripp
May 6th, 2009 11:17 pm
How far we can ask a question to the visitors? If I ask them about something outside my posts for example politics, then visitors maybe dislike it. What is your opinion ?
Kimberley Payne
May 10th, 2009 11:26 am
I followed the advice and plan to pose a question every Saturday. The first question I asked my readers today is whether they prefer to exercise at a gym or in their own home.
http://fitforfaith.blogspot.com/2009/05/exercise-at-gym-vs-at-home.html
JayeL
May 10th, 2009 12:43 pm
http://artquiltmaker.com/blog
My blog is about creativity, design and quilts.
The recent question I put to my readers was about the arrangement of a quilt. You can see it: http://artquiltmaker.com/blog/2009/05/tarts-arrangement/
Justice44
May 20th, 2009 6:48 am
Hi Darren,
Again excellent post. I will use this in my identity theft blogs. Actually, I plan to ask questions about being an identity theft victim.
I have used a lot of questions as threads in forum post. I was unsure if question blogs were appropriate. However, your reasons why they are valuable are convincing.
Danielle Ingram
May 20th, 2009 5:46 pm
I think the number of comments on this post goes to show that questions work!
I think questions are useful for any writing whether a blog, article headline etc. They are a great way to engage readers and as you said create a sense of community by bringing like minded people together!
Great post!
ed hardy
June 29th, 2009 5:07 pm
I always learn from Pro bloggers, and you’re actually one of them! Thanks for sharing Darren :)
your ten reasons for why we should ask questions to our readers to grow our blog are very amazing. people always curious about what are added following their answers to our questions. that one way to increase your blog pr.
Comments will be closed off on this post 90 days after it is published. Apologies to those this impacts but it's a regrettable and temporary measure to combat a growing comment spam problem. See our most recent posts where you can comment here.