Written on September 24th, 2009 at 01:09 am by Darren Rowse
Principles of Successful Blogging – Confessions of a ProBlogger
This post is a collection point of links in a long series that I’m writing on principles of successful blogging. It was originally stimulated by a presentation that I gave at the MarketingNow conference here in Melbourne. I shared my story of blogging and then explore 25 or so lessons that I’d learned as a blogger in the 7 years since I started.
Following is the slide deck from the presentation. It might not make a lot of sense without the commentary (the presentation went for an hour and a half and the slides are not that detailed) but I had quite a few people asking to see it and wanted to share what I’d put together.
Over the coming months I’ll take each of the lessons and put them into a series of posts fleshing them out – but in the mean time – I hope you find the slide deck to give a little inspiration.
Here are the posts exploring these principles of successful blogging so far:
- A Post explaining the Homebases and Outposts slides
- Listening
- Trust
- Usefulness
- Community
- Being Personal
- Telling Stories (plus telling stories part 2).
- Uniqueness
- Leveraging What You Have to Take Your Blog to the Next Level
A quick explanation – slides 1-22 go with the telling of my story of blogging and slides 23-51 each go with the ‘lessons’.



38 Responses to “Principles of Successful Blogging – Confessions of a ProBlogger” - Add Yours
Beesz.com
September 24th, 2009 2:11 am
I loving it, thank you so much for sharing with us.
Dave Braden
September 24th, 2009 2:12 am
Great slide Darren. I look forward to the break down! I love the be transparent slide! You’ve got that one locked down.
Sebastian
September 24th, 2009 2:19 am
Looking forward to the valuable lessons, the slides tell a story but needs the added flesh to understand it.
Great Slide.
Jenny
September 24th, 2009 2:25 am
Thanks for sharing. Even without the commentary.. can still take away some great ideas/lessons from these.
Shajib
September 24th, 2009 2:45 am
hmmm… Thats nice.
Greg Ellison
September 24th, 2009 2:52 am
That was a cool slide show. Greg Ellison
William Womack
September 24th, 2009 3:07 am
I really liked the posts about building up a home base and then leveraging social media to help you build your home base faster.
The points of being prolific and valuable are also really good ones. (obviously, otherwise you wouldn’t have said them, lol)
Just those 3 points helped me go from 20 visitors a day, to now around 200! (Which is a TON for me.)
And it all happened in 45 days or so.
Thanks for the slideshow, I’m looking forward to the “fleshier” posts!
Jenny
September 24th, 2009 3:12 am
This is exceptionally inspiring and very succinct too.
There’s a lot of critical aspects to blogging that I struggle with – namely, community. And as social networking continues to grow and grow, I’m realizing that that aspect of blogging is going to be evermore important to my site’s future growth. It’s like I’m so focused on building content that I overlook the other, more community-oriented aspects of blogging. When I get a surge in comments or emails etc, I get overwhelmed and throw up my hands in the air because I’m not particularly well-equipped to respond quickly to everyone.
At any rate, I’m looking forward to seeing how you address community in subsequent posts.
Ivan
September 24th, 2009 3:29 am
Excellent! Don’t need much to say… But, when do you say “be prolific” you refer to ebooks or something like that?
Web Marketing Tips
September 24th, 2009 3:36 am
Hmmm looking interesting one. Let me save it so that I can have it on my weekends. I am also looking for good post like you posted as How to promote blog
If you have any such kind of posts again than please let us know.
Wesley Craig Green
September 24th, 2009 3:54 am
While the slideshow is interesting to look at, it definitely needs a soundtrack to get the full effect.
I hope you do take the time to expand on some of the pointers you “mention” in the slideshow.
BTW, very cool and creative use of graphics in the slideshow!
Wesley Craig Green
The Geek Entrepreneur
ChristopherR2D2
September 24th, 2009 3:58 am
Nice post — love seeing glimpses of your early days as a blogger!
@Jenny1 — Agree fo’ sho’
:o
Paramendra Bhagat
September 24th, 2009 5:07 am
I would like to see the 90 minute video. :-)
Ms. Freeman
September 24th, 2009 5:12 am
Actually some of them make perfectly good sense without the commentary; however I do look forward to the serious.
Thanks for sharing :)
Ms. Freeman
September 24th, 2009 5:15 am
Hi Darren,
You know what? I have a question.
How come you don’t use an avatar in your comment section? Just about every blog I visit and comment on displays the reader/commenter’s gravatar.
Is there a strategy behind this? Is it simply for aesthetics?
Fakhrul Alam
September 24th, 2009 5:50 am
Great great post and the slide show was wonderfull and very useful but I want to ask a question to Darren.
How long did it took you to grow like that…
Waiting for the answer.
Thanks
Alam
abrablog
September 24th, 2009 6:10 am
nice confession. HOho!
Christina Sponias
September 24th, 2009 7:36 am
Thank you for the nice slides!
The steps for real success are too many, but the results, really great.
Judith
September 24th, 2009 7:54 am
Having read your book, I can almost “hear” the words that go with each slide. ;-) Looking forward to the series you mentioned possibly doing and more reality-based info!
needmoney.com
September 24th, 2009 8:05 am
Nice slideshow Darren. Looking forward to upcoming posts explaining it.
Lydia, Clueless Crafter
September 24th, 2009 8:14 am
Unlike Judith I haven’t read your book, so I look forward to being filled in SOON;-)
Jannie Funster
September 24th, 2009 9:21 am
Hmn, I thought I was getting pretty cool with about 3500 average uniques a month, but 3,000,000? Wow. Good going.
Viral promotion, looking forward to your post on that!
Darren Rowse
September 24th, 2009 9:46 am
Ivan – the ‘prolific’ one was more about being active in multiple places on the web rather than just your own site or one other social media space. I find that people bump into me all over the place and that that reinforces the brand.
James Clark
September 24th, 2009 9:49 am
I saw your talk at MarketingNow. I didn’t get to say hi afterwards so I just wanted to say thanks for an interesting and entertaining presentation.
Technology Slice
September 24th, 2009 10:06 am
The slide-show actually made a lot of sense. It’s the story of how you started and some pointers to be successful.
Building Your List Blog
September 24th, 2009 10:30 am
Very good slides, I really appreciate it. What make me impress is the lesson i get from it. Thanks for the great post.
Ryan
September 24th, 2009 11:37 am
Thanks for sharing Darren. Can’t review the slide show now but will check it out later.
Jonny
September 24th, 2009 3:13 pm
Thanks for your slide. And I hate buffering.
ITrush
September 24th, 2009 11:25 pm
Can’t wait to hear more from that lesson Darren.. and nice slide too.
Tonny stone
September 25th, 2009 12:54 am
Hi Darren,
very good slides. now *we* say “a slide worth 1000 words” :).
BN Softs
September 25th, 2009 1:00 am
hmmmmmmmm nice
akhlis
September 25th, 2009 2:04 am
Thanks to my amazingly lame internet connection, I can’t perfectly view and scrutinize all your dear slides, Darren T_T
But I guess your site’s been undergoing such a magnificent (r)evolution since the first time you built its first page. Hope I can have the perseverance and determination to stay on track as long as, or, if I dare to dream wilder, longer than yours..
Angel Wilson
September 27th, 2009 7:52 pm
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Online List Building Blog
October 1st, 2009 12:08 am
I really like the slides. Keep up the good work.
Tek-Nos.com
October 1st, 2009 12:33 pm
Loved the Social Media Proof Pic. So true!!!!!!!
Alan
October 9th, 2009 12:13 am
Thank you for the valuable information. Enjoyed the slides. I have learned a lot and look forward to helping many solve a major health problem.
umar
October 11th, 2009 7:22 am
Nice suggestion
Disini tempat sharing
December 16th, 2009 12:04 pm
Wow! Thank you! I always wanted to write in my site something like that. Can I take part of your post to my blog?
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