ARI HERZOG

My Personal Blog

Signals and Noise

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We spend a lot of time echoing what other people are saying instead of finding signals in the cacophony, extracting data we want, and saying that with meaning and context. Creating original thought is hard work but it has a greater payoff.

Here’s an experiment: The next time the President speaks, monitor what White House reporters are tweeting. Many do it real-time. Some fact check first and tweet after. Others are quiet. Look for the tweet that is written a little differently than what others say. Maybe it has a statistic. Maybe it has a link. Maybe it’s a simple concept that people can latch onto and recreate. If the tweet is not part of the echo chamber of repetition, it’s a signal.

For instance, when I write about big topics such as the coronavirus and justice, I try to meld current events with my own thought. I’m not merely repeating what other people are saying but I’m providing my own voice.

The next time you share something, think about purpose and not action.

  1. How necessary is that update or message to anyone but yourself?
  2. Does your audience need to know your feelings about something that will be passe a minute later?
  3. Why are you compelled to share a link if nobody thanked you for your last shared link?
  4. Would the world end if you waited an hour or a day, or didn’t send that message?

If you don’t have a reason for producing noise, maybe the world would be more productive if you created a signal instead.

In other words, be unique and don’t echo.

P.S. This is a revision of an earlier blog post from 2011.

Stop Writing Here

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Nearly every web page has links for people to click from page to page. It’s unfortunate that many online journalists, bloggers, and website owners don’t know how to create links.

I wrote about this in 2008. Why is it still happening?

It is important that online content creators know how optimize link text. They need to tell people about the link, and they need to tell search engines the relevance of the link.

For example, how many times have you read something with a request to click here to read something else? Sometimes it’s just a link to here.

I saw this behavior in 2008 and I still see it today.

Unless you click the above links, you wouldn’t know that the first is about the Disney+ streaming platform and the second is about the Rogue One Star Wars movie. But, even these links aren’t great.

It would be better if I told you that I prepaid a year of Disney+ to access its digital library of movies and TV shows, or that Rogue One is an awesome example of a stand-alone movie in the Star Wars canon.

It comes down to relevant linking and contextual keywords. This is essential.

Why should someone click here? Why would someone write here?

Frozen in Time

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My LinkedIn network includes over 2,000 people; but most of them only know me through my past. They remember me as a social media consultant, or a government manager, or a teacher, or a classmate. They don’t necessarily know who I am today or where I want to be tomorrow.

Carol Fishman Cohen describes this concept as being “frozen in time.” Simply stated, it’s when people from your past only know your past.

Whether you embraced a new career direction, started a family, or took on new responsibilities, if the people from your past aren’t aware of who you are today, then their perspective of you is dated.

The barrier shows itself when I reach out to John or Sally for a referral or recommendation, and we quickly recognize that neither of knows the other as we want to be known today. We are living in the other’s past. We are frozen in time.

I want people to know where I’m living, what I’m doing with my life, and where I see myself in five years. I’m slowly reaching out to those LinkedIn connections (and others spread across social media) to tell them my story and build upon our past relationship to create something new.

How To Be a Better Guest Blogger

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Every blog publisher wants to increase eyeballs and visits. We are open to introducing our readers to new voices by way of guest posts; but, after years of blogging and receiving email requests from wannabe bloggers, I’ve learned that a lot of people don’t understand the difference between blogging and article marketing.

Here are 6 real examples of emails that suck:

The 6th reason your email sucks:

You never researched nor read my blog.

I wanted to make sure my topic fits with your theme. I have two guest posts that I would like to have published. One is about how to plan for retirement in your 20s. The second post is about odd things that need to be transported.

The 5th reason your email sucks:

You confuse guest blogging with article marketing.

Hey there,

We have been reading the articles on your website and are very impressed with the quality of your information. We have a team of copywriters who specialize in writing articles on various topics and would like to write an original article for you to use on your website.

The 4th reason your email sucks:

You are the same as the 6th reason. What has a cost here?

I came across your site, Ariherzog.com, and would like to offer you free content.

The 3rd reason your email sucks:

You are the same as the 4th reason.

I read some of your content and really found them interesting and informative. So I was just wondering if I can also do something for your site, maybe writing an article for your site FREE of cost as a guest writer.

The 2nd reason your email sucks:

You don’t even introduce yourself, and your article is off-topic.

I have attached an article for guest posting please review it. Waiting for response.

And, the number one reason your email sucks:

[insert drum roll sounds here]

I was wondering if you accept guest postings?

I used to have a page with guest posting guidelines. I don’t anymore. But I will still publish guest posts. I don’t care if you make a living as a content marketer or a search engine optimizer but try to personalize your email to me. Accept the fact there is a difference between guest blogging and article marketing, as Ann Smarty elaborates in this table:

Guest postingArticle Marketing
Unique content?Yes, absolutelyNo (“spunn” content is NOT unique. Period)
Extra links? (to your article)Yes!Hardly possible
Potential promoters and followers?Yes!Hardly possible
Increased exposure to social media?Yes!No
Networking power?Yes!Hardly possible
Boosting reputation?Yes! (if you are great)Maybe (if you are great!)

Michael Dolen is among a slate of guest bloggers for me. He wrote a great 2-part series about the online successes and failures of the credit card industry. His email?

Hi Ari,

It’s interesting that your focus is on emerging media, because I own/operate a very popular forum and blog; CreditCardForum.com. On behalf of my site I do quite a bit of guest posting and take pride in the fact that I don’t write the cookie-cutter and bare minimum “guest posts” that a lot of people churn out these days, ha. Is there any particular topic you would like to see me cover? I reviewed your archives showing the last 100 articles and here are a few ideas that popped into my head from looking at those…

[Mike shared three sample titles and related content.]

Would you like me to write up one of these? Or something else? Just let me know what’s best for you.

By the way, congrats on being elected to Newburyport’s city council! Even though I live some two-thousand miles away on the other coast, just want to say I dig local politicians… I feel they’re the only politicians who actually get stuff done 😉

Thanks,
Mike

Show me you are a person and I’ll be your best friend. But the moment your email seeking guest blogging opportunities turns into a spamfest of SEO qualifications, pluralized pronouns, and irrelevant content, you make it painstakingly clear you never visited my blog, shared a post, or would ever think of talking about your passion to my readers.

Why You Should Ask Why

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Run a Google search for the exact phrase, “how to write a blog,” and peruse through 416,000 results.

Type “why to write a blog” and see 47,300 results.

If you agree successful online content (the type that one bookmarks and shares with others) involves human interaction, there are reasons for creating blogs, websites, and social networking profiles, argues Jason Morrison:

One of my motivations was sharing some of the research done for classwork – it seemed a shame to write up a report, turn it in to a professor, and then let it gather dust in some corner of my hard drive. My undergrad degree was in journalism and I do miss writing, so that’s another motive. Also, having been through some rough patches in my career during the dot-com downturn, I thought blogging might help me establish a bit of a professional brand. I have my URL on my resume and I would hope that any company looking to hire me would get an idea that I’m knowledgeable and interested in relevant areas.

That’s why he created his blog. Why did you create yours? Or, if you think you want to create something — a blog, a Facebook page, a Twitter account, an online video to go viral — why do you want to create it? What’s the plan? Where’s the strategy?

Doing something is answering the what. Explaining background is answering the how. Providing motivation is answering the why. People are more inspired to take action if there is an emotional connection and that is better portrayed through a why than a what or how. Make sense?

P.S. An exact search is when you type a query inside quotation marks. The above search statistics are from March 2015. The same searches from March 2010 resulted in 2.2 million and 131,000 results, respectively. Either Google deleted spammy results from their algorithm or thousands of items over five years were deleted. I’m more inclined to believe Google changed.

Why (and How) I Forced 912 People to Unfollow Me on Twitter

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3 Month Chart of My Followers.

This screenshot, courtesy of TwitterCounter, shows a 3-month tally of my Twitter followers from early 2014. Notable milestones include 4,721 on January 14, 2014; and 4,887 on February 2, 2014.

Do you see the downward slope on the far right? Notable numbers there include 4,832 on February 18; 4,503 on February 20; and 3,975 on February 22.

Fast forward a year and I had 2,117 followers on March 18, 2015.

While some people may have unfollowed me, the primary reason for the slope is because I forced inactive accounts to unfollow me. I will tell you why and I will tell you how.

First, meet my former followers

I’m not sure what Team Eclipse Pro did but they don’t do it anymore. Not on Twitter, anyway. And they follow over 4,000 of you.

Twitter - Team Eclipse Pro

The Standard, an internet newspaper, hasn’t tweeted for five years but it’s following over 1,400 people. I was one of those people.

Twitter - The Standard

But those are companies, you might say. What about people?

Give the next screenshot a whirl — and then keep scrolling for my explanation.

Twitter - Mafalda Sivels

Why I forced them to unfollow me

“Oh, look, @AriHerzog has so many thousand followers. He must be someone special. I should follow him too!”

You know you say it. Something like that.

I wanted the number of people who followed me to be an accurate representation of real people — who still tweet today; and not outdated accounts that haven’t tweeted a message in years. And yet the above screenshots are from people and companies who followed me. They inflated me. They boosted your opinion of my influence.

I want you to follow me because of me. But moreover, in the age of social influence ranking systems such as Klout and Peer Index, I want to be current. I don’t want to carry around dead weight.

How I did it

Tinkering with Twitter management systems in recent months, my favorite is Tweepi. It’s simple. Most of its functions are free; but to do the above, I paid the developer $7 for the ability to perform advanced functions.

The “force unfollow” function debuted in 2012. It’s not a block (which can prevent you from seeing anything of mine) but it’s truly a forced unfollow. I told the program to sort my followers by their last tweet, with the oldest up top, and I clicked buttons.

Tweepi Unfollow Screenshot

I don’t know how it works; and frankly, I don’t care. All I know is 912 accounts that haven’t tweeted in over 6 months are no longer following me.

Oh, and the same is true for who I follow: Accounts that hadn’t tweeted in recent history I’m not following either. But that’s just an unfollow, not a forced unfollow. Two different functions depending if I’m following or being followed.

I always blog about my social media actions as a way of 1) charting my own evolution; and 2) helping you discover something new.

Many don’t care (or don’t know) inactive accounts still follow them. Many don’t take the time to look and sort. But now that you know the likes of The Standard could be following you, do you care?

I hope I planted a seed in you today by discovering something new; namely, that the number of people who follow you on Twitter (or any social networking site for that matter) is meaningless unless they are current. If I’m right, then please share this blog post and help others discover it too.