How do you feel about people, who criticise you or your work negatively?
Well, if you are thinking of using a blog as a part of your marketing mix, (and you should), you will need to figure out how to deal with them. This is especially the case, if your blog becomes popular.
The 2 sides of blogging
There are 2 sides to blogging: The side the readers see and the side the blogger sees. Readers only see the published comments and the blog posts. The blogger sees everything. We see the spam and in some cases, the abusive emails too.
I generally just get smartasses telling me about typos – I call them The Typo Police! These people love passing on negative criticism, but they are harmless.
Naturally, as a blogger’s success increases, so does his or her reach. In reaching more people, you become a target for those who are either envious, bored or usually both.
For instance, when I started this blog, I used to get around 10 emails a week from people, asking me general marketing questions or enquiring about my services. Today that’s around 70/80 emails every day and often over 100! Just 2 or 3 emails a month are abusive and I hardly ever get any kind of abusive blog comments here. I’m very fortunate to have attracted the right crowd; people who will debate and critique, but without the abuse.
Compare this to what famous people get!
For example, last year I found myself exchanging emails with the massively talented IT Journalist, broadcaster and American TV personality, Natali Del Conte. Natali had been mentioned in a post I wrote and received some totally uncalled for criticism via the comments section of that blog.
Some of the comments were really abusive and insulting. Natali’s only crime was to be both talented and beautiful (how dare she). Sadly, when you mix the kind of success Natali has earned, with envy and (the supposed) anonymity of the Internet, some people will say things that they would never say to your face.
With increased visibility, comes increased exposure to the good and the bad – the positive and the negative. I believe you need to develop a broad pair of shoulders, if you want to develop a high profile blog or business.
IMPORTANT: If you want to make more sales, boost your profits and grow an amazing business, this will help you!