Comments on: How I Reached 2,000 Subscribers On This Blog

By: Home Business Answered » What I Wish I’d Known When I Started This Blog

Home Business Answered » What I Wish I’d Known When I Started This Blog — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 06:34:06 +0000

[...] other day when I posted about breaking the 2,000 subscriber mark, Breaking Free reader Caleb, of [...]

By: What I Wish I’d Known When I Started This Blog

What I Wish I’d Known When I Started This Blog — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 06:15:08 +0000

[...] other day when I posted about breaking the 2,000 subscriber mark, Breaking Free reader Caleb, of [...]

By: Brian Armstrong

Brian Armstrong — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 05:58:52 +0000

Oh yeah, and be opinionated. Take a stance in your posts and say what everyone else was thinking but didn’t have the balls to say. I think I was too afraid of offending anyone up front and this was a mistake. It’s boring and not worth reading.

By: Brian Armstrong

Brian Armstrong — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 05:57:05 +0000

That’s awesome Tracey, keep it up and let us know how it progresses. Enjoyed your article on color palettes, I was actually just struggling with that this weekend for a new site. Design doesn’t really come naturally to me so I mostly just try things blindly or “borrow” from other designs until I get something I like.

By: Brian Armstrong

Brian Armstrong — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 05:53:51 +0000

Hi Caleb, that’s a good question. I think it could go a bit faster the 2nd time around by using some important things I learned:

1. pick a topic that has mass appeal – great way to do this is to browse magazines in barnes & noble. If there is a magazine dedicated to it, it probably has enough people interested to make a good blog topic.

2. pick something that I know I’m already passionate about so that it will be easy to continue writing – something I’d write about (like a journal) whether anyone read it or not

3. pick something that I have the potential to be the best in the world at someday, the #1 expert in a particular niche – even I’m not right now

By: Brian Armstrong

Brian Armstrong — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 05:49:58 +0000

Yep…totally agree. This is what makes passive income counter intuitive to most.

By: Brian Armstrong

Brian Armstrong — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 05:48:30 +0000

Hi Derek, nope I don’t use AIM. A while back I decided to get rid of all chat programs to improve productivity. They make it too easy for someone to interrupt you – the #1 enemy of productivity :)

By: Tracey Grady

Tracey Grady — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 11:30:45 +0000

Congratulations. I fall into the second thousand subscriber group. I have read before about the compounding effect of subscriber numbers after a slow build-up, and my (five month old) blog is seeing evidence of the compounding effect too, although my figures don’t match yours yet.

By: caleb

caleb — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 13:51:23 +0000

Brian,

You say it took you about a year before your blog picked up momentum.

If you were to start a new blog all over again now, from scratch, but knowing what you now know, how long do you think it would take to reach the same number of subscribers/revenue? (No cheating by using your old blog to direct traffic to your new blog.)

I am curious about how much of it is “skill and knowledge” vs. how much is “17-month gestation”.

By: Caroline

Caroline — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 13:11:12 +0000

Once you are on a roll your on a roll. RSS subscribers are like a snowball being pushed downhill. at first they are small and roll slowly but as they go they pick up more snow and more speed.