Long posts and niche question

[Joe52]

I just started posting about consumer issues. The middle (chronology) portion of the posts is giving me a problem and headache. There's too many facts and posts are longer (word count and timewise) than I care for, but I can not see a way to avoid it. Do you have any thoughts on ways to reduce the middle, making the posts more effective, and that would attract readers.

Related to this are a few questions about the niche. Looking at low subscriber and visit stats, was a niche selected that was too narrow, if so any suggestions on how and what to broaden it without having to start over again.

[davemcnally]

A lot of people choose a narrow niche. It doesn't mean you are going to be unsuccessful. Just give it some time, subscribers aren't something you are going to pick up that easily. Keep the content quality consistent.

I don't think the entries are too long personally. If you are worried about the length of the homepage, could you not just use the <!-- more --> tag to provide readers a link to continue reading?

[Michael Martin]

You don't use enough formatting in your posts. There are no subheadings, no bolded keywords, not enough paragraphs, lists etc. (Check out this post (http://www.problogdesign.com/blog-usability/30-ways-to-improve-readability/) for pointers). Once you write a post, you should go through purposefully looking for ways to incorporate these things.

eg. One section of your post is: "First they said that they were starting a refund. Four days later they issued a refund then reversed it. The next day, following a third call they e-mailed the customer that they would be issuing the refund within 2 days and six days later they issued a refund."

Why not change that to?

What happened was:

Day 1 - Said they would give a refund.
Day 5 - They issued one, but then reversed it.
Day 6 - Following a 3rd call, they sent an email saying a refund would be issued within 2 days.
Day 12 - A refund was finally issued.



It's easier to read, and breaks up your posts. :)

[bloggercamp]

Here are is one tip I've discovered while editing my own posts (which I do on a regular basis, even well after they've been posted.


Reread your posts slowly. Locate ANY words that are in your sentences that do not ad to the purpose of the sentence.

For example:

Change:
"When you go to a store to shop you expect a store to provide a safe environment for you."
To:
When shopping at stores you expect a safe environment.

Not only does it make the sentence stronger... it also is a faster read as well as easier to comprehend.