For bloggers who read a lot of other blogs, I’m sure that once in a while you face the same challenge as I do – your feed subscriptions are in a bloody mess! :mrgreen: Sometimes, you need to take 2 or 3 hours to really look at each feed that you have subscribed and ask yourself – “Do I really need to read this blog?”, “Is this blog interesting enough and useful?”

So, I was organising and managing the feeds that I subscribe to in FeedDemon yesterday and I suddenly realised how powerful the idea of “relationship marketing” is.

Relationship marketing puts you on the priority list.

I realised that I tend to favour the bloggers who have commented in my blog, or actually mentioned my blog in their own posts before. I also put priority on the bloggers who I have had interesting discussions with – whether on my blog or theirs.

In fact, I grouped my feeds (of each topic) into the four categories:

  1. Priority #1 – Bloggers whom I know and met personally
  2. Priority #2 – Bloggers who know me, or at least, mentioned me by name
  3. Priority #3 – Bloggers who have wonderfully interesting posts everyday
  4. Priority #4 – The others

Note the priority.

If I had 5 minutes today to read my feeds, I’ll go for the blogs in priority #1.

If I had 15 minutes tomorrow, I read the blogs of the people I know personally, and those who have mentioned me before.

Basically, you get the point. You don’t want to be in “The others”.

(of course, here I’m talking about me, but I suppose it applies to how many others read their feeds as well :mrgreen: )

It doesn’t matter so much to me that you are posting great content, but I’ll give you priority if you take effort to build a relationship – because no matter how terrible your blog posts are, it does matter that you are possibly posting about me. :)

Just a mere discussion or just by replying to your comments, you can get from “The others” to Priority #2.

Think about it.

Its human nature to socialize

Yes, obviously human beings are sociable creatures – we need to talk and socialize. The purest evidence for this is the humongous success of Internet Relay Chats (IRCs) and Instant Messaging (IM) applications… and erm… Blogs! :mrgreen:

So let your thoughts flow as you read other blogs, contribute your thoughts with constructive comments, and get to know the human behind the blog! Take the blogosphere as a 60 million people party that is going on 24 hours, 7 days a week! Socialize!

What I am advocating you to do is not rocket science, its human nature.

Its human nature to reciprocate

When I attended an entrepreneurship and business seminar back in 2004, one of the key lessons that I learnt in making business work is to kill that WIIFM (What’s in it for me) attitude and start going out and asking “How can I help?”, and going out to give.

The reason for this is because human beings tend to reciprocate goodwill (and evil doings too, actually), and by offering out with open arms, you instantly break the ice between your new found friend and yourself.

Putting that business knowledge back to blogs, there are two key things bloggers yearn for – comments, and incoming links! Now, aren’t this just the fundamentals of “building relationships” with blogs?

If you want comments, go out and comment on others’ blogs. If you want links, first link out to people and recommend others in your posts.

Because when you do so, the fellow blogger appreciates your attention and may tend to give you their attention in turn. That is how relationship marketing works – its all about “Do onto others as you would have them do onto you”.

Besides, its a wonderful practice to adopt. An attitude of giving makes this world so much a better place. So spread the love. Pass the word. Get to know people. Build blogs, and build relationships.