Relationships puts you on the priority list
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! 
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:
- Priority #1 - Bloggers whom I know and met personally
- Priority #2 - Bloggers who know me, or at least, mentioned me by name
- Priority #3 - Bloggers who have wonderfully interesting posts everyday
- 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 )
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!
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.
Tags: blog-marketing, blogging-strategy, building-relationships, conversations, relationship_marketing
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Tan Kian Ann is blog marketer based in Singapore. He now works with individuals and small businesses reach out to the world using blogs. 
March 8th, 2007 at 4:58 am
Visit Amanda
I just started with RSS feeds I like to goto the sites still and make sure i click all the ads since I know how hard it is but I read rss feeds based on my mood. I have tons of really good friends I dont read at all. Or I read others and see what resources I can find for theblogworld.net I think it all depends
March 8th, 2007 at 4:59 am
Visit Andrew Flusche
Insightful piece, as always. I just might adopt something similar for my feeds, since they’re getting unruly again. I find myself reading less and clicking “mark all as read” more often. Bad Andrew!
Take care,
Andrew
March 8th, 2007 at 5:07 am
Visit Kian Ann
Hey Amanda,
When I started blogging, I used to visits some blogs daily too - until I realised that the numbers got too large to handle, then I switched to feeds.
However, I do think that it is also a great thing to do to check out the blog page to see what new on the sidebar.
March 8th, 2007 at 5:10 am
Visit Kian Ann
Andrew!
Actually, I think it is okay to “mark all as read” - I do that at times when the numbers go up to like 2000+++!
What I felt bad about (before I arranged my feeds this way) was that I was neglecting even the people who came and read and commented on my blog.
Now, I can “mark all as read” for “the others”, and spend more time with the ones I should pay attention to.
March 8th, 2007 at 5:49 am
Visit Andrew Flusche
Kian,
Well put. Fortunately, I don’t think my feeds ever get up into thousands being unread. But I’m pretty anal, so even a few hundred unread gets under my skin.
March 8th, 2007 at 5:54 am
Visit Kian Ann
Haha.. Well those that get me to the thousands are the blogs on top of the Technorati list, those that post 30 posts a day.
Actually now that you say it, I doubt I really read them anyway. I should get them off “the others” in the first place!
March 8th, 2007 at 9:22 am
Visit Ganchau
I am surprised at the huge amount of 4 letter words and profanities that can be be found in some blogs. Xia xue’s blog is a classic example and yet it is so highly rated and received.!
Can you tell me why?
March 8th, 2007 at 12:41 pm
Visit Thought Provoker
Relationship building is not a new or even foreign concept. Surprisingly, many people have forgotten the value that it holds. These days though, I notice a renaissance of this concept, which is a welcoming sign.
As for Ganchau’s question, that girl is (was) popular because of the sex factor - simple as that. If Kian Ann were to adopt that approach, he’d be shut down faster than you can say ’sedition’.
No matter how hard she tries, she can never be as respected as mrbrown, for example. In any case, if I’m not wrong, her site is predominantly visited by Ah Bengs and Ah Lians - all of whom wouldn’t know intellect if it hit them square in the face.
Moreover, her transition to mass media (TNP & TV) has made it so obvious that she’s a gimmick and exposes her shallow personality and thought.
What I’d really like to see is how popular she’ll be in 20 to 30 years’ time. No more sex appeal to sell and nothing is as scary as an over-the-hill Ah Lian (I shudder at that thought). Conversely, it is not unrealistic to imagine a very old mrbrown still coming up with engaging points of discussion.
This is a good post Mr Tan, thanks…
March 8th, 2007 at 1:29 pm
Visit TIMMGuru
Hi Provoker,
I believe Wendy Cheng aka xiaxue managed to establish relationship with her visitors. They like her speak and her style of writing despite of her obvious shallow personality and thought.
xiaxue.blogspot.com is not the type of blog I will subscribe with my feed reader.
Some time ago, way before she was on the newspaper, radio and tv, I did a small research on her blog to find out how she became so popular and stood out of the many thousands of blogs before her.
One thing that I discovered… it was not exactly her sex appeal but her mention of the words sex and singapore in her earlier posts that got her found by others. The combination of singapore, sex and other related words are some of the top search terms in search engines.
Oops, now Kian Ann’s blog has there search terms.
March 8th, 2007 at 2:28 pm
Visit Kian Ann
Shi - Ooi ooi! Don’t anyhow put that three letter word and four letter words here hor!
Thought Provoker - I think you have a point too, by the fact that she is a lady and she dares to publicly publish the 4 letter words and the 3 letter words makes the blog posts entertaining.
In fact, readers who get to her blog must appreciate satirical humor, if not they WILL find the contents offensive. When you do appreciate that tone of humor, the profanities are more entertaining then offensive.
March 10th, 2007 at 11:57 pm
Visit Ganchau
In stylistic writing, a word used too often and unnecessarily loses its impact and colour, and reflects the writer as someone who is limited in his vocabulary. I am afraid Xia Xue has used profanities somewhat profusely.
March 11th, 2007 at 10:39 am
Visit Ganchau
I was pondering over what my pastor had once preached. “Ironically the world is not so keen on things that are good, decent and helpful. Somehow the perversity of man seeks that which is not so good and healthy to feed his mind, body and soul.”
Good blogs like yours, others and mine are not as popular even though the articles in our blogs could be thought-provoking, humorous and inspiring!
March 11th, 2007 at 2:19 pm
Visit Kian Ann
Hi Ganchau
I went in yesterday to take a closer look at Xiaxue’s blog. (I’m not a regular reader of her blog!)
It seems that while she has indeed managed to engage her readers into reading her profanity filled posts, the comments on her blog are also spread between “worship” and “total condemnation”.
It is obvious that many of these readers are just out to put her down, but from this we also can learn that it is impossible to please everybody. The profanities and “shallow personality” appeals to a group of people who are very expressive (especially when they work under perceived anonymity). These expressions could have attracted more people of the same nature, creating a very viral effect.
With regard to the thought on “the world is not so keen on things that are good, decent and helpful.” - I personally feel that wanting to be good, decent and helpful is human nature. The world (at least, in my perception
) is helpful and decent. Unfortunately, the competition to be popular in the good category, is a lot tougher than to be notorious. In the Technorati top 100 (if we just use that as a gauge) we see more decent blogs than indecent ones.
Maybe people are keen on the good things, but it unfair to measure success in terms of popularity because the playing field is different.
That said, we need to identify our niche “playing field”, and be popular in that field. That is enough (for me).
Thanks Ganchau, for sharing your thoughts.
March 13th, 2007 at 5:34 pm
Visit tree
“Besides, its a wonderful practise to adopt”
I believe it’s “practice”. ;D Sorry, just had to point that out.
March 13th, 2007 at 5:37 pm
Visit Kian Ann
Haha.. Thanks Tree
Will update it.