A blogger once made an off-hand comment to me about running giveaways. “We just enter each others’ anyway.” It caught me off guard and made me sad for them. The discussion implied that this blogger was in a circle of people that just interacted with each other, and they seemed to think that there weren’t many other people to interact with.
I’ll admit that I have felt now and then like I’m stuck in a circle going round and round with the same people. Then I realize that is nobody’s fault but my own. There are new bloggers starting and many bloggers typing away every day. In 2010 Technorati claimed that there were over 112.8 million blogs. Not sure about Technorati? Check out this statement from Wikipedia:
As of 16 February 2011, there were over 156 million public blogs in existence. On October 13, 2012, there were around 77 million Tumblr and 56.6 million WordPress blogs in existence worldwide.
Maybe you think those numbers are a bit inflated. Plus we want to interact with the actual bloggers and many bloggers have more than one site – or write for more than one site. Even cutting the number in half to 78 million gives us a lot of people to interact with. And that’s only looking at other bloggers to interact with.
What if we look at people that are active online? YouTube statistics claims “over 800 million unique users visit YouTube each month.” [You knew I had to mention video, right?] As of Sept. 2012 Facebook is said to have over 1 billion active users. That should give us plenty of people to interact with - don’t ya think?
Bottom line: If you want to stop interacting with the same people over and over online you need to change something you are doing. You’ve probably heard the Anthony Robbins quote “If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.”
Here are some Real Life Ideas ideas to get you moving in a new direction.
1. Attend a conference. Better yet – attend a new conference. And for Pete’s sake, if you want to meet new people you can’t hang out with the same friends all the time!
2. Go to some local meet-ups. Better yet – host one. Maybe they won’t all be bloggers, but if they do anything online they might interact with your blog. We know that everyone loves good comments!
3. Tell your family and friends about what you are doing online. Of course, that means you can’t be mean when you talk about them; but you’d be surprised how often it will come up in casual conversation that “so-and-so I know has a blog.”
Not ready for the face to face yet? Here are some online-only Social Media Networking Ideas:
- Start being active in a new or different social media platform. Key word: active.
- Follow a Twitter hashtag and interact nicely.
- Find an active Facebook page and start interacting.
- Join a forum.
- Comment on new blogs every day – even if it’s just one. If you can’t find new blogs you’re just pathetic – ahem, sorry – you can check out the other comments and follow through to the blog. You know there are blog directories with thousands of listings, right?
There are millions of people out there that you can interact with. Don’t limit yourself or your circle. Reach out and grow!
What did I miss? What would you add to this list of ways to broaden your circle?
Photo © Uki – Right to use purchased at Fotolia.com
Jendi Pagano quickly became addicted to online video in 2008 and now pursues it with a passion. She actively video blogs on lots of topics, as well as creates more formal videos with and without chroma key, records live events, and creates & markets videos for clients that are local or around the world. In 2009 she launched the Simple Vlogging Tips site and live show through MomTV to encourage others to just vlog it. She has learned how to create an online video presence that got her content to the front page of Google and YouTube. Online video did more for her online presence in 6 months than regular blogging did in a year; and she believes that online video can help any website or business. She formed Scenes and Cinema, LLC. for her work as video marketerand creator. She'd love to connect with you on Twitter @vloggingtips. It all started in 2007 when Jendi started her daily life blog, Jendi's Journal. In 2010 she started speaking at conferences, teleseminars, and webinars. She lives in PA with her husband, stays busy homeschooling her 3 children, and tries to make sure the dog, bird, and rabbit get fed. You can follow her daily life tweets@jendisjournal.
Wendy Wright
Attending a conference is definitely a great tip, Jendi! So much changed for me when I went to SheStreams, which was my first conference.
Shareen Ayoub
You have great fresh ideas!