If you look around here you’ll notice we don’t get too much feedback in our comments. You might experience the same lack of discussion on your blog too, but don’t let that little fact worry you just yet.

There are six major types of readers out there:

1. Passer-Byers - most of these people hit your blog from search engines. They come like a storm (sans the effects) and they’re gone before you know it. The only reason that would keep them around is if they find something interesting on your blog, then they might come back another day. These are also called speed-clickers.
2. Lurkers - these are probably the most loyal of readers any blogger can have. Lurkers would come to your blog like their lives depended on it, but they always keep below the radars. Lurkers don’t post, they just like to read you and watch you from a distance.
3. Commenters and Critiques - this is a mixed group. Some may come from search engines or other links and they would say something because they feel the need to. Some commenters and critiques are loyal readers and they would say something from time to time. They keep you in check. They’re very honest and sincere about what they say most of the time. They’ll praise you when you do an excellent job and they’ll shove it right in your face when you suck. Commenters and critiques are a valuable asset as they can help you shape the direction of your blog.
4. Flamers - unlike commenters and critiques, flamers on the other hand are quite the opposite. They would post flammatory comments because they want to be cool like you but they can’t. These are envious people.
5. Friends - just like lurkers these are the most loyal of readers, but they would share their thoughts with you from time to time. They read you not because of what you write but they read you because of who you are. It’s always nice to have friends around.
6. Robots - some are nice (like Googlebots) and some are evil (spambots). They come and they leave like a thief in the night. Good bots index your content to help boost your search engine positioning, evil bots leave nasty links and spam your comments box.

There’s probably more types of visitors out there, but those are the six major groups that come to our blogs.

So if you notice that your blog isn’t receiving much feedback, don’t worry. You might have a bunch of passer-byers, lurkers and friends, which is good enough for me any day of the week. Look at some of the gods of blogs out there, like Gizmodo, they don’t get too much comments either. So cheer up and remember, content is king!

This entry was posted by JErm on Friday, December 2nd, 2005 at 3:10 pm and is filed under Blogging. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.