December 9, 2009 at 19:49Interview with css-tricks.com author, successful web designer and blogger.
- Transfer
Today I decided to translate an interview with a successful American blogger and web designer, whose name is Chris Coyier. The pages of his blog, CSS-tricks , are scanned 1.5 million times a month. In this interview, he talks about how, in his opinion, a successful blog should be maintained.
A lot of everything. I started blogging when I started learning web design. It all started with installing Wordpress, finding the right template and upgrading it to your needs. Wordpress attracted me with its functionality, using which I could create dynamic sites, rather than dull static ones. Later, when I finally learned a lot about web design, developing and improving wordpress themes, I decided to start my blog and write in it about what I learned. The reason that led me to start blogging was the desire to help people and, with luck, make money. Good luck turned out to be favorable to me and my blog went far, but all this is the result of hard work.
First, you need to have something to say. Secondly - you need to be able to properly present all this. That is, to have an opinion on everything, and the ability to express it on a blog with a certain amount of confidence in your words.
You just need to write interesting things, and readers will appear by themselves, like a snowball. And that’s it. It doesn’t happen that someone wrote really interesting things and didn’t have good traffic on his blog. If your article is really good, you just need to push it a little to the masses and it will soon become popular by itself. This means - if there is no traffic on your blog - you need to write an article better.
Nope.
Interest - 60%, design - 35%, Advertising (promotion) - 5%.
You need to write really good articles - it comes from your personal interest in the topic of your blog. That is, interest is a very important part, which, in any case, will not let your blog die. But blogs, especially about web design, should embody their content with their appearance. You can’t write about design on an ugly site, it's stupid. It's like being a politician preaching the importance of family values, and at the same time cheating on your wife. But, despite the fact that I myself am a designer, and I pay great attention to design, I believe that content is the most important part of the blog. Even the ugliest site with good and interesting content will always beat a beautiful, glamorous blog with shit articles. I paid so little attention to advertising (promotion) because blogs now spin up automatically. People like to find and share interesting things. This is exactly what I wanted to say above when I mentioned that readers will appear 'by themselves, like a snowball'. Just a couple of users sharing your article with friends will easily turn into a whole bunch of traffic.
I work at home, it saves a lot of time. Also, I do not have a wife and children, who usually take up a significant part of their free time. I believe that I was lucky, and now I have a very productive moment in my life. I can spend a lot of time designing and supporting / developing my own projects. This may sound strange to many, but I get a lot of pleasure from all these activities.
The work that I spend most of my time on is a generator of many ideas for my articles.
Also, do not forget that I did not wake up so successful and famous. It took me years to learn how to work so efficiently and correctly organize my workflow. And even now, when I find a way to speed up the execution of certain tasks, I always actively use it.
Do not make listings and lists of other people's articles. This shit and so in bulk. If you still want to do this, you should have your own opinion and do something better than Noupe, Smashing Magazine and Vandelay Design.
On my own, I want to note that Chris does not say a word about SEO and other magic. From this we can conclude that search engine optimization for the blog is not very important, and the content is of decisive importance. On Chris’s blog, of course, everything is done semantically, so in this regard, he did take care of search engine optimization.
In principle, the fact that the content is the most important thing is not surprising, but, strangely enough, many people sometimes forget about it.
The translation of this interview can also be read on my blog .
What prompted you to engage in this nonsense (blogging)?
A lot of everything. I started blogging when I started learning web design. It all started with installing Wordpress, finding the right template and upgrading it to your needs. Wordpress attracted me with its functionality, using which I could create dynamic sites, rather than dull static ones. Later, when I finally learned a lot about web design, developing and improving wordpress themes, I decided to start my blog and write in it about what I learned. The reason that led me to start blogging was the desire to help people and, with luck, make money. Good luck turned out to be favorable to me and my blog went far, but all this is the result of hard work.
What is the recipe for creating a successful web design blog?
First, you need to have something to say. Secondly - you need to be able to properly present all this. That is, to have an opinion on everything, and the ability to express it on a blog with a certain amount of confidence in your words.
Give advice to aspiring designers who really want their blogs to be special and successful.
You just need to write interesting things, and readers will appear by themselves, like a snowball. And that’s it. It doesn’t happen that someone wrote really interesting things and didn’t have good traffic on his blog. If your article is really good, you just need to push it a little to the masses and it will soon become popular by itself. This means - if there is no traffic on your blog - you need to write an article better.
Is there a chance for a blog to become popular if its sole purpose is to make a profit?
Nope.
Self interest is interest, design and advertising (promotion) - in what proportions should these things be mixed when creating a good blog?
Interest - 60%, design - 35%, Advertising (promotion) - 5%.
You need to write really good articles - it comes from your personal interest in the topic of your blog. That is, interest is a very important part, which, in any case, will not let your blog die. But blogs, especially about web design, should embody their content with their appearance. You can’t write about design on an ugly site, it's stupid. It's like being a politician preaching the importance of family values, and at the same time cheating on your wife. But, despite the fact that I myself am a designer, and I pay great attention to design, I believe that content is the most important part of the blog. Even the ugliest site with good and interesting content will always beat a beautiful, glamorous blog with shit articles. I paid so little attention to advertising (promotion) because blogs now spin up automatically. People like to find and share interesting things. This is exactly what I wanted to say above when I mentioned that readers will appear 'by themselves, like a snowball'. Just a couple of users sharing your article with friends will easily turn into a whole bunch of traffic.
How do you manage to combine your main work with blogging Css-tricks?
I work at home, it saves a lot of time. Also, I do not have a wife and children, who usually take up a significant part of their free time. I believe that I was lucky, and now I have a very productive moment in my life. I can spend a lot of time designing and supporting / developing my own projects. This may sound strange to many, but I get a lot of pleasure from all these activities.
The work that I spend most of my time on is a generator of many ideas for my articles.
Also, do not forget that I did not wake up so successful and famous. It took me years to learn how to work so efficiently and correctly organize my workflow. And even now, when I find a way to speed up the execution of certain tasks, I always actively use it.
And finally, another tip that you would like to give to those who start a blog related to design.
Do not make listings and lists of other people's articles. This shit and so in bulk. If you still want to do this, you should have your own opinion and do something better than Noupe, Smashing Magazine and Vandelay Design.
On my own, I want to note that Chris does not say a word about SEO and other magic. From this we can conclude that search engine optimization for the blog is not very important, and the content is of decisive importance. On Chris’s blog, of course, everything is done semantically, so in this regard, he did take care of search engine optimization.
In principle, the fact that the content is the most important thing is not surprising, but, strangely enough, many people sometimes forget about it.