FAQs: Some common problems that bloggers face, Blogging season part 2

Hello readers, in part 1 of my series on blogging, I showed you how to become an epic blogger. In part 2, we are going to look at some of the common problems that bloggers like myself face all the time and how we deal with those problems. Some of them are easy to deal with whilst others do not have any simple solutions, but we still have to try our best to cope with those problems anyway. Let's get started!

Problems with blogging? Fear not, Limpeh is here to help!

Q: People just don't believe me, they think I am making stuff up on my blog.

A: This is a very common problem and one which I face too. This is particularly tough for new bloggers without a track record - when my blog first went viral in a big way, many people simply greeted it with disbelief. I was even accused of being a prostitute from China who was a fantasist making up stories (LOL I write pretty well for a PRC whore eh?) - which is hilarious of course. Do you know why they reacted like that?

Let me show you with a simple example. I am bringing you back to my family home in Ang Mo Kio in 1984 during the Los Angeles summer Olympics. This was the first time my family watched sports together in a big way and we were all caught up in Olympic fever. When we watched American Carl Lewis win the 100m sprint in just 9.99 seconds, under the 10 second mark - my parents reacted by claiming that he cheated. No human could run that fast and that the American must have been taking illegal steroids to make him run that fast. They refused to believe it was possible.

We then watched the women's gymnastics and were thoroughly amazed by the stunning display of physical dexterity - once again, my parents claimed that the gymnasts were all cheating because no normal human body could bend like that. They claimed that these gymnasts were given steroids and injections to stunt their growth, trapping adult athletes in bodies that resembled prepubescent girls. Some of the Chinese gymnasts were especially flexible and my father even claimed that they were force fed Chinese medicine to make their bones extra soft - "look at the way normal children in Singapore are, they look nothing like these freaky Chinese gymnasts", my parents claimed.

Some people would watch the video of Ma Yanhong's performance at the 1984 Olympics and go, "wow, she is amazing, no wonder she won the Olympic gold medal." Others are sceptical - why? Because they are judging others by their standards, ie. "if I can't do that, then it is impossible for others, including the Chinese national gymnastics team, to do that - they must have cheated or it is some kind of camera trick." They don't look in the mirror and realize just how silly they are in comparing themselves to an Olympic gold medallist. Have you been training all your life for the Olympics? No and that is why you can't run like Carl Lewis.

It's not a matter of jealousy or spitefulness - it is just that a lot of people are just incredibly self-centred. They think the world revolves around them and they are unable to try to see things from another person's perspective. It is not that they are bad people per se, just really ignorant people who don't know much about the world and their understanding of the world is limited to their own experiences. What can you do about people like that? Not much really. Just ignore them I suppose? Do you really want to start educating them? Are you trying to cure the world of ignorance with your blog? Talk about mission impossible - it's a problem you simply cannot solve with your blog.

Q: Okay, so are people just ignorant or are there those who are spiteful? 

Oh you will get people who are jealous and spiteful. Let me give you an example from years ago. I have worked with a lot of famous people over the years during my time in media. I once mentioned on a forum that I worked with a famous singer in her music video and that was met with just outright disbelief and everyone accused me of lying. So I released a photo that I had taken with that singer as proof that I wasn't lying - and guess what? One person still insisted that the photo I had provided was a fake - so I found the 'behind the scenes/making of' documentary short film on youtube which clearly showed me in the shoot. This cynic claimed, "No way, no no no. Impossible, it wasn't you - it was just another Chinese or Japanese looking dancer who kinda looked like you."

I was then contacted by another person in the forum who explained the situation to me. "This guy who seemed determined to prove you a liar is actually a huge fan of (this singer) - he had spent a lot of money to go see her in concert in New York last year and he was so proud of it. The fact that you actually got so up close and personal with (this singer), he is probably seething with jealousy and rage because he would give anything in the world to be in your position. Cos you come along as the guy from Ang Mo Kio who says oh I went to London and I worked with (the singer) whom he's been crazy about all his ife - the only way for him to deal with his jealousy is to deny it because if he had accepted it was the truth, the jealousy would just drive him insane. He wants to put (this singer) on a pedestal where mere mortals like him cannot touch - you've managed to touch his idol and that's why he hates you."

It all makes sense now I know why he hates me...

Q: So some people are ignorant, some people are spiteful... what else? 

Another reason why people suspect you're not using your own photos or divulging details about your own experiences is because that is something they would never do. I am sure you have friends who reveal very little on their Facebook profiles - why? Maybe they are too busy to bother with Facebook, but some genuinely feel that such a social networking website is an intrusion on their privacy. Maybe they are self-conscious about their appearances - I certainly do not like unflattering photos of myself on Facebook, but then again, I am confident enough to laugh at an unflattering photo of myself but many do not share my sense of self-deprecation. These are insecure people who are worried what people may think if their friends see a photo of them on Facebook - would they be criticized for their hair? Skin? Fashion sense? Weight? See, I just wouldn't give a damn - but others do.

Also for them, they find it hard to believe that bloggers like myself love talking about ourselves so much. They probably rarely ever talk about themselves (probably because they haven't done anything all that interesting to talk about), so that is why they find a blog like mine unbelievable but I am doing something they just wouldn't do in the first place. I am putting myself out there, on the internet, for anyone to judge me, mock me or criticize me - that is just too scary for a lot of people; so they just default to disbelief. After all, if I was some 16 year old student who hasn't done that much with his life and doesn't have that much to talk about - I certainly would hesitate to write a blog because I just wouldn't have that much to say even if I did have the facility to address the world wide web with a blog.

Most people prefer to remain anonymous - not me!

Recently, someone took the photo below from my blog and posted it on the EDMW forum - but the person who posted it said, "don't know whether this is really him or not but this is a photo from his blog". I'm like, why the hell would I post the photo of someone else on my blog? Like it or not, that's me in the photo, like it or hate it that's the only face I have. Who would be so bo liao as to create a blog like mine which is completely fictitious?

And for crying out aloud, if I am going to use someone else's photo, I would at least choose the photo of someone a lot more good looking. Tolong lah, uncle Limpeh is a balding 37 year man - like hello?. I have uploaded so many photos and videos of myself on my blog, I would have really had been a class A stalker of some unfortunate person to have been able to get hold of this many videos and photos of one person. If you wanna bitch about how freaking old, ugly and botak I am - then fair enough, go ahead and feel free to be as frank and brutal as you like. Given how plain and ordinary looking I am, I would've thought that most people would take one look at the photo below and think, yeah that's him alright, so bloody ugly it must be his real photo lah, cos if he wanted to use someone else's photo he would've picked someone who looks more like one of those gorgeous K-pop idols with perfect skin.

That's the photo we're talking about it - it's my ugly face !

Q: I spend ages writing but only get a few hundred people reading my blog.

A: Don't forget, even if you are a good writer, you need to know how to layout your blog in a way which looks pleasing and gives your readers a nice experience. I have a dear friend who blogs too - he writes very well but his blog is a sheer WOT (wall of text) and needless to say, he doesn't get that many readers because people don't even stay on his website long enough to realize just how good a writer he is. They get put off by the WOT.

Basically, you need at least one blog post to go viral and then you have to try to hold on to that traffic.  This is a two step process - firstly, you need to write a piece that is so epic that it gets over 1000 likes on Facebook, plenty of people are tweeting it and it is being picked up by blog aggregators and other bloggers. Read part 1 of my guide as to how to write such an epic piece. You then need to sustain the attention of the people by doing a follow up piece on the same topic and you need to direct readers from your most successful blog post to other newer blog posts you have written on the same topic. This way, you will establish yourself as a credible blogger on that topic.

Use funny photos to spice up your blog!

Q: That sounds like hard work, what if I never get a post that goes viral? Is there a short cut?

Yes, there is.

Q: Tell me please. 

A: It isn't rocket science really. All you need to do is to write a blog post on a current event - pick an event that is likely to be controversial, one that will be not be widely reported in the mainstream press and has a human interest angle. Read about it and blog about it - offering your point of view. Make sure you put the appropriate labels in the 'post settings' section for the blog so when people want to google the story, your post will come up when they search.

You can always pick someone interesting to blog about.

I got my teeth into a story in Singapore about Jerard Lee and his former employer Timetric - now whilst his story was not reported in the mainstream press, many Singaporeans did hear about his story on the internet and started googling details. Now just try this now. Open a new window, go to google.com and do a search for "Jerard Lee" - the first link is to Facebook but my blog features as the next six links for "Jerard Lee". Given that I was one of the few bloggers who bothered with this storm in a teacup story, I have now become the definitive source for this story and thanks to the way google and blogger works, none of the crap that the people on EDMW have said matters as much as what I say on the blog because when someone googles "Jerard Lee', they end up on my blog, not the EDMW forum. Bwahahahaha. Imagine what would happen the next time Jerard Lee applies for a job and the HR manager googles "Jerard Lee" and gets directed on my blog - whether or not Jerard even gets an interview would probably depend a lot on how critical I am of his actions in this episode. Oooh Jerard, behold the power of the internet.

So, I am sure there will be something in the news today you have a say about - choose carefully and turn your blog into the definitive source for details of that story. The Jerard Lee case has blown over in about a week and people lost interest fast enough, but what you can also do is pick a big story in the news and focus on an unusual angle. My readers in Singapore will remember the Kong Hee and City Harvest Church financial fraud episode from last year - most bloggers focussed on Kong Hee or City Harvest Church, but I chose to focus on his wife Sun Ho instead and analysed her role in this saga. So you can always try tackling a big story from an unusual angle and if you play your cards right, your blog posts will go viral if you can pick a unique angle which brings new perspective to the story.

I've blogged a lot about Alvivi!

Q: I have haters who leave nasty comments and people say horrible things about me on Facebook.

A: Sticks and stones my friend. You are putting yourself out there - people will be nasty and that is all a part of blogging. I have a thick skin and can laugh off most of the nasty comments I get - you can either turn the tables on them and start attacking them like Xiaxue did, or you can just choose to ignore those comments. In some occasions, some of these criticisms may actually have a valid point and it may be prudent to calm down and try to sift out the constructive criticism whilst discarding the rude insults. For me, I'd rather be controversial than bland, at least controversy invites attention, being bland means defaulting to such a boring, tame stance that nobody even gives you a second glance and that's just not me.

Q: People accuse me of getting my facts wrong, or not knowing what I am talking about.

A: There could be several possibilities when this happens. Firstly, you could have honestly got the facts wrong, it could be a typo or you could have used the wrong data. If this happens, acknowledge your error and then edit the piece to correct the mistake. Secondly, perhaps the person who accused you of the error has gotten his facts wrong. It could be simply down to human error - for example, you may be referring to data covering the period of the year 2012 whilst the other person may be looking at data for the year 2011. In which case, always feel free to challenge the person and see if you can get them to produce the source of their data.

Always get your facts & figures right. 

Of course, the other possibility is that you're being challenged by someone who has no idea what s/he is talking about and s/he is trying to pass his/her opinion off as facts without having actually referenced any concrete data. This is a lot harder when dealing with something that is far more subjective, say the issue of racism which I talk about a lot on my blog. Here is an example of how I dealt with a reader Aura who had based her opinion on what she had heard from others and how I presented my point of view in disagreement with her.

Q: I find it hard to sustain traffic to my blog.

A: Aha, this is a common problem. On my blog, I tend to get about 5,000 to 7,000 views a day on quiet days, but when I get my hands on a hot topic, that shoots up to over 20,000 views a day and it has even exceeded 100,000 views a day. You need to constantly monitor the traffic to your blog - if you see the traffic slowing down, then look back over the historic data and see what you were writing about then. Review your own performance - clearly you have done something right back then to attract more traffic to your blog, so what did you do then which you are not doing now?

A common problem faced by many bloggers is that they can get so busy with work that they just don't find the time to blog properly. If you find yourself in that position, try this. Find something interesting you have read in the news or in social media, share it on your blog as something that has amused or intrigued you and invite your readers to talk about it. This is exactly what I did here. It generated some responses and traffic to my blog, not bad considering it took me about 3 minutes to post that piece. Remember, not every piece you post has got to be a proper essay - they can actually be remarkably short as long as you make one good point in it.

Q: Is blogging lucrative? Can I make money from it?

A: Now this isn't a common problem per se, but a question left by my reader neuroticramblings on part 1 of this series on blogging. The short answer is no, it is not lucrative - you can make some money from it but I wouldn't be quitting my day job just yet to blog full time.  You need very big number of followers before you can turn that traffic into a considerable source of income and whilst I have had 3.4 million views on my blog, I am just not there yet. The simplest way to get some revenue on your blog is to allow Google Adsense to place ads on your blog. Now these usually appear on the side of your screen or at the very top of the page - I use Google Chrome so I can block out most ads. Very little revenue is generated from these ads and it really depends on people clicking on those ads . I get a little bit of money each time someone clicks through and so if you like my blog, thank me by clicking on those ads!

I do get a cheque from Google Adsense every month, the amount is usually around £60 to £80 - not a lot of money but then again I am not vlogging. One can only truly make a lot of money through vlogging as a bit Youtube video that goes viral can instantly earn you a lot of money from Google Adsense and people are far more likely to accidentally click through if there is a pop up ad and they're trying to close it but miss the little 'X' in the top right hand corner of the ad. Vlogging of course, take a lot more time and effort and it involves scripting the piece, delivering the piece to camera and then editing it. This can take ages and even a short 5 minute piece would involve days of production - now I like communicating my ideas to my followers via a blog or vlog, but what I don't like is the task of editing videos which is a time consuming task - I barely have the time to blog and I won't be vlogging by that token.

To be able to make a living off vlogging, you need to have hundreds of thousands of subscribers on Youtube and have generated several million views on your videos. Many who are big on Youtube use it as a stepping stone to launch their showbiz careers - my favourite example are Munah & Hirzi in Singapore whom I adore so much. It was on the basis of their Youtube success that they managed to get a whole series commissioned on Suria (with season 2 akan datang) - so many vloggers are using Youtube as a stepping stone to greater things, so if they can make some money along the way, great. But if not, they still have their sights set on greater goals in the long run.

Another way that one can generate revenue via blogging is if you establish yourself as an expert in a field and gain many followers. So for example, if you establish yourself as a blogger who reviews restaurants, you may be able to get some restaurants to give you a meal on the house if you are reviewing that restaurant. If you are a blogger who reviews cosmetic products, then you may have a lot of cosmetic companies giving you free samples to review. This does raise some questions though, like if a restaurant were to give me a free meal in this context, would I want to give them a bad review, knowing that I would never get another free meal there ever again if I gave them a bad review? How objective can I be as a blogger if I am effectively being sponsored by the people I am reviewing? There is a conflict of interest there, still some bloggers/vloggers do get sponsors who give them product/money for a product endorsement.

So it is not something you can just jump into and say, "I am going to blog/vlog full time." You need to be able to start somewhere, build up a following over time before you can evaluate if you are in a position to make enough money from it to do it full time or not. Otherwise, there are plenty of bloggers/vloggers like myself who simply do it because we enough it and we're not really fussed whether or not we make any money from it.

So there you go, that ends this piece on the art of blogging. If you have any more questions or issues you want me to address, you know the drill: leave a comment below. Don't forget to share this piece on social media to encourage others to blog. Thanks for reading and happy blogging everyone.