Every blogger enters the blogosphere with one goal in mind, to make it big. He wants his blog to be popular, to be read by a lot of people and to have a loyal readership. And he is ready to do whatever it takes to reach there. However, there is one problem that he has to face. There is a lot of ‘help’ available out there that is causing more ‘harm’ than help. Ironical, isn’t it?
Let’s say that Mr. White (Yes, I love Reservoir Dogs!) is a blogger who has just started a new blog. His readership at the moment is zilch. In fact, he hasn’t even decided the topic to blog about.
When he enters the blogosphere, he is as confused as a cow on Astroturf and is desperately looking for directions. Thankfully, there are hundreds of bloggers who have been there and done that before him. They are the demigods of the blogosphere. They have walked the walk and talked the talk. They have a six figure reader base and make a six figure income each month from their blogs. And Mr. White will rely heavily on the inputs and tips that he receives from these experts to help him establish a base in the blogosphere.
So, Mr. White starts his journey by looking for Blogging tips. A simple search on Google gives him 93,200,000 results for ‘Blogging tips’. Wow! That’s far too many experts for a subject as difficult as blogging. ‘Maybe it’s simpler than I thought’, thinks Mr. White and enters one of the first websites on the search results page. This site is almost the holy grail of blogging and has a lot of advice for beginner bloggers. Mr. White is happy and smiling that he has found such a large resource of invaluable information.
He spends the next three hours on the same website and jots down all important tips and links that will help him in one way or the other in his quest for success on the blogosphere. He subscribes to the RSS feeds for regular updates and is just about satisfied. ‘But’, thinks Mr. White, ‘there can be more information out there.’ Why stick only to one website? So, he goes to the next website.
But here is where Mr. White errs.
He finds that there is an equal amount of information on this website as well. A lot of it duplicated content and a whole lot of new stuff as well. Well, the more the merrier. He spends some time on this website as well before going to the next one and the next one and the next one. He is greeted by newer tips and ideas on every blog that he goes to. Each new blog speaks about something new that the earlier blogger had missed out on. ‘Do you know your link karma?’ ’10 tips for amateur bloggers’ ‘Using Twitter for your blog’ ‘Going viral and getting more readers’. ‘How, I got 10000 readers on my post in one day’… Aaargh! There is so much information floating out there that analyzing and segregating, genuinely useful content is a tall order.
Mr. White is overwhelmed at all the information and is back to square one. He is feeling as lost as a cow on Astroturf again. This (information overload) is a problem that is faced by most amateur bloggers. I faced it too when I started out on the blogosphere (which was like three months ago).
Information is a lot like food. It is best when served in small digestible reasonable portions that serve its purpose. But we (everyone from managers to bloggers to couch tubers) keep ingesting information till the point of asphyxiation. One of the reasons why we do it is, to prevent any information from being left out or, in other words, to be as perfect and complete as possible. But it’s easier to lose direction amidst all that information.
And hey, you can very well be accessing and storing wrong information.
The internet makes it easier for us to get more information that we would ever require. The onus is on us to ask ourselves ‘When do I have enough?’
The solution
Ok, so I have blabbed enough about the problem. Time to get into constructive mode and suggest a few solutions.
1. Rely on the best: The blogosphere is full of self certified experts who can talk about any subject this side of Jupiter. But there are very few people who can truly be labeled as experts in their field of expertise. If blogging is what you are looking for then you can rely on Problogger.net as well as Bloggingtips.com. There are others that are good. But you won’t need anything else once you visit these two. Similarly, look for the ‘best of the best’ in your niche and rely on them for sometime to come.
2. Limit link hunting: I have coined the term ‘Link hunting’ and it is the phenomenon where you follow outgoing links from blogs. Your favorite post has a comment and it leads to a different blog, a comment from that blog leads to another and so on and so forth. New bloggers have the habit of following every link that may seem even remotely useful. Link hunting is one of the prime causes of information overload. Limit it to, say, 3 outgoing links per day.
3. Set a time limit and stick to it: Accessing information and acquiring knowledge is fine but you have to set a time frame for information loading and stick to that timeframe. And once you start to exceed that timeframe, switch off your browser and get back to your tasks. It will also help you improve your productivity.
4. Learn data control: It’s so easy to hit that ‘subscribe to RSS’ button on every blog that you come across. But think about it. Do you really need that blog subscription? Take time and clear off all the unwanted RSS links from your subscriptions. Controlling the influx of unwanted data is the key to curbing information overload.
5. Meditate: There are a thousand ways of meditating. Try and find what relaxes your mind. Play soothing music; relax with your eyes closed. Even if you can do it for 5 minutes in a day, do it. A relaxed mind always helps you focus and improves your creativity as well.
Notes: Image courtesy Flicrk: Information Overload, originally uploaded by DeaPeaJay.
