This is a guest post by Heather von Doehren, Assistant Editor at Relief: A Quarterly Christian Expression

Scott Sweeney’s previous article on How to Handle A Reputation Hit caused me to reflect on how we at Relief handle not only a hit to one’s blogging reputation, but how to handle negative feedback from loyal readers.

Most successful bloggers will give you the advice to really listen to your readers when they have comments, feedback, or criticism. And it’s good sound advice, as not listening to feedback/criticism is the first step to losing anyone’s respect, let alone website traffic. But what happens when your readers are just flat out…well…wrong?

I’m not referring to the kind of “wrong” that you feel when you are hurt from negative feedback (can you say denial?) …I’m referring to commentary that runs counter to the very niche that you’ve built for yourself in the blogosphere. One such occurrence happened to us at Relief.

Now, if you are unfamiliar with the purpose of Relief, we are a Christian print journal publishing fiction, poetry, and creative nonfiction with a spiritual slant; however, we’re not your typical “safe-for-the-whole-family” Christians. We’re looking for work that isn’t sheltered, fluffy, or preachy. We sell our journal as being “edgy” in that we don’t censor our authors. So, in essence…anything goes. At our website, (our blog specifically) we attempt to build this persona as well as act as a resource for writers striving to write/represent Christianity as it stands in the real world, not the fabricated ideal one that you’ll find stacked in a typical Christian bookstore.

As you can imagine, blogging in such a strange, narrowly-focused, and controversial niche has placed us in a difficult position. Some conservative Christians judge us because we’re too “morally loose” and some nonreligious folk hate us because we’re too preachy. Needless to say we get some hate mail, which is to be expected.

What surprised us though was to find an atheist website that criticized us for not being more biblical, attacking our reputation not just as a Christian literary journal, but as Christians. And following the advice of many, we decided to counter that attack by running a blog series centered around studying scripture, something that our website had yet to really dedicate itself to doing. All in all, the criticism was valid in that by shear omission of the topic, we had left it open for attack. So something had to be done.

We enlisted some bloggers to help with this and quickly posted two blogs on reading the Bible, as this is what we perceived needed to be done in order to “fix” our problem. But to our surprise, we received more negative feedback from that move than anything else we had ever done.

I thought about ignoring the criticism, thinking that it was just impossible to make everyone happy. But when I received an email from a loyal Christian reader titled, “WTF Relief? So Much for Edgy” I knew I had to do something.

What To Do To Win Back Your Loyal Readers (And Gain Some Too)

1. Confront the Criticism Privately If You Feel It Was Wrong

Since ignoring a reader’s feedback is the first step to losing that reader, confront it privately first. Send that person an email explaining your reasoning/rationale. More often than not, a lot of criticism stems from a misunderstanding, and opening the door for communication is the first step in seeing eye to eye.

2. Make Your Readers Aware of the Situation

If the negative feedback comes from more than one person and you still feel it’s out-of-line, write a blog addressing the issues ASAP. A good, successful blog is more than just one person standing on a soapbox writing about whatever pops into his/her head. It’s a community of people who share similar interests and goals of which you are the mediator. If your children aren’t playing nicely, put them in time-out by writing a blog that confronts the issues at hand. Speak to them and with them. They’ll listen.

3. Ask for help

I’ve experienced a strange phenomenon among some of our readers. Sometimes they forget that there’s a person at the other end of the computer screen who’s just as fallible as they are. Asking your readers for advice will not only remind them that occasionally we need help too, but motivate them to be more active members of the community you’ve worked so hard to build.

After posting our reply about our negative feedback, we received not only the highest traffic day ever, but so much positive feedback from readers who had previously been very passive members of our blog.

If you follow all the above advice and you still receive the same negative commentary, then it’s time to either start considering taking the feedback and making some real changes, or…it’s time to get ready and kick some reader ass butt.

I wish it were just so simple. But the point’s been missed, you’ve made a mess, and who would have guessed that it’s as simple as it seems.

-Katy Perry ‘Simple’

As I was driving in to work the other day, I listened to radio station Kiss 103.5 in Chicago. Usually, I don’t make it a habit to listen to Kiss because it embodies everything I don’t like about the music industry. Kiss is owned by a large company that basically dictates who is successful and who is not on mainstream radio in America. I do like good songs, however, and you do get a nice blend of songs on that station. A new song caught my ear as I was getting out of my car. It is by an artist named Katy Perry and the song is called ‘I Kissed A Girl’. As soon as I got to my computer, I headed over to MySpace and took another listen to the song. It was catchy, but nothing groundbreaking. It will probably be a hit. It has a few controversial lyrics and a terrific beat. Katy is attractive, and an excellent singer but my first impression is she is a cookie cutter pop singer. Watch a bit of the video below, it will help prove a point later in the post.

I Kissed A Girl

I headed over to Wikipedia to a little more investigation. There was very little information about the singer (which has changed in the last few days as the song has started to make it big). One thing that struck me as odd was she released an album when she was 16, back in 2001. Then there was no history until 2007 when she digitally released the single “Ur So Gay” on iTunes.I have been struggling in the music industry for the past 10 years. If Katy Perry was a true artist, there would be a history. No one just starts playing music, stops for 7 years, and then comes out of nowhere with a new look and sound. I just figured her new label buried it. Record labels like to do that from time to time.
I started doing a little web surfing and stumbled upon a handful of YouTube videos. Katy has been working for many years at becoming successful in music. She has starred in other peoples videos (Cupid’s Chokehold by the Gym Class Heroes), and she has been honing her craft for years. You watched the first video, now check out this one. It is called ‘Simple’ - It was on a movie soundtrack released by Java Records in 2005.

In 2004, Katy was listed in Blender magazine as the next big thing. She has been dropped by several labels, and has encountered many a hardship trying to get that big break in the music industry. She has been open in discussing this, especially at shows. In need of a change and, perhaps, better luck, she took a risk and reinvented herself. Ever since unveiling this new, more grownup ‘look’ and sound late last year, it has been full steam ahead for her music career.

I like to incorporate things I have learned in the music industry and apply them to blogging.

If you feel your talents are being overlooked, there is no shame in reinventing yourself. Evaluate what you are trying to accomplish and make changes when needed, even if it means adopting a new persona. As long as you are true to your personal vision, reinventing is a great way to get a fresh start at something you love.

One of the biggest crazes on the internet is how you can turn blogging in to your career. Many of you are attempting this, I know I have been. You can find so many resources that will tell you exactly how to turn that passion for writing into a lucrative and rewarding career.

It CAN be a lucrative career, but that isn’t what this post is about. Hit up Google and you can find out all about the career bloggers and their rise to financial security.

The main problem with career blogging is also the reason that so many people are attempting it. It is extremely easy to start a ‘business’ blog in an attempt to profit. Many services cater to the career blogger, and it has over saturated the marketplace. Finding a fresh and new voice in the blogging world is about as difficult as finding a needle in a haystack. It doesn’t mean you cannot be that fresh voice, but the odds are stacked and they are not stacked in your favor.

As a writer, do you feel it is in your best interest to expand the reach of your writing?

What if you are a good writer, but feel that you are wasting your talents in a going nowhere blog?

Have you considered writing a book?

It seems a forgotten way to turn writing in to a career is to author a book. I say forgotten only because my writing experience has been limited to the internet. I bet many blog writers feel the same way. When I was a writing music for a living, I always felt my work was legitimized by producing a physical CD. Would I feel more like a ‘real’ writer if I published a book? I decided a month or so ago that I was going to research that, to see how I would like the challenge. Maybe this is another way to expand my writing and truly make writing a career? Like any good interweb user, I approached Google with a simple query:

“How do I write a book?”

The first listing that came up was actually insightful and beneficial to me. It was written by Scott Berkun and posted to his blog. He has some pretty straight forward advice when it comes to writing a book. After taking a little time to mull over if I did or didn’t want to write a book, I decided it was something I wanted to try. What do I have to lose?

So for the past three weeks I have been working on my first book, and it has nothing to do with AdSense, Blogging, Wordpress or how to generate a six figure income online. I have been using Wordpress on a non-public blog to write the book. Each post I make is a chapter, and it is very easy and comfortable because of the amount of time I spend blogging in general. I can go back, edit, and make changes at will, and it’s kept in order for me. The beauty of the book I am writing is that it’s chronological in a way, so using a blog format works. I am aware that I will have to convert everything into a publisher ready format, but the process appears to flow so far. Without knowledge of book publishing, however, I had to do a little research to find out what my options are. When I was in a band, It was difficult to land a record deal so many bands would self-publish their music on CD and then sell them at shows. I figured the same could be done for an aspiring author, but instead of playing shows, I could sell it online. You may call it a lack of self confidence or a lack of knowledge, but I feel it will be easier to self-publish than attempt to find a publisher, at least at this point.

After looking over about 100 self-publishing websites, I decided that Lulu.com was looking like the winner. They offer all types of publishing solutions, and it appears they have a one that will fit my book style and my budget. They let you create your project in a private or public setup, so you can go right to selling it online if you choose. I have set mine up as private because I am not ready to publish. I intend of finding someone to edit and proof read my book first, similar to how I rely on sound engineers to record and produce my music. Another good thing about this specific company is you can publish as few or as many as you’d like, so I intend on publishing a small amount first, just to see if I like the quality of the product.

When I get close to completion, I will post about it here and more than likely create a website specifically for the book. I am excited about this endeavor because I feel closer to that ultimate goal of being a self employed writer. Blogging is great for earning income, but I definitely feel I have moved some eggs to a different basket.

I am interested to find out how many blog writers have considered publishing books if they have not done so, and if they have, what are some good suggestions they could give an aspiring author such as myself.

I have heard there are two guarantees in life. I feel there are three.

1. Death.
2. Taxes.
3. You will write a bad and pointless blog post.

When I start out every blog post, I try to make it as witty, informative and interesting as I can. I spend a bit of time crafting it, proof reading it, and then I hit that little publish button. Later that day, I’ll come back hoping to see comments from fellow bloggers and readers about what they felt about my opinion. Sometimes, I will come back to the website and see a big fat zero in the comment section. Immediately, I think ‘Wow, everyone must be stupid except me!’

Then reality sets in.

The post I made just plain sucked. I can picture it now. Joe or Josephine Average opens up their RSS reader and clicks on the newest brilliant article from Man vs Blog. They read it, utter a quick ‘meh’, and wish they could get that 5 minutes back.

Don’t think it won’t happen to you. Trust me it will. I have pulled up articles from great bloggers such as Darren Rowse and thought ‘Ok, that was entirely a waste of time.’  Even the best writers can start with a great idea and have it go south. The key is to not get discouraged when this happens.

Readers will forgive the occasional bad post. Readers will not forgive a string of uninspired and worthless posts. If you look back at your most recent post and feel it isn’t your best work, don’t fret.

Just make sure the next post you have is up to your usual high standard.