October 24, 2011

• Some Ideas on Xanga Improvement

  I wanted to start a conversation on ideas for how Xanga can improve itself. TheXangaTeam has already started this, but here are some thoughts I've had lately. About 3 years ago, I wrote a post titled "Could Xanga have Retained its Popularity?" on what Xanga could do to improve itself. Given that Xanga is once again working on self-improvement, and that Vanedave did a post on this recently, I thought it was a good time to do such a post again.
  
  Lifestyle Blogging, Not Topic Blogging: I was very much in favor of the -ish sites 3 years ago, because I thought there was still room on the web to grow such sites. Now, however, seems like special interest areas are flooded with blogs. So I'm wondering, is it time to shift focus? Less blogging about things, more about personalities?
  I am wondering what Xanga can do to create blogging stars that people outside Xanga would want to follow, in much the same way Youtube has accomplished this. There are certainly several people on here who have a cult following. But to be honest, most of the time the people who are popular on here work hard for it and wouldn't be appealing to a broader audience. What I'm saying is, find people who are doing interesting things like going to another country for 6 months, doing a fashion internship in NYC, or creating art. Bloggers like @rvexpeditions or the late beloved @jstickmann might be perfect for such a site.
  *What if Xanga would create a blog section called "Collegetown" and choose 6 students to blog throughout the school year about their ups and downs? This might encourage other students to blog.
  *What if Xanga created a blog that collected the work of such guy bloggers as @ItIsAllGravy, @Cakalusa, @GodlessLiberal, @Vanedave, and @Paul_Partisan ? All have rather edgy humor, similar ages, etc., and if collected in one blog, updates would be more frequent.
  *Is it worth it to take out a Google or Facebook ad to promote some of the better Xangans and attract some visitors?
  
  Branding: The word "Xanga" should mean something positive when people hear it. The challenge Xanga faces is to either aim for a different brand image or to work at reaching people who want what the brand offers. I think that no matter how may new features Xanga adds, it won't matter if the brand image doesn't improve. This should be a high priority. An additional problem is that because most Xangans write only about themselves instead of about hot topics, Xanga is not as visible as it should be on search engines. Isn't that right, George Clooney Hot Sandwiches Butter Jessica Biel With Obama Crazy Fun?
  *Could Xanga better target the youth market? Xanga suffers from an identity crisis: its -ish sites and reputation skews young, but many of the top bloggers are older. I think Xanga needs to find a way to better feature younger writers.
  *Could Xanga actually change its name altogether? Luring people back to a site they think they know everything about can be difficult. I wonder if the time has come to completely rebrand.
  
  Tastemaking: Steve Jobs once said that great products were a triumph of taste, of “trying to expose yourself to the best things humans have done and then trying to bring those things into what you are doing." At its best, Xanga was great at finding creative work that Xangans were doing and putting it on the front page. I understand that was difficult work, and takes a lot of time. And I don't wish to ignite the old argument over "Most Views, or Selected Content" on the front page. All I'll say is, Xanga needs to do more curating and make sure that good content produced on the network is found and emphasized. It's not just about providing the tools, it's about also sorting through content. And many people who have left mentioned that Xanga did not seem tasteful enough anymore.
  *What about using Paper.li to create a "Best of Xanga Writing" daily paper?
  
  Contests and SEO: One of the best ways to lure outsiders into a site is to have contests. Xanga has a lot of contests already, but even more would help. There's a lot of research on gamification and how creating contests and making everything into a game can be rewarding. I am not suggesting Xanga go the way of myspace and tagged and focus solely on games. But I am saying that some contests, especially if they are geared in such a way to help Xanga's search engine rankings, could be good. Featured questions were good, but perhaps could be re-organized to better get people's attention. People could vote on their favorite entry, perhaps. This can also help to perhaps have people write more content that could attract search engine traffic by focusing on a hot topic.
  * But what about a "Contest of the Week" feature that in some way can bring in outsiders to try to compete?
  * What about having a "Theme of the Week" on a writing topic?
  
  Community: Yes, we all whine about the community on occasion, but it's still one of the best features Xanga has going for it. When people return, they usually say that they missed not having the same community on other blogging sites. Used properly, it can still be a strength for Xanga. Features such as@MyHomeIsWriting, @confessionsandsecrets, @seedsower's Sunday feature, and @Featured_Grownups help by drawing on the resources of the community. I do think Xanga can strengthen its community by taking a more aggressive stance against trolls whose sole purpose is to disrupt the community and by protecting its top bloggers against the inevitable hating and envy. (Although don't ask me what to do about top bloggers who are trolls, heh). Otherwise, I can't think of more ways to fix this.
  
  Cool Analytics: It amazes me how obsessed Xangans became over earning "True" status. They started analyzing their total posts and doing whatever they could to game the numbers so they could get that badge. Why not go further and offer a full range of statistics? I want to know what my most viewed and least viewed posts were, most popular times, most visited days. All this is already stored in our blogs, so why not write some quick code and make this more available to us? Numbers have a way of making people want to post more. Please, @TheXangaTeam?
  *Why not create a module on each page displaying our most read and most recommended posts?

  • 3:47 pm
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