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When you send your company’s blog feed out into the world, which option helps (or hinders) your sales and 
responses? Do you allow just a partial, teaser clip with ‘Click here to read the full article,’ or do you just plop the entire post out there for all the world to see?
One way improves sales/responses, the other . . . not so much.
Plenty of good arguments to be made on both sides, so when fellow copywriter and blogger James Chartrand went on a tear about full vs partials blog feed snippets, I could feel his pain because a year earlier I faced the same conundrum.
Here’s what I learned and what I posted in his comments (with some additions in this version for clarity):
“I used to feel the way you did, and up until the beginning of last year, I was a committed full-feed guy. ThenI read a report or POV (can’t remember which) that had me think of the blog’s home page as the front page of a magazine.
And what is the first we do with magazines to see if it is worth reading? Yep, we scan the cover. And if there are several similarly-themed magazines in a row and you don’t have the time to peruse them all, what do you do to whittle down the list?
Yet again, you scan the covers first. Same with with the Home page of a blog. It’s a magazine cover or the first page of a lengthy novel - depending on how we use it and that is where the feed debate comes into the picture.
With full feeds, one gets 1-3 chances to catch the eye of a reader and draw them in. With partial feeds you get 8-10 chances of catching the reader’s eye. I agree that some people do the partial feed badly and should be taken to the wood shed for it.
I appreciate partials because, let’s face it, as copywriters we know that if the headline and lead are bad — it ain’t gonna get better from there. So in my aggregator I scan through the headlines and partial leads to see what I want to read.
Many of us don’t have time to read everything online that interests us, so we’ve developed strategies that cut through the clutter faster.
The Problogger survey is interesting, yet my stats (and those of client blogs) have shown that when it comes to partial vs full feeds, partials give me lower Bounce Rates and more Pages/Visit and more Avg. Time on Site.
That trifecta makes me (and the clients) happy.
So there it is, another POV. Hope it helps.”
Last I heard, James is reconsidering his stance. Read it here.
Like what you read? Then click here to buy me a coffee.
By Walter |
Topics: Client Top Secret, Pro Analysis |
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Comments
responses? Do you allow just a partial, teaser clip with ‘Click here to read the full article,’ or do you just plop the entire post out there for all the world to see?
November 14th, 2007 at 4:18 pm
I’m still reconsidering
Your perspective does make one think. Each day I go to my blog home page and think… man, snippets would be so much better. Then I think of my feed snippets, stats, readers…
Then I go to Google Reader, start skimming, and get frustrated each time I’m cut off.
One solution? Extend the feed snippets long enough to get people interested. Some feed snippets are two sentences - how is a reader supposed to get excited over two sentences, no matter how good the headline is?
Other feeds have snippets that cover a good-sized paragraph or two - and those, I often click through. I don’t feel cheated, cut off, or like just another hit stat. I feel like a reader invited to come on over.
Gah. Now you’re having me convince myself about snippets. Sheesh!