This post is intended to help followers of bloggers, as well as bloggers. The topic may not be exciting, but I hope you'll read it, pick up a few tips, and/or share it with others that may benefit.
There are many ways to follow a blog, with the two main categories are being a private follower or a public follower. Today, I want to talk about Public Followers (e.g. why, how, trouble shooting, etc). And, share insights that may help those that follow any blog, as well as bloggers that have followers. I also want to invite others to share their insights & recommendations, by way of leaving a comment on this post.
For Bloggers: There are a variety of reasons a blog may care how many followers they have, or who is publicly following, but one of the major reasons, is this is the number of Blog Followers is a blog metric. And, it is a blog metric that potential sponsors or advertisers use to determine if they want to sponsor a blog for a giveaway, or other type of sponsorship.
This post is not intended to annoy bloggers or non-bloggers, that don't care about the number of followers on one blog vs another. It isn't a matter of competition, but a matter of a blogger being able to provide visible metrics to a potential sponsor. Ultimately, if you enjoy and want to support any blog you should consider being a Public Follower of that blog.
You may follow a blog through a variety of methods: RSS feeds, Facebook, Twitter, NetworkedBlogs, Google Reader, or other tools. But, Google tools that are available for the Follower or those available for the Blogger may not recognize you as a Public Follower unless you complete a few steps that you may not have done for blogs you enjoy following.
To clarify, Google has a variety of Profiles (e.g. Google Profile, Google + Profile, Blogger Profile, etc.) and while your log in ID for these profiles may be the same, Google doesn't synch ALL info between these profiles. Thus, there are a few basic steps to be a "Public Follower" of a blog, that are frequently overlooked.
To start off, I want to share insights on how to Follow a Blog:
1) Have a free Google Account, which you can get at www.google.com. Even if you are a blogger on another platform, SewCalGal recommends you create a Google Account AND follow these steps.
2) Click the "Join this site button", which is located on the right hand column of this blog, but could be located in a variety of places on other blogs (take time to locate it on blogs you wish to follow).
3) Once you have a Google Account (and if you have a prior account you should still perform this step) go to http://www.blogger.com/edit-profile.g
Be sure the following are checked:
- share my profile
- show my email address
- show sites I follow
- scroll through the various fields and provide info, as you feel appropriate to share. Continue scrolling down to the bottom of the page and click the "save profile" button.
TROUBLESHOOTING
1) Check your profile. Leave a comment on a blog and then go back and click on your name, to view your profile.
2) This will take you to your "Blogger Profile" even if you do not have a blog. Tow key areas you want to check to see is visible on your blogger profile are:
- BLOGS I FOLLOW
To make changes go to: https://www.google.com/settings/account
1) EMAIL ADDRESSES should be edited, if it does not accurately reflect your email.
2) Go to: http://www.blogger.com/revert-
Be sure your profile settings are not linked to a Google + profile, as it doesn't seem to be linking your profile info when you leave comments on a blog. Plus, there appear to be limits to a Google+ profile for changing back & forth between a Google, Blogger, Google + profile, etc.
You have the option of reverting to your Blogger profile for up to 30 days after you make the switch. After 30 days, your Blogger profile will be deleted and if you want to switch back, you will need to create a new Blogger profile.
I hope this helps. It should also help resolve issues with no-reply bloggers, which are those that leave comments on a blog, but can't be contacted as their are issues with their settings.
SewCalGal will update this post, based on feedback and on-going learnings. I also hope you'll take time to check my post where I have maintained a log of those that enter giveaways on SewCalGal, but don't have their profile set so they could be contacted if their name is drawn. This post also has tips on how to change their settings too!
31 comments:
Thank you!
on the things I've had trouble with is - unfollowing someone. I went through blogger's steps - in a couple of ways but inevitably I haven't unfollowed at all - all the original blog are still there. any ideas?
Thanks for posting this. I know that I have many more readers than followers. If they all followed I could offer potential sponsors a much truer picture of the reach of my blog.
This should help!
Should probably note this is for Blogspot/Blogger blog and not WordPress ones. ;)
For the blog writer, if you want ot know how many rss subscribers you have (which may overlap followers) burn a feed at Feedburner. It'll give you a total count of everyone reading your blog via rss.
Thank you for posting this. I "think" I've finally gotten added as a public follower on your site through adding it to my "reading list." Maybe. Google doesn't always make things easy for us non-tech-savvy folks. Especially when it appears you can still join a site through Google Friend Connect and add the setting "follow publicly" there, but apparently nothing happens when you join that way. Hopefully your post will help a lot of folks navigate the quagmire of Google settings.
Great information here! I know I watch my public followers numbers very closely. I have no idea how many people follow privately. Those numbers help keep us bloggers blogging. It tells us that someone out there is actually reading.
Great post! I get questions from people all the time about following and how to sign up to follow. It can get confusing to those who are new to the blog world. Thanks for sharing this!!!
How odd that that would be what you would care about and why. We definitely have different blogging priorities. Be well. Lane
Thanks Darlene!
liebe Grüße
Bente
I have a Wordpress blog and I will never forgive Blogger for discontinuing google friend connect on non-blogger blogs. They certainly don't like to play with anyone else! I lost so many followers and the RSS feed doesn't show a true picture of how many people are subscribed.
thanks for the info, though. Lately I've been making a bigger effort to follow though google friend connect, instead of just through the RSS.
I've been getting questions from no-reply bloggers lately. I'd love to reply, but.... I'm hoping that more people will read your posts and change their settings.
In addition to sponsors...it just makes me feel better to know I'm not talking to myself! I have a very small number of public followers and I really really hope there are more private followers otherwise I would feel a little silly for blogging at all. So follow publicly so the blog owner knows they have a friend!
Hi Thank you for the info I do have a google account. Why is it that when I leave a comment that it shows me as pippa' I also sometime get that coming up in the blogs that I follow but corrects itself when I go on to there blog. Not a techy I am afraid and do not wish to be it is just annoying to me.
Thank you so much. I am so non computerish. My son set up google for me so I couldnt figure out how to change it so my email would show. I have been typing it in every time.
If you see my email would you please email me back and let me know. Thanks so much
Baby steps! Thanks you.
My profile wasn't sharing the sites that I follow, so I clicked on it to do so. Interestingly, it does NOT show all of the ones that I've been following...including yours...though my blogger home screen does. Is there any way to fix that?
I learned something new about why to have followers.
I had a question. I am trying to update the blogs I follow and when I try all I get is this:We are unable to load your FriendConnect data at this time. We apologize for the inconvenience. Please try again shortly.
I have been trying for 2 weeks and even went to the old blogger interface, same thing.
I know another blog who is going through the same thing and put a question out there on some "help" post, but no answers yet.
thanks for any help you might be able to give me.
Do you know how to get out of Google+ once you've signed in for it? Can't seem to figure that one out??? Thanks for all the information. Another question - why do you want to have us check the box about all the blogs we follow? I look at my list and it makes my head spin....
You are always so informative. Thanks so much for helping those of us who struggle to make sense out of all this 'new' stuff! :) I do think I'm set up correctly - now; good grief, I sure do hope so.
Thanks for another great educational entry!
How do I change my settings from "Follow Privately" to "Follow Publicly".
Thanks so much for the info and catching it for me.
What a great giveaway....I would be over the moon to win bundle #2
Kristin
Absolutely gorgeous Christmas wall hangings. I would be very excited to win.
Thanks for the detailed explanation. I am slowly learning this stuff.
i am a follower, and also one who doesnt win. but the offer is so much appreciated anyways. of course who couldnt use this. if i had the money to get me one, i would want 1500 to go to the hurricane sandy "victims". we all need something like this when we least expect it.
Thank you for this. I'm trying but don't have the same options as you show in step 3. I will check this comment to see if your next step works for me! No wonder I've never won anything! :)
Thank you again. I did find that somehow I got into Google+ so I opted out of it. I never did find a way to show what blogs I am following. This might take a few days to work as Google says it will take a few days for them to cancel the Google+ account. Hopefully, I'll eventually be able to fix this. Thanks again for your help.
Thank you. I am now a public follower of SewCalGal.
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