This might seem like a “who cares” type entry to some, but it’s a legitimate question to explore in a bigger context of how to get on a popular blogger’s reading list. Specific suggestions and tips are included. Yeah, I’m going all lab rat on you, readers, do you see my tail?

Andrew Ferguson dot NET is wondering how to get on Microsoft blogger extraordinaire, Robert Scoble’s reading list:

So here’s my question to Scoble (and I’ll probably email this to him too):What does it take to get on your feed list? You seem to have a very nice cross section of feeds. Here is why I think you should read mine. I’m from Seattle and grew up with Microsoft in my backyard, so to speak. Now I’m at college in a quaint little town called Golden going to the Colorado School of Mines (CSM), arguably one of the best schools in the mid-west for engineering. I’m planning on being an electrical engineer, but I also might go back to the UW and get a degree in computer sciences. I am ambitious. And perhaps most importantly, I am the future.

You are the future? I like that. Expand on that. Why are you the future? What are you going to do with the future and technology? How could you make Microsoft better? These are questions I bet would at least intrigue Scoble. Especially if they take a fresh point of view on the topic.

Also, what’s up with the dot NET thing but no .NET code? Is that just a reference to the domain? I would think something with dot NET in the title would be about the .NET framework. I wonder if other readers would assume the same thing?

Scoble used to read like 1000+ blogs, but it seems like lately he has switched to citing memeorandum and digg as being primary sources of information for him to blog about. If that’s true I can see why because both those sources deliver the pulse quickly and concisely without having to turn and burn through 1000+ sources trying to find the good stuff. Still, both these sources miss good stuff too.

Also, Scoble has written about this subject before and even showed at one of the conventions that certain keywords will trigger to show up in his aggregator. If I remember correctly, and maybe this has changed, but the term ‘Microsoft sucks’ was one of those triggers.

I saw that Andrew is going to (or may) email in his request which is a good contact. The caveat: if not abused comes to mind. Emailing somebody busy is something that needs to be done with great care and concern. Too many emails from the same source, especially when they are self-promotional, and one risks become annoying. Becoming noise, not signal.

I had some trouble initially emailing Scoble (he said he never received my email) so I switched to using my .Mac account and ironically enough he responded right away. I have called him once before as well to let him know something I thought was important and to offer to help him on his hosting situation awhile back (he seemed politely disinterested). Personally, I try not to make a habit of calling or contacting anybody online for self-promotional reasons, mainly because I realize people (like him especially) are extremely busy.

Keeping this busy factor in mind and being respectful of his time, I’d review the blogs he is reading and ask yourself what makes your blog different and stand out from the others? Why should he read your blog instead of the other tens of millions out there? Just because you are from Seattle and he is too I’m not sure that is good enough. I’m from the Seattle area and don’t subscribe to every Seattle blogger’s blog. I do try and subscribe to most people I’ve met before face to face so I can keep up with what they are doing, but I just unsubscribed recently from several Seattle bloggers because the things they wrote about were all the things I’m not interested in at all.

Andrew was proactive and contacted me awhile back via Skype to try out this new video program. I was grateful for that exchange. I enjoy when people look me up to demo new stuff or send me beta invitations or call me up to go places to see new, cool technology. In fact, I’m going to return that favor now by adding Andrew’s blog to the main blogroll here. BTW, don’t go to the .com (it is Andrew Ferguson dot NET) because that domain holder place crashed my browser, yowsa. I’m removing two other blogs that haven’t been updated in awhile (I think these bloggers might have called it quits?). No offense, but no sense giving that real estate to bloggers that don’t update their blogs at least a few times a week. I also removed one of my own blogs from that list that hasn’t been updated very frequently, so touche.

I just listed a bunch of reasons I thought CNET should put this blog on their top 100 list. If you can’t list reasons why he should read your blog, things that make your blog different, unique and/or useful or standout, then why should he subscribe?

Scoble doesn’t like partial feeds, I’ve picked up on that one, so if you are running out a partial text feed, then you reduce your chances. He doesn’t seem to crazy about ads either, so if you have a lot of ads that will probably knock you out. He likes good writing, so if you are a good writer then that will be plus.

Seems to me with Scoble like the rest of us, it all boils down to signal vs. noise.

You might also want to mention that you own and use a Tablet PC. Most of the posts he has linked to of ours here were Tablet PC related.

Now when and if you do succeed in getting Scoble to subscribe to you — congratulations — that still doesn’t mean he is going to read every post. In fact, he probably will read a very small percentage of them unless you are in his immediate circle of influence like his friend, Dave Winer. Is he reading this post? Hello Robert, if you are, feel free to correct me if I’ve got any of this wrong. I probably do.

Heck, I was talking about the Slingbox back in August and Scoble didn’t start talking about it until September. He never mentioned if he learned about it from here but I do know he has talked about it quite a bit since. He likes it.

I didn’t learn about the Slingbox from any blogs, BTW, I learned about it from walking into a store seeing it, and then buying it. So blogs don’t have all the interesting product news that interest me. I still have to watch TV, listen to the radio and actually venture into the retail environment. That’s why Tuesday and Fridays are my two favorite days of the week: new releases!

Did this post make you go hmm?

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