Improve Your Blog - Request a Peer Review

Over on the Budding Bloggers Network, there has been a lot of discussion about helping fellow bloggers achieve their blogging goals. A couple of suggestions have been put forward including cross blog conversations (something I am yet to be convinced about) and a pro-active approach to encouraging comments. My latest suggestion is one that I have borrowed from my day job, the concept of peer reviews.

Nothing highlights the opportunities for improvement more than watching a first time reader navigate your blog. They see things differently to you, they look for things you thought were unimportant and skip over things you thought were the highlights of your creativity. It can often be a very disheartening experience.

I don’t feel I need to explain the benefits of having a second pair of eyes look over your work, but I do feel that peer reviews are often misunderstood. Peer reviews are simply a way of capturing the feedback from a second pair of eyes. They don’t have to be structured and could even take the form of a simple verbal comment. All feedback is equally valuable. The aim is not to be critical, but to be constructive.

What I have tried to do over on the Budding Bloggers Network is to bring a little structure to the concept of peer reviewing a blog. The hope is that after reading a blog for the first time, the semi-structured template prompts the reader to offer feedback on areas that can easily be addressed by both budding and experience bloggers alike.

Areas I focus on include: the aim of the blog, the title, the ease of navigation, the structure of the archives and a clear idea of who the author is. Along with these, it is also important not to forget to read the actual content of the blog.

If you are interested in the idea, want someone to peer review your blog, or even feel like peer reviewing my own blog please sound off in the comments or head over to the budding bloggers network.

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