Multidimensional Posts

Every now and then in the blogosphere you run into a post that lists types of posts you can make on your blog. This is a great help if you are stuck. There is even a Firefox plugin called PostWisdom to help you write the post once you have figured out which post type you are going to make. There are how to posts, news posts, inspirational posts, and on and on.

But does a post have to only fit into one type. Doesn't a more complete picture of reality contain a spectrum of types?

I have read how to posts that explained a process but never quite explained why I should do what the author was telling me to do. If I was coming from a search engine looking for this exact tutorial, I would have found it and it would have helped me. But if I was having the issue that post fixed, I would have never found it.

I would love to look at the search patterns of affiliate marketers over time just for this reason. Before they became "affiliate marketers", they probably searched for "make money online". As their knowledge of the subject increased, the terms they used change to things such as "split testing Adwords script".

The question is,"If you are writing for affiliate marketers, which level of marketer do you want to reach?". Or do you want to reach them all?

A tech person will understand simple words just as well as technical terminology, so don't use the big words. This will spread your spectrum. A few lead-in paragraphs for the newbie explaining why the tutorial is so important can be skipped by the expert. This will reach more of an audience.

And who says a tutorial can't also be a humorous post, a satirical post, or a rant post. A lot of my tutorials turn into rants because things just don't work the way I expect them. I hack things. I find just enough information to do what I need to do and then try to do it. The operative word is try. For people in the same boat as me, the rant gives them some hope. If the tutorial was laid out in a 1-2-3 fashion, issues that come up for the reader will not be covered. As I bitch about the process I am explaining, I am telling them the road they are taking. It's not going to be cut an dried. If I say a step if very important and then not say why, the actual importance of the step does not hit home. But if I say I lost a whole database because I didn't use the step once and then bitch, they know exactly how important it is.

No one can cover everyone when writing a post, but you can cover every dimension that resides inside you. And you will reach more like minds. Not just tech like minds, but bitching, complaining like minds as well.

P.S. I owe this post to my wife. She told me a while ago. It took me a few weeks to listen. We have been married for three years yesterday. My life and its direction started three years ago.