Are your hubs popular because of luck or because you want them to be?

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   Aj Sethuramanposted 10 years ago

   I want to write about things I love, which is what I'm told you should do. So, for you guys who have had successful hubs, are your hubs like that because:
   You got lucky, and what you're passionate about is a hot topic;
   You made hubs that you knew were popular topics;
   Or some other reason?

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      OldRosesposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      I write about what I love - gardening.  Some of my hubs are more popular than others because they are "hot topics".  I just keep writing hubs that I want to write rather than what I think will be popular.  It's also important to promote your hubs.  I promote mine on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.

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         Aj Sethuramanposted 10 years agoin reply to this

         That's a good point, I think I should promote my hubs more but a lot of the people that would see that on my FB/Twitter aren't really into what I'm writing about. Good for you though, I love what I have written about so far, and it's kind of a hot topic, but not a good hot topic for HubPages. Which is fine, I won't stop, it's fun to write.

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      jht1414posted 10 years agoin reply to this

      I have an article I wrote about Gilligan's Island that gets me 50+ hits a day, which is for me, a lot. It's a pretty good article, but it's not spectacular. It just so happens a lot of people are searching for Gilligan's Island trivia. (Why? I don't know...) One thing that get's very little attention is my short stories. As much as I love them, that's just not what people search for. They'll get 50 reads, then sit sedentary unless someone just happens upon them. In the end, non-fiction and how-to's tend to do pretty well here.  Good luck, I'm sure you'll do great here.

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   ThoughtsWriterposted 10 years ago

   A lot of mine are luck. I write a lot and then just see what gets some traction. I then work on those and try to branch from those... so I guess it's a combination?

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3. 91

   Suzanne Dayposted 10 years ago

   It's a combination for me too. Some hubs just get somewhere with dumb luck and others I am quite fond of and will push and push them so they are successful.

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   jansharesposted 10 years ago

   Both. One of my popular hubs was pure luck. It was among my the first hubs I'd written when I didn't have a clue about popular topics and how this online writing thing works. After learning the ropes, some topics were chosen purposely because I figured out that it has to be something readers will search for and seek knowledge about to solve a problem. But it is also fun to just write about anything you feel passionate about. If it's well-written and there's an audience for it, you might get lucky.

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      Aj Sethuramanposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      I hope my stuff appears well-written. I don't think it's written poorly, personally, but then again I wrote it.

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   Alphadogg16posted 10 years ago

   I guess a little of both, especially since all my hubs are on Health and fitness, which is my passion, lifestyle and what I know best. However health and fitness is probably one of the most saturated topics out there, if not the most saturated. Just do what do.

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   lilmissmontanaposted 10 years ago

   I think the majority of mine that get a lot of traffic are pure luck. My hub that gets the most views is in my opinion, not the greatest and is a lot of opinion and not fact. Somehow though, it brings in traffic like crazy. I'm with everyone else, i write what feels natural and what I enjoy writing about and hope that a ton of people happen to be searching for it. I also do a lot of promoting. You may not think people on FB or Twitter will have interest in what you write about, but you never know. I was nervous to post my writing amongst my friends and family, but I have received wonderful feedback and great advice from them.

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7. 78

   Greekgeekposted 10 years ago

   I write about things I care about, but I boost my chances by learning about how to write effectively, learning about magnetic headlines (see copyblogger), structuring my pages for readability and scouring stock xchng and Creative Commons and Wikimedia and Clker for striking graphics, studying SEO and how search engines work, and most of all, observing how people tend to use the web. And then I'll pool all that knowledge together to shape how I tackle and present the topics I feel like tackling.
   
   E.G. Say I loved ping pong. I wouldn't just write any old page about ping pong. I'd think about the sorts of things that a ping pong audience might look for, enjoy, and/or share. I'd write a top ten ping pong tips page. I'd write a page on serves, or on how to put English on the ball. Maybe I'd review different ping pong paddles or materials. Maybe I'd do a gallery of crazy-looking custom ping pong balls. I'd Google around and find out what sorts of ping pong controversies there are. I'd do a tongue-in-cheek history page on the unsung saga of Olympic ping pong. Or maybe I'd write a serious page about how some ping pong matches helped thaw the cold war and open relations between the U.S. and China during a very tense period. And so on.
   
   
   It doesn't always work, but if you can identify sweet spots between what you know and love with what people would love to know, and then deliver that content using effective web writing techniques just as a novelist attempts to deliver a story using effective fiction writing techniques, then you've got a fighting chance of getting some traffic.

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      Suzanne Dayposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      +1 couldn't agree more!

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      Lew Marcrumposted 10 years agoin reply to this

      Thank you, GreekGeek, that was very insightful.  I just finished my fifth hub, and am hopefully out of "Boot Camp"!  Frankly, all are doing better than I expected, since they are in a very tight niche, Central America and Latino Culture, which do not draw an exceptionally wide interest.   All I have done so far is with the aim of promoting interest in and tourism to an exceptionally beautiful, but mostly ignored, land. 
      
      I want to continue with my niche, but I see the value of diversification, also.  I'm just not sure how to go about it, frankly.  You have some good ideas about promotion, but SEO so far has completely eluded my mental capacity.  As far as FaceBook, I write almost entirely in English, but most of my FaceBook fans speak Spanish, however my hubs are aimed at an English-speaking audience.  Any suggestions?

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   promisemposted 10 years ago

   I agree that it's a combination of effort and luck.
   
   The luck part is where you can't easily estimate the amount of competition for the same topic online or the amount of interest in that topic.
   
   The more competition for that topic, the fewer search engine visits the article gets.
   
   On the other hand, a lazy effort usually doesn't get good results.

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9. 84

   Lew Marcrumposted 10 years ago

   Oooops!  Looks like I clicked the wrong answer button.  My apologies.

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10. 60

    Mark Ewbieposted 10 years ago

    It was mainly luck if I am honest.  Oh sure I did all the courses, bought books, attended the seminars - but after I got out of prison I just buckled down to it.
    
    "What does the world want?" I asked my parole officer and she said I should think about getting a job.
    
    Huh? What did she know?  I started drawing stickmen and never looked back.
    
    As I sit here now, sipping a glass of lemonade and easing off my slippers, I am reminded...
    
    Oooops.  Got to go.  Real time analytics showed I had a visitor this week.  Yet more money to count.

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11. 65

    cfinposted 10 years ago

    My favorite hubs get no views and my least favorite get all of the views, if I am to honest.

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       Aj Sethuramanposted 10 years agoin reply to this

       What are your least favorite hubs?

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          cfinposted 10 years agoin reply to this

          Anything generic that has little or no imagination such as reviews.

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             Aj Sethuramanposted 10 years agoin reply to this

             Understandable, interestingly I actually like reviewing things I'm passionate about. Maybe I'll get lucky too. Thanks for the replies.

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                cfinposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                Well, I don't hate all of my review hubs. I don't hate any of them actually. It's more of a matter of my creative writing getting no views While my review hubs bask in a level of their own self crapulence that hasn't been seen since the I ate 3 tubs of Culvers ice cream that my family couldn't finish. They soak up the google hits like a sponge but I'm not in it for the google hits. I really want my creative stuff to get some attention.

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                   Aj Sethuramanposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                   I understand what you mean. I've only written 3 hubs and I'm not all that worried about their views or anything, I'm still new to this. But I'd like to see what other people say. My creative writing (well, what I think is creative writing) tends to be about stuff that isn't going to come up on the normal Google search. Which is fine, I just enjoy writing about things, the words flow more freely. I just kinda hope at some point I figure out somebody, somewhere likes what I have to say

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                   Mark Ewbieposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                   I want to write something supportive but I have nothing.  Non-creative works. A bit.  Creative doesn't apart from a few friends who might pop in and say "Wow".
                   
                   I tried writing creative answers to mundane questions for a while  - and just pissed off the few search visitors that stumbled on this pointless waste of their time.
                   
                   Thought I might write a book on wizards.  Got an idea for a boy who learns magic and has adventures.  He ends up paralysed in a freak Quidditch accident.  Sales fall off a cliff.  He tops himself.

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                   1. 89

                      Jean Bakulaposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                      I always wrote about topics I was interested in and had knowledge of. I didn't make a killing money wise, but before the Panda hits and all the plagiarism, did pretty well. I enjoyed exercising my creativity, becoming a better writer, and making a bit of extra money.
                      
                      I don't feel it's worth it to write here anymore, too many of my pieces that took hours of research and reading and writing have been stolen. What are newer, popular writing sites now? I would like to start fresh somewhere else. I have a blog, but personal blogs don't make much money, though I do readings from mine and it does generate a clientele. I just want to write for myself, but someplace less obvious, as HP is such a plagiarism target now. I'm not saying other sites aren't, but most of them aren't as popular, making HP a larger target. Plus there's a much smaller readership here than there used to be.

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                      1. 91

                         Suzanne Dayposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                         HI Jean, just thought I'd post a thought on this. I still think it's worth publishing here regardless of the plagiarism, as the earnings aren't too bad, especially if you like jumping around with your topics (like I do). Google puts A LOT less emphasis on duplicated articles so they should, theoretically get far less traffic than the original anyway. This lack of emphasis I believe will increase over time. You can also report anything that ranks above yours and is your own content to Google and they will take it extremely seriously. They are working on search results to make sure original work floats to the top.
                         
                         You can also input bits of hubs into Google Alerts when you publish, so it emails you when copies are put up, rather than hunting down the copies.
                         
                         If hubbers were to stop chasing duplicate content and just maybe use Google Alerts or nothing at all, they will still get a lion share of traffic to original hubs and all they have to concentrate on is building their subdomain up so it becomes more important.
                         
                         Of course, there are errant duplicates, such as a Chinese news service posting someone's hub, but these have to have a lot of sway before the duplication ranks above the original and you can still report it to Google anyway here:
                         https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1Pw1KVO … Y/viewform
                         
                         I'm still going to keep writing here and enjoying it. I've heard from numerous people that there's less payment on other sites (unless you make it with a niche blog of your own).

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                            Jean Bakulaposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                            Hi Suzanne,
                            I didn't know about the Google alerts, it's something to keep in mind.
                            
                            I've been through so many changes as I've written on HP, I used to use internet explorer, but now need Google Chrome to post here and don't like using it as much. I do like Hubpages, and have never found another site I liked as much, and others likely feel the same. Many of us have a smaller body of work on other sites, but never felt inspired to go on. Thanks for the encouragement.

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                               Suzanne Dayposted 10 years agoin reply to this

                               Well I've gone away and come back and no doubt will do it again when I'm bored with writing. But keeping hubs up for years on end does pay off with many of them.

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