There was a time when this blog got 600 visitors per day. These days, excluding Google referrers, we do well to get 20, which is why I found Susan Mernit’s post on growing blog traffic rather timely.

Let’s see how I stack up:

• Post consistently (fail … I sometimes go a week between posts … just too busy, and sometimes I’d rather play poker)
• Post in the morning (fail … I’m not a morning person and if I’m up early, I often feel compelled to get to work as early as I can)
• Post frequently (fail … but only slightly … I don’t post from work and won’t, but often on days I do post, I post several posts)
• Write what interests you (pass … that’s all I do … less politics these days, because I have less interest in politics right now … what fascinates me is how media is changing)
• Share and give credit: (pass … look at my blog roll … and I often link to other bloggers … can’t say I’m getting many of those same bloggers to link to me, thought)
• Have a point of view (pass … and least I think I have a POV)
• Listen (pass … I think I do this all the time … I’m interested in lots of stuff and what a lot of people have to say about all of those things)
• Have fun (pass … of course, or else, why blog?)

But another way of looking at Mernit’s post is what it means for online news sites. Many of those same points of advice would serve well any MSM site — post consistently, often with items of interest and share and give credit — be part of the conversation, not over it. And always have fun!