Build a site you (and your readers) will love

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I’m thrilled by the recent attention and your feedback. Seeing your “Aha!” moments motivates me to write — though I’ve been neglectful lately. I’m busy, the dog ate my browser, the draft’s in the email… you know the drill. If you need an explanation fix, check out my old site from college:

http://www.cs.princeton.edu/~kazad/resources.htm

It has many posts I’ll be revising and importing over time.

This post is for betterexplained newcomers and old-timers: the how and why of the site. If you like my approach, it’s a guide to writing. Otherwise it’s your own list of advice to avoid.

Find your purpose

Blogging is introspective. I’ve realized my interests after much thought:

  • I like math, writing, computers, business, personal development, communication, and learning.
  • I cringe when ideas are explained poorly. Jargon and complicated explanations discourage the beginner. It shows you don’t really know the material. I get upset thinking that a poor explanation may turn someone away from a field forever, and want to fix that.
  • I have many beliefs about education. Insight beats memorization. Any subject (anything!) can be explained simply if you understand it well enough. Curiosity and passion are enough to conquer a subject.
I’ve always wanted to share hard-won ideas and save other people mental anguish — BetterExplained has been a nagging thought in my mind. Today it’s alive with a purpose:
To explain topics clearly, intuitively, and share the “a-ha!” moments that make learning fun. Any subject can be better explained; today it’s just me writing, but I want to catalog insights from everyone.

This vision excites me — find the one that motivates you.

Be yourself (it’s harder than you think)

Writing naturally is hard. When you put pen to paper, fingers to keyboard, or stand before an audience, you stiffen. You get self conscious. You don’t act like yourself.

Fortunately this feeling disappears with practice. You stop pontificating; you explain. You don’t “write an article”; you have a conversation. You use humor, stories, and personal examples instead of abstract generalities. You write even if people won’t agree with everything you say.

Use your talents in whatever combination you can.

But if you want something extraordinary, you have two paths:

1. Become the best at one specific thing.
2. Become very good (top 25%) at two or more things.

– Scott Adams

I feel my greatest talents are being curious, having enthusiasm and wanting things to be simple. I’m no expert. But I’m going to learn what I can and share it in the most intuitive way possible. Someone I admire feels similarly:

I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.
–Albert Einstein

Write what you know; link what you don’t

You may not be an expert (I’m not), but you’ve collected nuggets of information and personal insights that nobody else has. Share them in your own style.

Then link to wikipedia, delicious, and the detailed articles so readers can learn the nitty gritty. Eventually you’ll learn the nitty gritty too, have your own insights, and simplify them into a new article.

Write well

Writing well is hard. Really hard. My definition means:

  • Timeless content that is still relevant in a year.
  • Original thought and deep insights that aren’t immediately obvious. If sharing details, organize them in a clever way.
  • Fun to read. Write for people. Use humor, quotes, stories. Remember: I’m Kalid, you’re you, and we’re having a conversation. This is no textbook.
  • Succinct, clear, and organized. I want to pump ideas into your head as fast as possible (I hope you don’t mind). Fewer words = faster intake = happier user.

That’s the goal, not that I always reach it.

Why write quality, not quantity? In my experience, an outstanding post trumps a dozen average ones. Top posts create traffic, links, diggs, and get people talking. You receive emails and comments which make your day and motivate you to write more, and better. Sub-par posts dilute your site and waste time.

Astound visitors with the quality of your content. Define your own quality bar and run towards it. Be merciless when revising. Don’t be afraid to fix up old posts — streamlining previous articles is good practice.

Just write

Blogging has no holy book. This is a non-fiction site about math and programming topics; a poetry blog has different goals. I don’t know your goals, so just write and push your own bar. You can be top-quality in your field.

I think I have above-average interest in math, science, simplicity, education, curiosity, and passion. The combination lead to my style and the focus of this site. I’m thrilled that others seem to like it too. Find your style; someone will like it.

Pace yourself

Writing on a consistent schedule is hard — if you’ve mastered the secret, let me know. I have dozens of posts in various draft forms, and it seems I need a Herculean effort to go back and revise them. Some posts stream out of my head and I’m done in a few hours. Others weigh over me for days or weeks, requiring a flurry of energy to finish and clean up.

I suggest an “articles” folder to collect your thoughts, in whatever stage. Sometimes you just have a sentence or two, but it can grow into a whole post over time.

I’ve learned writing isn’t all fun, even on topics you enjoy. Editing can be painful — push yourself through.

Keep learning

My opinions were shaped by these authors:

Good luck in your writing. Now that you know my passions, I’m interested in what you care about. Drop me a note anytime.

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39 thoughts on “Build a site you (and your readers) will love”

  4. Thanks for the reminder, I like that book as well (I’m adding the link). “On Writing Well” was written by the mentee of White — it has a similar message, with more examples vs. a list of rules.

  5. Nice summary, Kalid. Having started my own blog a couple months ago, your words certainly ring true, especially the part about some articles just flowing out of the fingers whereas others really taking effort. All the effort certainly is worth it when you see from visitors’ comments that you’re providing a valuable resource.

  6. Thanks Peter! Yes, interacting with visitors is one of my favorite parts of having a blog. It’s much better than keeping essays locked away on your computer :)

    I’m still trying to figure out how to turn the “no go” artilcles into the flowing ones…

  7. Kalid, This is one site that I don’t feel like to leave, want to read every word of it. Be it a math tip or about MVC or APR/APY. I’ve recommended this to my kid and his teacher. Very aptly named “Better explained”. Beautiful.

  9. Hi there,
    I your site inspired my greatly. I have been searching and looking for answer about my purpose in life. At school I always got excited about Physics but became scared when I saw the language to explains the ideas. I was at average 9 the highest in the class without studying but came up with creative solutions, these solutions were not acceptable because it didn’t have the mathematical language to describe them. So I decided again to study Theorical Physics but got scare when I saw the mathematics involved to explain thoses ideas. Then I accidentally discovered your website and found out that that the Mathematics that scared me suddenly became clear to me. I thank you very much for that!!!

  11. Kalid,
    Thanks for the insightful post. I really enjoy your posts on math because it gets me thinking in ways I hadn’t before.

    I enjoy computers and martial arts. I’d be thrilled if you took a look at my latest posts and commented.

    Take care.

  12. Hi Dan, thanks for the note. Sure, I’d be happy to check out the site, I enjoy martial arts and computers also :) .

  13. Kalid,
    Thanks for taking the time to visit, and for the comment. I agree with you assessment and maybe one day I’ll figure it out. Until then…

  14. I agree totally.. do something you love because it makes it easier to think about it all day… and if you do that you will also increase the amount knowledge and skills and you will attract even more traffic to your site

  15. About pacing yourself and editing:
    Such is the mighty downfall of writers throughout time! Although I say that sort of jokingly, I really have to say that I agree with you that it is difficult keeping organized and on task. Creating an articles folder is a great ideas. I actually have a writing folder on the D:/ drive of my laptop. With in that, I have different categories, one of which is “Ideas” And I have some word documents with just a couple of words, thinking that I may someday get back to it. Also, if and when I get to a poem that I decide to “perfect”, I actually create a folder just for that poem, and every time I get to a point that I think I should save, I save as “Poem A Edit 1.” I can’t say that I’ve ever gone back to any of these edits (yet!), but it helps me keep myself unrestricted on editing. Once I start restricting my editing, I start getting writer’s block.

    Anyway… I thought this may be an interesting thing to share!

  17. The information you presented here is really helpful. Some new bloggers forget that they are not writing to themselves but to others! That is really the big secret to blogging: keep readers interested and add value!

  18. I stumbled upon your blog with these keywords in Google: “divergence calculus explanation simple” and I think after a few read, I’m going to make myself at home here most of my spare time at work. My hear-tearing moments dissolved in laughter over your examples and they really make me understand the concept more. You’re right.. textbooks don’t care if we can ‘see’ all these equations physically. They just pile up equation after equation on you.. most times with different symbols that mean the same thing.

    Thank you very much for sharing your ‘a-ha’ experiences in writing form with us. I really appreciate it…

  19. @Asa: Thank you!

    @Umi: Awesome, really glad it was able to help! You’re more than welcome :) .

  20. Hi Khalid,

    The more I read your articles,more addicted I get to your blog.You have in a way saved my electrical degree. :) Thank you

  23. I am interested in writing but not instructions as maths or programming. I am not sure whether it is only for the technocrates or people like me, who is very much zero at technical fields. I am a Journaism student N I like writing blogs N I came across your webpage Kalid, and got stuck here.
    I was reading N understood it has more to do with mathematics and synonomous things only. Can u please recommend me other sites where I can write literature? Any blogging webpages?

  24. Very nice site! I recently made a blog myself too and I am struggling since then with finding a comment widget that works. googles friend connect will not display all comments all the time and another one that I’ve tried did not work properly. Do you have any article about comment forms or any tips?

    Thanks

  25. I have this – I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.
    –Albert Einstein

    on a bookmark and has changed my life

  26. I’ve been reading your articles about math and they fascinate me! They make it clear as to why one would ever use such “hard” and “difficult” math. Once I read your explanations, though, these “hard” and “difficult” topics make sense and instantly become intuitive. Have you ever considered writing math textbooks? I think you could help our education system a great deal.

    Keep writing!

  27. This article is good! I’ve been considering starting my own blog, yet afraid that I don’t always have something to write or it’s hard to “pace myself”.

    I learn from your article a few tips as shown below:

    1,Find the purpose of writing
    2,Do not worry about what other people will think of what you write, “write even if people won’t agree with everything you say.”
    3,Use fewer words to make your article as succinct, clear and well organized as possible.
    4,Don’t be afraid to fix up old posts,be merciless when rivising.
    5,Just write.

    For me the most important tip is the first one and the last one.

  28. @Zleung: Thanks! Yep, the hardest part is just getting started. Don’t worry about what others think, just get your ideas out there :) .

  29. @Bryan: Thanks for the kind words and encouragement! As I get more material out I’d love to make a textbook available. I think for me, I enjoy most the process of finding the intuition (formal definitions and working through example problems, etc. are available already!). I really want to think about this more in the future :) .

  30. Great post Kalid! Good stuff to think about when considering how to write a blog and what to write about. The one thing I would add to what you have written is to always remember to reference any thing that is not your original thought, photo, or art. Many bloggers forget to do this which is unfortunate because:
    1. As a reader, I might want to know where something originally came from, what the source is.
    2. Well, as a person whose copyrighted photos have appeared on random blogs without my permission and without being credited, it just feels wrong.

    I am glad to see you credit your sources ;) ! It is so simple to do and most people are flattered and excited that you like their work enough to post it!

  31. ..Natural Flow… LOVED your site and your Style … I am your type …wana be like you someday :) ….

  32. I found your website while searching for a keyword on Bayes Theorem. As a gap year high school graduate before enrolling in college, I’ve always wanted to start a blog. I’ve been writing lots of daily journals and found out that I have to write in order to internalize what I’ve learnt from my experiences, books and people, and the act of writing definitely helps me synthesize new insights.

    Thanks for the post and links :) I’m surely your type and want to be like that! (perhaps by getting in Princeton haha) I will definitely link to you when I start my blog (which should be soon)

  33. Hi Khuyen, awesome, glad to hear you’re starting a site. You’ll never know where it might lead :) .

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