An Interview with Lax of ‘Tech Zoom In’

Laxman papineni , Better Knows as Lax is the owner of TechZoomin – a weblog dedicated to Blogging tips,SEO,wordpress,Money making,Internet tips and everything useful for Bloggers around the web.

Apart from writing in TechZoomIn, Lax is also the author of SteStuff.com, WPPlug.in.

Currently Lax is working as a Software Engineer for an MNC in India

1.Tell us something about your main gig “Techzoomin”. When do you started your blogging journey ? How many blogs do you have or write for currently ?

Lax : TechZoomIn was my first blog started on 2nd sep,2008. First I started it as Tech blog, but after a month or so, I found interest towards Blogging & Money making and moved the niche towards this. That’s why you’re seeing domain “TechZoomIn” instead of “BlogZoomIn”

I own 4 blogs in total, but only 3 of them are active at the moment, they are: TechZoomIn.com, SteStuff.com (Software Testing blog) and WPPlug.in (Launched Recently). And I do own a domain called DailyUseful.com (Started as a Tech blog recently, but not active now & Planning to sell soon…)

2.How many hours do you dedicate to your blog every day? Are you a full time blogger?

I’m not a full time blogger at the moment (But planning to be in future). On an average I do dedicate at least 3 to 4 hours a day on blogging.

3. If you could read only one blog, which one would you pick?

Hmm it’s tough to answer.. Really I don’t have any one blog in mind. Every blog has got its specialty… But initially I used to read only DailyBlogTips.com (In blogging) and TechCrunch.com (In Tech niche)

4.If you were given the chance to change the way you have developed your Blog from Scratch what change you would implement?

I recently got custom design from a designer and happy at the moment. But I love to use Full graphic theme with lots of images and designs (Load time stops me to go further )

5.Over the years, the “Blogging tips” Niche has grown steadily and there are quite a number of blogs competing over it . Do you think that slowly this Niche is getting saturated?

Of course, competition is the correct word, but saturation can happen only if all the bloggers get succeed. I don’t think it will happen

6. How does the design aspect affects a Blogs Performance? Do you think that a Blog can be successful on a Free theme or a Blog should have a Unique Brand of its own ?

I don’t believe in this concept. Content & writing style plays major (90%+) role in blogs success. It’s good to have a unique theme and brand value, but it’s not mandatory.I recommend to start on a free theme and just go for a low cost simple design once you start getting some bucks. Simply I want to say, don’t spend even a single penny from your/fathers pocket. Just avail all the free stuff, make some money and then start spending on blog.

7. According to you which is more important for successful blogging ” Writing a Blog on a Profitable niche ” or ” writing a Blog on a Niche you have expertise on” ?

Writing on niche which you have experience is the best option, as you don’t need to learn nothing new initially. Then you can start one more blog with the market choice 

8.You get a lot of comments in your Blog posts which means you have developed a Strong community around your blog. How do you Build relationships ?

I believe in the concept of “Respect your readers and help them if you can”. I do comment on some blogs which I love, most of the friends follow my blog regularly and comment. I do share if any of my reader asks to share his new theme/plugin release on my blog.I do write guest posts on some blogs and I do allow bloggers to guest post on TechZoomIn. There are many ways if you really want to build relationship.

9. How do you find compelling content ? Social Media ,Rss or the Muscle between your ears ?

I’m not a big fan of social networking/media sites. Visits/submits very rarely (Don’t know the reason but am not a fan of them). I do have around 15+ rss feeds on my aggregator which I follow daily.

10. What has been some of the challenges ?

Being a software engineer in an MNC, it’s very difficult for me to find time to maintain the blogs. There is no other challenge than this for me

11. What has been the most satisfying part of growing Techzoomin ?

I never expected that I can get a unique theme for TechZoomIn within 8 months. And I never expected that TechZoomIn will be at this stage now..It crossed 1000 page views per day and 450+ RSS subscribers.
I’m 100% satisfied with its performance and earning till now. What else we need than this  (I’m happy because I didn’t expected too much )

12. Has Blogging changed your life or personality in any way?

Yes 100%… I used to watch TV/Movies before starting blogs. But now I don’t have time to play around them. Blogging changed my personal life and financial life too.

13.If you could give an advice to a blogger who has just started, what would it be?

Start blog by using all the free stuff. Don’t even spend a single penny from your pocket… Don’t expect anything from that in first 6 months. Don’t bother about comments and RSS counts…
Just watch the success blogs, analyze, plan, make friends, help people, blog, blog and blog…. You will land in safe place one fine day.. (Do remember that blogging is a long time effort and long term earnings, don’t expect anything overnight)

14.What is the biggest blogging mistake you did?

I never felt bad of anything…But initially I spent lot of time in observing the things and tweaking/changing the theme very often. But I recommend you to start with whatever you know/had and learn…Don’t waste time in observations and dreams.

15. Finally, where do you want to see TechZoomIn in the couple of years?

I want to see TechZoomIn helps fellow bloggers and want it to build a strong readership around. In terms of revenue am not expecting too much.Of course you don’t need to think of revenue in blogging. Because, revenue starts flowing automatically with the age & success of the blog.Just keep rocking and Happy Blogging..!