How to Give Your Postgres Blog Posts an Outsize Impact | Claire Giordano | FOSDEM 2023

@clairegiordano
Claire Giordano
@clairegiordano/@hachyderm.io
@clairegiordano | @citusdata | @CitusCon
HOW TO GIVE YOUR
POSTGRES BLOG POSTS
AN OUTSIZE IMPACT

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@clairegiordano
Engineer
Dev Manager
PM
Marketer
Writer
Open-source champion
Community Lead
@clairegiordano
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@clairegiordano
Citus database extension to Postgres = open source
project I spend my days on

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@clairegiordano
It’s not just
open source, it’s
open engineering.”
“
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@clairegiordano
Warning: Lots of dog
illustrations in talk
Hello Zucca!
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@clairegiordano
This talk has 2 parts...
What you write
Where you send it
1.
2.
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@clairegiordano
Or as they say in “marketing speak”...
What you write
Where you send it
1.
2.
Content
Distribution
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@clairegiordano
So first, let’s dive into CONTENT!
1.
2.
Content
Distribution
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@clairegiordano
You & Your
Frame of Mind
The Edit
Cycle
Explore 2 aspects of CONTENT
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@clairegiordano
#1 – Write with a
specific reader in
mind
Who do you want to read your post?
Write to that person
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@clairegiordano
#2 - Pick good
topics!
Searched for
Inspiration: Stack Overflow, Slack, IRC,
Reddit, Twitter, Mailing Lists...
Incognito browser & Google Trends
Useful
“Interestingness factor”
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@clairegiordano
#3 – Have EMPATHY for your readers!
EMPATHY
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@clairegiordano
Source: www.gapingvoid.com/blog/2016/04/18/i-feel-your-paing/

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@clairegiordano
Empathy should be
your True North
§ Care about reader more than yourself
§ Recognize they’re busy & in a hurry
§ Remember—they don’t know what you
know
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@clairegiordano
Empathy #1:
SCANNABILITY
Your readers are busy—and in a hurry!
While the manufacture of rubber goods is in no sense a secret industry, the majority of
buyers and users of such goods have never stepped inside of a rubber mill, and many
have very crude ideas as to how the goods are made up. In ordinary garden hose, for
instance, the process is as follows: The inner tubing is made of a strip of rubber fifty
feet in length, which is laid on a long zinc-covered table and its edges drawn together
over a hose pole. The cover, which is of what is called “friction,” that is cloth with
rubber forced through its meshes, comes to the hose maker in strips, cut on the bias,
which are wound around the outside of the tube and adhere tightly to it. The hose
pole is then put in something like a fifty foot lathe, and while the pole revolves slowly,
it is tightly wrapped with strips of cloth, in order that it may not get out of shape while
undergoing the process of vulcanizing. When a number of these hose poles have been
covered in this way they are laid in a pan set on trucks and are then run into a long
boiler, shut in, and live steam is turned on. When the goods are cured steam is blown
off, the vulcanizer opened and the cloths are removed. The hose is then slipped off the
pole by forcing air from a compressor between the rubber and the hose pole. This, of
course, is what is known as hose that has a seam in it.
For seamless hose the tube is made in a tubing machine and slipped upon the hose
pole by reversing the process that is used in removing hose by air compression. In
other words, a knot is tied in one end of the fifty foot tube and the other end is placed
against the hose pole and being carefully inflated with air it is slipped on without the
least trouble. For various kinds of hose the processes vary, and there are machines for
winding with wire and intricate processes for the heavy grades of suction hose, etc.
For steam hose, brewers’, and acid hose, special resisting compounds are used, that as
a rule are the secrets of the various manufacturers. Cotton hose is woven through
machines expressly designed for that purpose, and afterward has a half-cured rubber
tube drawn through it. One end is then securely stopped up and the other end forced
on a cone through which steam is introduced to the inside of the hose, forcing the
rubber against the cotton cover, finishing the cure and fixing it firmly in its place.
Source: the Paris Review: How Mechanical Rubber Goods
Are Made. February 14, 2014
@[email protected]

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@clairegiordano
Empathy =
SCANNABILITY
While the manufacture of rubber goods is in no sense a secret industry, the majority of
buyers and users of such goods have never stepped inside of a rubber mill, and many
have very crude ideas as to how the goods are made up. In ordinary garden hose, for
instance, the process is as follows: The inner tubing is made of a strip of rubber fifty
feet in length, which is laid on a long zinc-covered table and its edges drawn together
over a hose pole. The cover, which is of what is called “friction,” that is cloth with
rubber forced through its meshes, comes to the hose maker in strips, cut on the bias,
which are wound around the outside of the tube and adhere tightly to it. The hose
pole is then put in something like a fifty foot lathe, and while the pole revolves slowly,
it is tightly wrapped with strips of cloth, in order that it may not get out of shape while
undergoing the process of vulcanizing. When a number of these hose poles have been
covered in this way they are laid in a pan set on trucks and are then run into a long
boiler, shut in, and live steam is turned on. When the goods are cured steam is blown
off, the vulcanizer opened and the cloths are removed. The hose is then slipped off the
pole by forcing air from a compressor between the rubber and the hose pole. This, of
course, is what is known as hose that has a seam in it.
For seamless hose the tube is made in a tubing machine and slipped upon the hose
pole by reversing the process that is used in removing hose by air compression. In
other words, a knot is tied in one end of the fifty foot tube and the other end is placed
against the hose pole and being carefully inflated with air it is slipped on without the
least trouble. For various kinds of hose the processes vary, and there are machines for
winding with wire and intricate processes for the heavy grades of suction hose, etc.
For steam hose, brewers’, and acid hose, special resisting compounds are used, that as
a rule are the secrets of the various manufacturers. Cotton hose is woven through
machines expressly designed for that purpose, and afterward has a half-cured rubber
tube drawn through it. One end is then securely stopped up and the other end forced
on a cone through which steam is introduced to the inside of the hose, forcing the
rubber against the cotton cover, finishing the cure and fixing it firmly in its place.
Source: the Paris Review: How Mechanical Rubber Goods
Are Made. February 14, 2014
X
@[email protected]

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@clairegiordano
Empathy =
SCANNABILITY
Section Headlines (not subject
titles)
Bullets
Bold-font prefixes on bullets
Short sentences
Short paragraphs
Whitespace
Tables
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@clairegiordano
Example
A real-world example: a multi-tenant TODO application
Example #1: Turning H2 Section Headers into
Newspaper headlines (not subject titles)
Boring:
Much Better:
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@clairegiordano
Example
PgBouncer
How to set up PgBouncer (our preferred connection pooler)
Newspaper headlines
Boring:
Much Better:
Just ok:
Much Better:
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@clairegiordano
Example
PgBouncer
How to set up PgBouncer (our preferred connection pooler)
Conclusion
Cheat sheet for tuning Postgres autovacuum
Newspaper headlines (not subject titles)
Boring:
Much Better:
Just ok:
Much Better:
Don’t do this:
Much Better:
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@clairegiordano
Not everyone is a reader!
People’s brains process
information differently
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@clairegiordano
Empathy #2:
VARIETY OF
FORMATS
Don’t just include paragraphs of text!
To make your blog post more
accessible to different types of
people, use:
Diagrams
Tables
Screenshots
Code blocks
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@clairegiordano
Imagine David Rowley’s blog
post about:
“Speeding up sort
performance in Postgres 15”
without its charts >>>>
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@clairegiordano
TIP:
Don’t forget about Accessibility
(A11y), especially:
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alt-text—for graphics
H2s help screen readers too

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@clairegiordano
Empathy #3:
READABILITY
§ Write at 3rd or 5th
grade level
Source: HemingwayApp.com
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@clairegiordano
Empathy #3:
READABILITY
Write in a
conversational voice
§ Write to 2nd person “you”
§ Write how you speak
§ As if explaining to a BFF over coffee
“If you’ve been running PostgreSQL
for a while, you’ve heard about
autovacuum. Yes, autovacuum, the
thing which everybody asks you not to
turn off, which is supposed to keep
your database clean and reduce bloat
automatically.
Source: Debugging Postgres autovacuum problems: 13 tips,
by Samay Sharma on the Microsoft TechCommunity Blog
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@clairegiordano
EMPATHY
Checklist for Blogging
Scannability
q Section headlines
(not subject titles)
q Bullets
q Bold-font prefix to bullets
q Short sentences
q Short paragraphs
q Whitespace
q Tables
Variety of Formats
q Not just paragraphs
of text
q Diagrams
q Tables
q Screenshots
q Code blocks
q Captions for images
q Alt-text & H2s for screen
readers
Readability
q Conversational voice
q Write how you speak
q 2nd person (“you”)
q Teaching BFF over coffee
q Write at 3rd or 5th grade level
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@clairegiordano
You & Your
Frame of Mind
The Edit
Cycle
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@clairegiordano
#1 – Embrace the
iteration
Writing = Editing
Gotta do the work
Unless you’re famous (and your posts get
traffic even if crappy)—a good blog post
will involve editing and rewriting
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@clairegiordano
#2 – It’s OK for your
first draft to suck
Dirty little secret: Everybody’s first drafts
are a mess
Give yourself permission to write things
that aren’t perfect!
“Perfect is the enemy of the good”
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@clairegiordano
#3 – Feedback is a
gift
Good reviewers are GOLD: they see things
you missed, give you actionable feedback
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@clairegiordano
#4 – Pro Tip:
Focus what you ask
reviewers to do!
Make it easy for reviewers to give you
what you need
People will not review everything—you
can pick their focus, or they will
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@clairegiordano
#5 – Get your
scissors out
Cut, cut, cut.
Keep this advice from Stephen King’s book
“On Writing” in your mind.
If you can’t bring yourself to “kill” your
darlings, just push them to the “cutting
room floor.”
“Kill your darlings,
kill your darlings,
even when it breaks
your egocentric
little scribbler’s
heart,
kill your darlings.”
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@clairegiordano
#6 – Fork your draft
into several shorter
blog posts
These 3 posts by my teammate
Andres Freund @ Microsoft were all
part of the same first draft.
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@clairegiordano
#7 - Keep it simple
KISS = “Keep It Simple, Stupid”
Use analogies to help readers put concepts
into mental model they already know
Move details into footnotes
Write at 3rd or 5th grade level
“IF ONLY IT
WERE
SIMPLE TO
KEEP IT
SIMPLE”
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@clairegiordano
#8 – Read it out loud
Your ear can “hear” mistakes that your
brain will self-correct when reading
silently
Reading it out loud is good way to assess
if it’s in a conversational tone of voice
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@clairegiordano
#9 – Optimize for SEO
Improving SEO of post increases likelihood
it will perform well in search results
Don’t need to be “SEO expert”, just some
basic SEO skills
Claire’s Simple SEO Checklist
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@clairegiordano
q Good content
is paramount
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@clairegiordano
q Good content is paramount
q Title
discoverability &
clickability
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@clairegiordano
Scribble lots of bad title ideas, to find a good one
TITLE OPTIONS, need to frontload key terms since Google often truncates
title on Search Engine Results Pages (SERP) at 60 chars (chars include spaces)
1. Citus adds support for PostgreSQL 15, zero downtime distribution
2. Citus adds support for PostgreSQL 15, zero downtime sharding
3. Citus 11.1 adds Postgres 15 & zero-downtime table distribution
4. New 11.1 release of Citus database adds Postgres 15 support
5. What’s new in Citus 11.1 (including Postgres 15 support)
6. What’s new in the Citus 11.1 extension to Postgres
7. Citus 11.1 adds Postgres 15 + create distributed table concurrently
8. New in Citus 11.1: Postgres 15 & create distributed table CONCURRENTLY
9. Scale out Postgres without downtime with Citus 11.1
10. Scale out Postgres without blocking writes: Citus 11.1
11. Distributing Postgres without blocking writes: Citus 11.1 what’s new
12. New in Citus 11.1: distributing Postgres without blocking writes
13. New in Citus 11.1: scale Postgres without blocking writes, plus Postgres 15
14. Citus 11.1 shards your Postgres tables without interruption
15. Citus 11.1 distributes your Postgres tables without interruption
@clairegiordano

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@clairegiordano
3 techniques for assessing Title ideas....
TITLE OPTIONS, need to frontload key terms since Google often truncates
title on Search Engine Results Pages (SERP) at 60 chars (chars include spaces)
1. Citus adds support for PostgreSQL 15, zero downtime distribution
2. Citus adds support for PostgreSQL 15, zero downtime sharding
3. Citus 11.1 adds Postgres 15 & zero-downtime table distribution
4. New 11.1 release of Citus database adds Postgres 15 support
5. What’s new in Citus 11.1 (including Postgres 15 support)
6. What’s new in the Citus 11.1 extension to Postgres
7. Citus 11.1 adds Postgres 15 + create distributed table concurrently
8. New in Citus 11.1: Postgres 15 & create distributed table CONCURRENTLY
9. Scale out Postgres without downtime with Citus 11.1
10. Scale out Postgres without blocking writes: Citus 11.1
11. Distributing Postgres without blocking writes: Citus 11.1 what’s new
12. New in Citus 11.1: distributing Postgres without blocking writes
13. New in Citus 11.1: scale Postgres without blocking writes, plus Postgres 15
14. Citus 11.1 shards your Postgres tables without interruption
15. Citus 11.1 distributes your Postgres tables without interruption
1. Most important terms
in first 60 characters?
2. Incognito searches
3. Boring vs. interesting
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@clairegiordano
#9 – Optimize
for SEO
Don’t need to be “SEO expert”, just
some basic SEO skills
q Title discoverability & clickability
qUse Terms your readers use
qAvoid general terms (“solution”)
qAvoid pronouns (“it”, “this”)
qRelevant keywords in Anchor
text for hyperlinks
qRelevant keywords in URL
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@clairegiordano
Don’t need to be “SEO expert”, just some
basic SEO skills
q Alt-text for graphics
q Author Bio shows
EAT:
Expertise,
Authoritativeness,
Trustworthiness
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@clairegiordano
Examples of Bio’s
designed to show
EAT
Expertise
Authoritativeness
Trustworthiness
Some debate among experts how much
EAT affects SEO... do it anyway!
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@clairegiordano
Checklist of basic SEO skills that can help
make your post more “discoverable” via
search engines!
q Title discoverability & clickability
q Use Terms your readers use
q Avoid general terms (e.g., “solution”)
q Avoid pronouns (e.g., “it”, “this”)
q Relevant keywords in Anchor text for
hyperlinks
q Relevant keywords in URL
q Alt-text for graphics
q Author Bio shows Expertise,
Authority, Trustworthy (EAT)
@[email protected]

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@clairegiordano
q Embrace the iteration!
q It’s OK for first drafts to suck!
q Feedback is a gift
q Focus your reviewers
q Get your scissors out & cut!
q Fork into multiple posts
q KISS = Keep it simple
q Read it out loud
q Optimize for SEO
Mastering “The Edit Cycle” when Blogging
q Content is paramount
q Title discovery & clicks
q Use readers’ terms
q Avoid general words
q Avoid pronouns
q Keywords in
Anchor text
q Keywords in URL
q Use alt-text
q Author Bio shows
EAT
Simple SEO Tips
9 Editing Tips
@clairegiordano

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@clairegiordano
That’s it for Content. Now onto: DISTRIBUTION
1.
2.
Content
Distribution
You & frame of mind
The Edit Cycle
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@clairegiordano
True or False?
“We’ll know which blog posts
are ‘good’ by how much traffic
they get.”
True
False
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@clairegiordano
Distribution
trumps content.”
“
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@clairegiordano
2 aspects of DISTRIBUTION,
let’s focus on Promotion
Publish Promote
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@clairegiordano
#1 - Pro Tip:
Before you promote,
doublecheck “unfurl”
Twitter caches og:image for over 24 hours,
so if it’s wrong when your post is first
tweeted, your post won’t have the correct
graphic on Twitter for a loooong time!
• LinkedIn Post Inspector
• Slack unfurl
Screenshot of an unfurl on Slack,
just drop URL into a slack to yourself
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@clairegiordano
#2 – Syndicate your blog to Planet Postgres
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@clairegiordano
#3 – Go to where your
readers are
That means promoting on lots of channels
“All the socials”
• Planet Postgres
• Twitter
• Slack
• LinkedIn
• Reddit
• Discord
• Hacker News (YC)
• Postgres Weekly
• Citus Newsletter
• Link in GitHub repo
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@clairegiordano
#4 –
Rinse Lather Repeat
Different times of day & time zones
Multiple days
Don’t be hesitant to tweet again,
especially if different time of day
Only ~1-2% of followers see a tweet
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@clairegiordano
Example of “Rinse
Lather Repeat
Same interview tweeted with different
graphics @ different times of day
When I interviewed with Scott
Hanselman, there were ~20 different
tweets to promote it, that hit every time
zone over a 5-6 day period
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@clairegiordano
#5 – Keep Twitter momentum by
recycling tweets
RT your own tweet after
~12 hours
QT your own tweet after
~1-2 days
QT other people’s tweets
YMMV
Example of a “Quote Tweet”
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@clairegiordano
#6 – Be there for the Q&A and the
conversation
One-way promotion is
considered advertising.
As “OA” (original author),
embrace the Q&A.
Especially on Reddit &
Twitter.
To stay constructive, wear
kevlar as needed.
@[email protected]

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@clairegiordano
#7 –Karma is a 2-
way street
If you shine a light on the
work of your teammates
and friends—they’re more
likely to do the same for
you!
@[email protected]

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@clairegiordano
PROMOTION
Tips & Checklist for Blogging
Promotion Tips
q Doublecheck ”unfurl”
q Syndicate to Planet Postgres
q Go to where your readers are
q Rinse lather repeat
q Recycle tweets
q Be there for Q&A
q Karma is a 2-way street
q Use “Promotion Checklist”
Promotion Checklist
q xxx
q yyy
q zzz
q aaa
q bbb
q ccc
@[email protected]

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@clairegiordano
Devil is in the details.
Checklists can help
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@clairegiordano
But if there’s just 1 thing
you remember from this talk...
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@clairegiordano
EMPATHY
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@clairegiordano
§ Asad Khan
§ Ashley McNamara Willis
§ David Perell
§ Hugh McLeod / Gaping Void
§ Isaac Alves
§ Marco Slot
§ My Nguyen
§ Rachel Agyemang
§ Sarah Novotny
§ Stephen O’Grady
§ Sumedh Pathak
@[email protected]
Credits & inspiration go to...

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@clairegiordano
The FOSDEM team & I would both LOVE your
feedback on my (and all of the) Postgres talks
“Submit feedback” link at bottom of page for
each talk...
https://fosdem.org/2023/schedule/track/postgresql/
Feedback is a gift!
@[email protected]

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@clairegiordano
Thank you
@clairegiordano
@[email protected]
github.com/citusdata/citus

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@clairegiordano
40 pairs
of lovely Postgres
& Citus socks to
give away!
@[email protected]

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How to Give Your Postgres Blog Posts an Outsize Impact | Claire Giordano | FOSDEM 2023

How to Give Your Postgres Blog Posts an Outsize Impact | Claire Giordano | FOSDEM 2023

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