And I have to disagree completely. Blogging is far from dead—blogging is thriving. According to Paul, the reasons you should skip the blogosphere are, roughly:
- There are too many other blogs
- Writing more than 140 characters is too much work
- Media companies are now blogging
- Jason Calacanis isn’t doing it anymore
Blogging has always been a medium. It’s a tool that you can use in many ways, and what’s happened is that this tool has been adopted by a lot of people for a lot of different purposes.
Some of what Paul brings up is actually valid: gone indeed are the days when a wayward blog post about a popular subject like “Barack Obama” could rocket you to the top of Google. But a blog still beats a static web site on SEO hands-down.
And there’s also the way that a blog lets you connect with your niche. The Techmeme leaderboard does not define the blogosphere. It tracks the “broadcast blogosphere” - blogs from people and organizations big enough that they’re essentially going back to broadcast models.
Today is an excellent time to start a blog, either for yourself or for your business. You will undoubtedly find your tribe.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
my dubai work blog 11.01.08 at 7:05 am
I totally agree with the thought that blogging is and will always be a medium. A medium for so many benefits and advantages as long as the search engines like fresh content.
If the search engines will disregard content, more so, discourage fresh content, then anyone can say that blogs and blogging is dead.
Biztrader.com 11.01.08 at 9:13 am
I enjoyed reading your article. There’s just one point I wanted to add - many business owners who finally start thriving blogs seem to stop. Consistency is the key to having a successful blog.
Ink and Beans 12.02.08 at 6:49 pm
I’m a novelist still in my first 9 months of blogging, and started the blog primarily as a cross-promotional tool. I post maybe twice per week, and get about 20 visits per day, and I’d say most of them are my friends (as in, friends prior to starting the blog).
While the blog has been satisfying in some respects, the promotional time required, i.e. becoming an “active member of the blogging community,” is about equal to the time I spend writing on the blog itself, and on the whole I’d say I spend 10 hours per week or more doing blog stuff. I keep up with and comment on other fiction writers’ blogs, as well as all the major lit blogs.
In my last post I voiced skepticism about the worth of the blog as a business tool, at least for me. Maybe there ARE too many blogs out there. Doesn’t seem worth it for 20 visits a day. Is it just the nature of my “industry?” Do I need keep trucking and be patient?
Think blogging is hard? So do I.