Blogging is Dead – But Long Live the Blogosphere

Why publishing will become the new blogging. And why you should join the force.

Social media, content marketing and business networking experts all seem to agree on one thing: businesses need a blog. Recent examples of this widespread opinion can be found here:
Why Every Business Needs a Blog

Every business needs a BLOG!!! Here is what you need to know and some tips to get started…

There are valid points to this opinion, with many of which I agree. Being able to produce valuable and relatable content has become an integral part of any content or inbound marketing strategy; a blog is an accessible place to publish content for these strategies.

It is not however, the only - or even most influential - place to share your ideas. (But, more on this later.)

Blogging became relevant between 1998 and 2002, when the world started to see the value in self-publication and producing a social outlet to share substantial content and ideas. In the beginning there were only few bloggers, starting from a couple of thousand bloggers in 1999 to tens of thousands in the coming years.

It’s tough to say exactly what happened, but let’s imagine the scenario went this way: people were exposed to someone’s blog, providing them with that person’s personal views. The reader then thought: “Well, that’s nice. He is letting us know what he thinks – and (sometimes) offering me information I find useful.” The reader then went on to think: “What a great idea! Maybe someone is going to listen to what I have to say! I’m going to start blogging.” And thus, the Blogger Revolution was born.

 While the thought process remains the same today (“Here is what I think, read my blog”) - the effect is minimal, if anything at all. A viewer may read an article on your blog, maybe even find it interesting, but then never return. Memory of the author, ideas in the post (and certainly the URL), are long forgotten amongst the array of activity online.

The thing is, with the worldwide success of blogs, and now highly impacted blogosphere, blogging has lost ‘being special’ and has been degraded to a marketer’s practice. Most people start blogs because they fear they will become irrelevant without one. Most professionals blog because a consultant advised them to do so. Heck, most people blogging today are consultants being told by consultants to blog (and even those consultants learned that from other consultants).

Have you just started a new blog? Are you running Google Analytics? How many readers do you have? Five per-day? Twenty-five? One hundred?

If it is more than that, you are already running a successful blog. Chances are, you have less than 5 readers.

Most bloggers get 4 readers per day: Mom, Dad, BFF and one random visitor.

Your consultants will say: “You have to stick with it. Start with link-building, build a following on Twitter, have a Facebook page, use G+, create interesting content, use Pinterest and StumbleUpon, connect to other bloggers.”

That is all valid advice – and true, if you wish to attain a true following. However, today you will need years to establish an influential blog. Not to mention, the work isn’t over once you reach your desired number of readers. Your work has to remain relevant and of high standard in order for you not to be overtaken by one (or more) of the millions of eager blogger who write about what you do.

Is this the same concept that supports the foundation of blogging? It shouldn’t be. Not for private blogs, and not for business.

Blogging used to be there to give people an easy way to spread their thoughts to the world. Business blogging was there to provide a simple way to showcase your business: your expertise, insight, comments on industry news and how your products could help potential clients. If you need to be an expert on social media and SEO to get there, then you are kind of missing the point, aren’t you?

Sure, there are many (really cool) established blogs out there, with really cool articles. But, would you know about them today, if the people running those blogs hadn’t started establishing them years ago?

There are contradicting examples of course. There are those people that miraculously find a topic to write on and have the charisma and devotion to push their blogs to thousands of readers in a short amount of time. But these people are few and far between. Blogging (usually) is their full-time job.

Ask yourself, are you planning on becoming a full-time blogger?

If not, then maybe you shouldn’t start a blog – but get back to the original idea of blogging: instead of trying to establish your blog, just establish yourself.

There are numerous portals on the web, where you can publish content without having to publish on your own blog. There are many already-established blogs, happy to take guest posts. For professionals, there is exploreB2B, a network that allows you to compose an article and leverage the framework of an established professional community.

These options have one thing in common: they allow you to get readers, based on the beautiful and useful content you compose. Because, what you actually want is not a blog. It is people caring about your content, the stuff you would (in theory) put on your blog if it were five years ago. The thing is, you shouldn’t have to feel discouraged after starting a blog – with all of your innovative and freshly designed ideas - just to see it disappear into the depths of Google. Your ideas should be heard, and – in fact, they can… once you start publishing.

Publishing is the new blogging!

The blogosphere has already begun to adapt to this situation. There are big blogs (Tech Crunch, Mashable, Venture Beat, GigaOM) that have taken the traditional role of magazines. There are established bloggers who function, in a sense, as the spokespeople of their industry. Most of these large sites and/or people see the value in opening their channels to new ideas, despite how seemingly impossible it is to land a slot on a Tier 1 blog.

Once we accept that ‘blogging’ in today’s world of Web 2.0 really just means ‘finding a way to share and expose your ideas online,’ we can realize this concept of how to create and share material is workable, and here to stay.

There is a great demand for personal and professional content. If the text (or image) is interesting, there are people who will want to read it. Do yourself a favor and make what you have to say available to your desired audience by allowing this content to remain visible; do not let it disappear on your blog.

Find interesting places to place your content and tap into all of your harbored creativity. Because after all, isn’t this what blogging is all about?

Culled from: https://exploreb2b.com