So Social Media has led to the demise of the so called Blogosphere with the loss in popularity of the terms Blogger, Blogging and Blogs. The name blog, being a shortening of the term “web log”, was never particularly attractive and certainly not a marketable brand. It dates from the mid-1990’s although it was its launch in 1999, with the online service Blogger, that made it popular with those looking to communicate over the internet with a readership. It was developed by Pyra Labs before being acquired by Google in 2003. But whilst blogs became less popular the micro-blogging service Twitter launched in 2006 flourished. So evolved the “twittershere” or another term used in parallel called it the “twitterverse”. The short sharp nature of Twitter, maximum of 280 characters per Tweet, survived whereas the often more wordy Blogger lost its popularity. Twitter being popular with celebrities, politicians, business people and media savvy individuals attracted large followings which served to grow traffic volumes on the platform.
But what should be acknowledged is the concept of a “blog”
has actually infiltrated into both the native websites and the Content
Management Platforms like Wordpress where the option exists to have a blog
installed on the website. These blogs allow for the site authors to include
into the site a running news cycle relevant to the subject they covered by the
site. So blogging has just moved into being more specific to a website’s
content and located usually as a menu option on the website.
In my case I used Google Blogger as a very easy to use
way of storing my personal DMB Publishing Knowledge Base in the Cloud for free whilst
not actively looking for any readership or income streams. It’s in built time
stamping capability ensured all my posts were accurately time stamped and
stored in an orderly manner. It was also built with a very simple easy to use
User Interface (AX) and being Google hosted it was extremely fast to use. It
was also very reassuring to have Google looking after the data security (ie potential
data loss) and data protection (ie potential hacking corruption) aspects. With
Google, as the owner of Blogger, you were probably storing your data on the
safest available internet platform whilst having all these services for free
along with seamless software upgrades and almost limitless data storage
capacity. What is not to like? It is difficult to believe that I cannot be the
only one that has spotted this excellent use of free cloud space. The fact that
it is functionally engineered as a blog is irrelevant whilst in fact the
automatic blog post time stamping is a bonus whilst each blog post having its
own unique URL make it the perfect data repository. Throughout my IT career I
have been amazed how you can use software intended for one purpose for a
completely different purpose and often it can be more effective than the original
dedicated software. Not enough has been made of creating “generic”
multi-purpose software. Like Accounts Systems built in Excel and Asset
Management systems built in Word. Microsoft to their credit built the first
truly generic set of software with Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Publisher along
with others like Paint, Media Player etc allowing for lots of software
application creation as well as creating the original intended file types. So
let’s move on.
In terms of gaining and maintaining a readership the
problem with Google Blogger was you were dependant on the readers finding you
and continuing to visit you on a regular basis. The truth Google Blogger has
carried on being very actively used by many authors and readers without the
hype. But at the same time many migrated to the Social Media Platforms (eg
Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIN etc) because the readership was more guaranteed
since a larger and more topical range of subject matter guaranteed more readers
on the platform that were more likely to find and read your content. Whilst
others, often the true bloggers, migrated to the more sophisticated Content
Management Platforms (eg Wordpress, Drupal etc) since these sites lost the
overriding time logging functionality common in Google Blogger and they could
be made to operate exactly the same as a native websites with menus and other
common capabilities.
Now what is significant is that whilst the original
bloggers stayed on Google Blogger (or other blogs) or moved to the Social Media
Platforms or moved to the Content Management Platforms some wanted a different more
pro-active approach. So was born a new market for using newsletters. Oddly
enough newsletters had preceded blogging on the internet being one of the
earliest ways of distributing narrative and pictures when the internet was
first established. But this time around it was the automated distribution
processes, including paid for subscriptions, that could be better engineered
rather than just the newsletter content.
So why read a newsletter rather than read a website? For
starters it requires less work on your part with it just arriving neatly in
your inbox. It also offers a finite quality in that it is short and sharp so
quite easily consumed by you the reader in a world offering continual data
overload. It is also a subject you have choose to subscribe to either for free
or paying a subscription. From the authors view point by managing a free part
leading to a paid part it does lend itself perfectly to being a potential
income generator.
Newsletters properly managed over a subscribing free or
paid for readership could be a saviour to those wanting an income out of
publishing their work. With Newspapers now moving over to the digital
subscription model with Magazines looking to follow this Newsletter option is
ideal for self-employed or hobby publishers. Newsletters combined with some
eCommerce trading in products associated with the theme of the newsletter is
another way of earning an income from your writings. In fact very often the
income from products sold can soon exceed that from your written materials.
Substack is the leading newsletter platform capitalising
on this new market. They advertise that anyone can start a publication that
combines a personal website, blog and email newsletter or podcast. Substack
lets independent writers and podcasters publish directly to their audience and
get paid through subscriptions. You can choose to offer some free and some
behind a paywall. You always own your intellectual property, mailing list and
subscriber payments without being blocked by gatekeepers always being
responsible for your own full editorial control. Best to go to the Substack
website to see many examples but a few examples below to allow you to get a
flavour for this new approach.
The main Substack Website
Buy, Bitch is a humorous and strangely addictive shopping
newsletter from Vice journalist Veronica de Souza.
Crème de la Crème is anything that delights or infuriates
the writer and podcaster Aminatou Sow. Her commentary covers everything from
capitalism to skincare.
Agony aunt Heather Havrilesky describes it as “bridging
the gaps between wisdom and dread” Both compassionate and confrontational.
But you don’t have to use Substack there are independent
providers who offer a variety of Digital Marketing Services including
newsletters. With my interest in United Kingdom Maps I have a monthly email
from Alan Godfey Maps which combines narrative and pictures of their current
projects as well as advertising their maps for sale via their eCommerce site.
It is a very effective way of keeping my interest up in what their business has
to offer. They use an international Digital Marketing business, Constant
Contact, to provide their newsletter distribution service.
Alan Godrey Maps
http://www.alangodfreymaps.co.uk
Constant Contact are the provider of the newsletter
service to Alan Godrey Maps
http://www.constantcontact.com
For those prepared to go further in reducing the content
provided to the reader than rather than having an email with an attached
Newsletter you can include all the content directly within the email. This can
be made to look like a newsletter displayed within the email itself. There are
many businesses prepared to provide this type of service. They cover the
inclusion of your graphical content in an email and then its distribution to
defined email lists or they will do a discovery process for you locating potential
readers for your content type. One big provider is “mailchimp” and I am sure you
will have a received an email from them with their distinctive monkey wearing a
cap logo at the bottom of the email.
Mailchimp provides a number of services with free startup
options. But it becomes too expensive to use for larger volumes for the home or
hobby author.
The End.
No comments:
Post a Comment