Why It’s Impossible to Build a New Blog in 2006

I’ve been tiptoeing around this issue for a couple of months, trying to figure out how to approach it in a positive and diplomatic manner. I’m not sure it’s possible to be all that positive about such a difficult fact of life, but here goes.

It is virtually impossible to build a new blog in 2006. Here’s why I have reached that conclusion over the past year.

First, to have a successful blog, just like any other web site, you need readers. The difference (at least I thought it would be different) is that unlike Yahoo, MSN and Google, blogs are not supposed to be about making money. They are (I thought) supposed to be about having conversations and sharing perspectives and ideas. Sort of a natural evolution of the newsgroup or message board.

But the more I think about it, the less I believe that.

The very large majority of the most successful blogs out there have one of three things working in their favor.

1) They got there first and filled an empty space. I know exactly how that works, since getting there first was a major factor in the growth and success of ACCBoards.Com. Once you are there and fill the space, growth comes organically and it is a lot easier to maintain your position in the space.

2) They have a unique platform that almost guarantees them an audience. If you are the representative of a larger company, especially one that is a player in the blogosphere, your audience comes pre-packaged- from traffic from that company and other bloggers who want to link “upstream.” Granted, you have to deliver to keep and grow that audience, but a ready made group of users is a gigantic (and I believe necessary) advantage to growing a blog.

3) They get help from other established bloggers, either directly via a formal or informal network or because someone with a big audience throws a line to them via links and inter-blog conversations. This is the only way I can see a new, unaffiliated blogger actually growing a blog. Unfortunately, this probably has a lot to do with pre-existing relationships, making the chances of a truly independent blogger being thrown a rope very small.

If you don’t have one of those three things, I believe you are trying to push a heavy rock up a steep hill as far as developing and growing a new blog goes.

Let me be clear about one thing, however. A ready made audience doesn’t guarantee a successful blog. All of these A-Listers have to keep bringing good content to stay at the top. You can have a ready made audience and still not have a successful blog. But I no longer believe you can have a successful blog without a ready made audience.

Why? Because, unfortunately, the blogosphere is a closed system. There are too many people who believe they are going to get rich by writing a blog. Once you add the element of money into the equation, the element of competition soon follows. So you get the haves linking to one another (and largely only to one another) and ignoring (or at best tolerating) the have nots, in an effort to boost their status and, perhaps more importantly, protect their shares of the readership pie. Anyone who argues this isn’t true hasn’t spent much time surfing around the blogosphere.

Yes, there are exceptions. Scoble and JKOnTheRun being two that come to mind. Both seem to be really good guys and both seem to be doing the blog thing for reasons other than the prospect of a dollar. There are others, both A-Listers and not, who simply aren’t interested in adding any more voices to the conversation. Logically, that’s understandable when you look at it from the capitalistic/competitive perspective. But if you believe the blogosphere is or ought to be about conversation and not solely about making money and inflating egos, it’s not good for the blogosphere.

Stated another way, if Firefox, Flickr, and most of the blogging platforms are free, why are links and seats at the table guarded like Fort Knox gold?

Am I talking my position? Am I discouraged and perhaps a little bitter? Probably, I can’t deny that. But I believe I am right about this. And if I don’t write about something that affects me, I’m not writing from my experience- and no one should write from anything else.

So let me briefly dispense with my place in all of this and then move on with the conversation.

I believe my varied experience in programming, web site development, writing, teaching, music making and lawyering gives me a fairly unique perspective on the internet in general and the blogosphere in particular that should be as valued in the blogosphere as it seems to be in the real world (I make my living and give 20-30 speeches a year about one or more of these topics). So, yes, I do feel like stomping my feet and screaming when I can’t fully join the conversations out here. But this is not a problem that is specific to me- and the point I am making here is not about me.

It’s about the ability (or not) of new voices to find a place in the conversations at the virtual watercooler.

Unfortunately, like the real world, sometimes the blogosphere is about who you know as much as what you know.

A lot of bloggers just give up. I can totally relate to that. But I am a fixer and a builder by nature, so giving up isn’t appealing either.

I don’t know the answer, but I know it’s a problem.

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This entry was written by Kent and posted on January 1, 2006 at 7:51 pm and filed under Tech. Bookmark the permalink. Follow any comments here with the RSS feed for this post.
  • Anonymous
    Maybe the problem then is finding a good way to get the world out about your blog. But, how to filter out bad blogs?? How about charge a small fee and make the posting visual... thus: BlogBillboard.com
  • Amy
    Hi, Kent

    Thanks for writing such a thoughtful posting. I understand what you're saying, and I agree that attracting readers to a brand-new blog, especially if you're a new or unknown blogger, is a challenge.

    That said, I respectfully disagree that it's impossible to succeed with a brand-new blog these days.

    Personally, I think the key to success is to define what you want to achieve via your blog, identify the right target audience, and court them actively by participating in the public conversation on existing relevant blogs.

    I've done this with brand new blogs and it works well. It does require time and attention, but I've never seen it *not* work.

    I've written more about my strategy here:
    http://snipurl.com/53th

    I'm curious what you think of this approach, and whether you've every tried a sustained effort like that.

    Thanks,

    - Amy Gahran
    RightConversation.com
    Contentious.com


















  • Like Amy, I liked this post, but disagree.

    ...in so much that the 'blogosphere' has always been like this, just that it is more noticable now.

    I'd be interested to hear what you would use as a marker of 'success' - is it a purely monetary thing (which I don't think you mean), or is it just a chance to get involved with the conversations that A Listers are having.

    If it is money, then I have no answer, I don't think about blogging as bringing in money in any traditional sense.

    But...if you want to get in on some of the great conversations, then why do you need to involve A Listers? Once upon a time A Listers had readerships under 20, but because of the quality of their ideas their readerships increased. A Listers aren't unassailable.

    Start your own conversations, link to the blogs and conversations that you want to. So what if Doc Searls, Robert Scoble, or whomever doesn't read you? - it doesn't matter, you can build your own network. Maybe you'll discover the next Doc Searls, maybe _you_ are the next Doc Searls - you won't know until you get your ideas out there.

    I mean, on the basis of this post, you have ended up in my Bloglines subscription, and if you keep up the good ideas, I'll keep reading, and if I have an opinion then I'll let you know.

    (Warning - I have had no sleep, so apologies if I have rambled, been incoherent or have completely missed the point of your post).













  • Blogosphere is like an open party.

    Everyone is invited. At the start there were only few who came in. Some of them were funny / interesting. They became the stars of the floor. Those who persisted also became A-listers.

    Now there are zillions on the floor. With few centers of discussions. Many of the conversations are many-one instead of many-many.

    The system is source centered rather than conversation centered (Google to be blamed !!).

    Links = popularity. If many of my readers are non-linkers my bad luck.

    The rules of game are similar to politics. Blogs are just another human system - with all the failings of democracy (- and benefits).

    Incidentally I am the one who lost the elections.











  • Yeah, I think I also have to join the "appreciate the post, but disagree"' sentiment.

    I think you're mixing two conversations here. One about blogs as a business. The other is about blogs as a cultural trend/phenomenon/conduit.

    I'm new to the blog world, and from my perspective I've been successful. And one could argue I have all three of the things you listed going for me. But these aren't reasons bloggers can't be successful, they are simply obstacles you need to overcome, or goals you need to meet.

    When I started blogging I took some time to think about what my unique perspective might be. And once I found something, I marketed it, via projects outside, and via the inherently viral blogging medium itself.

    A list from an A-lister is not going to make your blog a success. The same way an a-lister not linking can't prevent a good blog from spreading (might be too many negatives in that line *sigh*).

    There are barriers to "success" in any industry/profession, we're just talking about blogging cause it's new, and its the medium we're using. And ultimately we each define success in our own way.

    Which leads to your second point, and the true beauty of the blog culture. Every one can join in and have their own voice, and their own success.

    If you want to play in the NBA, sure, you have follow some "rules of the game," show a lot of talent, and more importantly, desire. But that doesn't mean you can't find a court near you and play a good game of pickup ball with some friends. Most people, it would seem, in fact prefer the latter, since there are tons of ways to make a living ...













  • When I started blogging I had no clue I'd have an audience. Yeah, it's nice when one shows up, but I would have blogged even if one didn't turn up. Now that one is here it's a bit weird. Enjoy not having an audience! It makes it easier to write a lot of times.
  • Kent,
    I almost agreed with you but I began thinking of another scenario (for lack of a better word). Are you measuring your success by the success of others? Are your motivations for blogging based on your perceptions that others created? You must do it for yourself, successful or not, and persist without exception. Do it for the experience and where the road takes you. Many doors will open and close as you research and think about your blog. You may never be rich, but you may get income you did not expect, or friendships for a lifetime with people you have never met, or nothing but a place to post your thoughts. All of these are more than you started with.
  • chu
    I disagree. It's obviously going to be difficult to compete with established blogs in certain areas such as tech, music, politics, porn. But look at cuteoverload.com for an example of a popular recent blog - a good idea well executed and virtually no competition.
  • I'm a brand-new, still-wet-behind-the-ears blogger who has been doing this for about two weeks. My blog launched the day after this entry was posted.

    Obviously, I have a stake in hoping that it is not impossible to launch a new blog in 2006. But I also believe there is some reason for hope that goes beyond my own desire to hope.

    When I started looking around the blogosphere several weeks ago, I looked for blogs that seemed to be doing the same sort of thing I planned to do (writing original satire for the enjoyment of an audience). I found a few to my liking, and The Assimilated Negro (in whose contrail I have been assiduously following and who has been more than kind in tolerating said assiduous contrail-following) came the closest to what I was looking to do in my own blog. So needless to say, I have been all over his blog like a cheap suit.

    Now, I'm not on any list, but I have managed to get a few visitors within my first two weeks of activity. I should have my thousandth visitor within a few days. Nothing earth-shaking, to be sure, but not a bad start, either.

    The thing is this: New spaces can be defined. New relationships can be cultivated.

    So even if you start out without knowing anybody in the blogosphere, you can always make new friends. The Instapundit may not have time for you (or maybe he might), but there are a lot of great bloggers with slightly-lower-than-Instapundit traffic with whom you can work to establish rapport.

    The bootstrapping process for new blogs is undoubtedly a slower process than it used to be. This may actually be a good thing from a Darwinian perspective. But the fact of the matter is that all the heavy hitters have a constant unending need for fresh material, and if one is able to provide good material on a consistent basis, then I think there is still room out there for a few more good blogs.











  • Anonymous
    Yeah, what Scoble said. :-) When I - and I suppose most of us - started blogging a number of years ago it wasn't a huge phenomenon and there was no audience worth chasing. We did it because it was awesome cool to play with the new tools, and hey my one reader really liked me? Amazing! Now it appears that you have to blog to 'achieve' something, either fame, money or an ego-massage. Why can't people just blog because they love writing to the world like most of us did, even if the world is one or two people. It's a wonderful feeling, and provides a fantastic sense of liberation.
  • Anonymous
    Kent,

    The problem you're commenting on here isn't new - it's as old as human nature, and has been around since people started communicating over computer networks (see "The Rule", an old article from suck.com... remember them? "A fish, a barrel, a smoking gun...")

  • I'm cool with Scoble's point, and I have a lot of stuff on my hard drive that I've just written for myself. I have also done a lot of writing in emails to friends, and they seem to enjoy my emails.

    But it seems to me that when one starts writing on a website (be it in blog form or other) there is some expectation that an audience will read it. Why else would one choose to put it in such a public place?

  • Great post, but I'm not sure I agree that you must be part of the haves in order to get attention.

    I promoted my blog mostly through friends and family (I was already e-mailing them all the same basic thing every day) as well as some of my print newsletter readers (who still seem to prefer the printed format over the digital one). Word of mouth took over.

    The best way to get one person to tell 10 friends is to get them to say "Hmmm!" and then have them click deeper and say "Hmmm!" again. That seems like it's a guaranteed referal.

    And to make money on a blog you have to actually believe you won't make money on the blog and make your advertising really not be a key focus. The whole blending thing needs to be taken 10 steps beyond.





  • In my experience, most bloggers work extremely hard for their audience. Promotion is key. Have you considered participating in any blog carnivals? These are great vehicles for getting your blog out in front of new readers. Whether they come back is up to you!
  • I found your link via the Gapingvoid site, which used to be wonderful and entertaining and then Hugh started using his blog to market some goddamn wine or some-such, and now 67% of his blog is about the company making the wine, Storm-somethingorother, and about 30% is self-referentially focused on "My Blog vis-a-vis Blogging and Bloggers" The remaining 3% - the napkin-art-like cartoons - is what I came for, and found very little of.

    I don't give a damn if my blogs (which are on hiatus right now as I'm focused on an art/noisic/writing project taking up my time/headspace/energy) has 3 or 4 readers as long as they like reading it and I like writing it. THAT is a successful blog...one written by someone who ENJOYS it.

    Same thing goes for blogs as any other art form: the MINUTE you do it with dollarsigns in your eyeballs, you have just lost the ENTIRE point, and will of course make no money whatsoever because who the hell wants something created just to make its creator money? People buy things for strange reasons. This century has been pretty miserable so far but the saving grace of it is that art, music, writing have all become decorporatized now - anyone can put out an album, write a book, do visual art, animation or film, and have a potential audience of hundreds. Potential. That potential is going to depend on so many varied factors: talent. timing. just plain luck. And yeah, who you know. But I think you vastly over-rate the importance of the latter.

    I really should get my blogs up and running again - I got frustrated by Movable Type, hated the corporatisation of Blogger, and can't seem to find a program I like using that's free (and I dun' make enough money to buy one, which is probably not surprising seeing how money oriented I am...haha

    Cheers and all that,
    DMT333








  • Anonymous
    Interesting post. Would you like some comments from someone who has used blogs in the past, but is not a hardcore blogger type?

    Maybe this is a feature of most "serious" bloggers, but your article presumes that success of a blog is defined by the number of people who read the blog and and link to it. I find that strategy amusing, considering the fact that I blog simply because I like to. I like to post my ideas about things. If people read them, great. If they don't, then I'm not going to get upset about it.

    At least I have a voice. Before the days of blogging, it was pretty much impossible to post your voice on important subjects (at least in a form where other people could read what you wrote.) You needed to be "famous" - a politician, a celebrity, etc. to get your idea heard. Or you needed to have a lot of money. Or be part of the media. Blogging made the idea that you had to have a certain level of success to contribute to the world community obsolete. Anyone can blog. Anyone can link to other people who's ideas they find interesting.

    That means that it no longer matters who you are to determine the numbers of people who will listen to you. Or so we all thought. What you've uncovered is that in reality, the old rules will ALWAYS apply. I.E., the world tends to organize itself into the Speakers and the Listeners. The Speakers are the ones that are viewed as listenable. The "A-List" blogger. The Listeners are the ones that complain that they aren't Speakers.

    I think what you might consider doing is figuring out how to become, and more importantly, BEING a Speaker. If you position yourself as a Speaker, then you are one. And that is the key. People will listen to you if you have something that is worth listening to. Focus on that, and you will have all the success you need.







  • I've been blogging for awhile now-- toiling away in obscurity, mostly for my own enjoyment and that of a few friends who read me. I recently added banner ads and a tip jar, not in the hopes of churning out income, but just in the hope of making enough to pay for the blog. I've earned $00.48 so far.

    Sure, I want to be part of the conversation. But to some degree there is an elitism among the A-listers which steers the conversation, inviting some to participate,excluding others. It's something I pointed out a couple of years ago to Cory Doctrow and pissed him off. Cory, no doubt is still blogging on the golden edge of success, but who has ever heard of Tie-dyed Tehuti or Tie-dyed Brain Rays? Not that I begrudge anyone their hard earned success.

    I admit to sometimes daydreaming about the right person stumbling upon my blog and linking to it. I think I've written some pretty funny things and supplemented the writing with artwork and cleverly Photoshopped pictures that I'm sure many would enjoy.

    But I don't want to be a link whore, I want my blog to stand on its own merits. How does one promote their work without losing the joy of the art to the chase for fame? I think that if my blog has any value to anyone other than myself, it is in my askew, outsider perspective rather than adding to the clamor in an already crowded and noisy room.





  • When I frirst started Blogging I did it to let a friend know that I was "listening" and striving to continue to build on our long lived friendship. Then I began bloging as a way of building a Readership for a novel I've been plugging away on; now I just blog to blog for myself - hoping to come across neat sites like yours and continue to grow as a person. You've just gained another reader; keep it up, even if no one come by...
  • Some of what you say is true - certainly, you have to deliver regularly, and it sure helps to have started blogging before the end of 2001.

    But getting links from other blogs is pretty much the main currency of the blogosphere, and the best way to write get them is to be willing to pay in kind.

    So, the first rule is to have a blogroll, and the next is to link other people in your main text. Eventually, people notice you because they notice you have linked to them. So they'll come over and check out your blog, and if they see something interesting there, they might just link back.

    But blogroll real estate is at a premium, not just because people are snobs, but because long blogrolls ultimately result in slower loading times and lower the value of a spot on the blogroll because people will only really pay attention to a limited number of them. (That, and the fact that most people find updating their blogrolls to be a pain in the tail.)

    I try to link as many other blogs as I can, but I can only read so much. I always have a bit of a feeling I'm slighting deserving bloggers, but we're only human.







  • Hi, Kent.

    I came here via Avedon Carol's Sideshow, fyi.

    I started my blog in October of 2003 and had precisely the same outlook as you: I thought it was too late. Most of my very slender traffic came through Google initially, along with a few friends who spread the word a bit. The traffic gradually built over the next year; I never did much to promote it. A few more widely read bloggers stumbled across it, which helped, and I spent some time commenting on a few blogs, which also helped, but most of the time I had the impression I was my only reader.

    Early in 2005 I added some contributors and got picked up by Google News, which boosted the traffic exponentially and brought a lot more recognition from other bloggers who ran across the site through Google News searches.

    In March of 2005 I got one of the contributors into the White House press room, which resulted in a lot of attention, including a mention from Dan Froomkin in the Washington Post. After that I started to get more links, including some from people such as Atrios, Digby and Avedon.

    Now I get a lot of traffic, by my standards anyway, a few donations and some Amazon commissions. I haven't added advertising, but I keep meaning to. I didn't intend to make money and for a fair while it didn't even occur to me that it was possible. Now I'd like to, and I think the traffic is getting to the point where I actually can sell some ads.

    So it's possible if not to make money, at least to get some recognition, and not necessarily on purpose. Now I do it on purpose.

    Avedon's right about the linking and the content. She's one of a handful of writers I read daily because she has so many good and unrepetitive links, and I'm both too lazy to find them on my own and too involved with struggling to write my own stuff, which is considerably more time consuming than I'd like it to be.

    More information than you need, I'm sure. The basic point is that if you're willing or compelled to invest the time in writing good stuff and circulating a bit, people will show up, as they have here. I hardly ever get this many comments.















  • Joe
    I've been talking about this for quite some time. I got in a while ago (started back in '03), but for whatever reason, my blog has never "caught on". I average about 120 hits a day, which is a slight improvent over the last year or so, but nowhere near where a three-year blogger ought to be, especially one who gets cross-posted at larger sites, and occasionally (read: rarely) linked by the "established" sites.

    It has nothing to do with content. I may not write as well as Digby but I get my point across pretty well. A lot of it is still social. If I write something like this, I'm "whining", if I try to get my blog a little more attention, I'm "blog-whoring". And God forbid you should do something to anger one of the bigger bloggers, you might as well just sell your computer.

    My main concern is that what started out as a truly populist technology could eventually gentrify and stagnate. The big bloggers aren't responsible for what's happened, of course, and they have no obligation to do anything for anyone else. But perhaps, if regular blog readers would search around some more and not just concentrate on the same sites, they might find themselves on sites where their voice is more than just one of a huge crowd.

    Anyway, that's my take.

    Cup O' Joe - Blog Of The Working Man's Thinking Man!







  • Excellent read.

    I built my first website in 1996. I was a film critic, and at the time it was great because there were so few of us at the time on the web.

    I got hundreds of emails, which was really all I ever wanted out of the gig... to interact with other people with the same interests as I had. But as time went on, the landscape got diluted. It became impossible for someone new to the scene to build an audience.

    And now blogging unfortunately is the same way.





  • I came into publishing in the early 70's and faithfully read the Letters to the Editor for personal views of folks like me. Actually, from folks more knowledgeable than me!

    I share your reasoning. I think a blogg is just a lonely comment made to the blogger and is rarely noticed.

    But human nature is to stand and want to be noticed so it's a wonderful channel. But I don't see how it means much else.

    I am new to blogging and have put up two bloggs and have no idea why I have done this because no one other than me will/have noticed.

    I suspect Amy's comments are the truth if one strives to gain some measure of notice and inclusion. But that is a FT job to say the very least!

    Keep on thinking, Kent, I would love to read a solution.









  • Ed
    What's an A-lister?
  • Very interesting read.

    For me, I think it has to do primarily with --

    a) whether you have anything worth saying;
    b) whether you can say "it" in a way that hasn't been said before; OR
    c) whether you can be true to your voice without diluting it in the hopes of satiating the content monster.

    I find that keeping myself limited to three or four topics works wonders. It provides me with focus and I don't run the risk of going astray. Stay on target is my mantra.

    In re blog promotion: I don't actively go out of my way to self-promote. I may have mentioned it to a handful of friends and I do link to it on one or two bulletin board that I participate on, but other than that, most of the people who've viewed and responded to the blog have been via my participation as a regular commentator on other blogs.

    It would be nice to be acknowledged and validated by the masses, yes. In the meantime, I'll settle for peace on earth and goodwill towards men. ;)











  • Lev
    Very interesting post. Shame I only came across it today. Last month I observed and wrote about what I call "Blog Pockets", i.e. when you come across the same blogrolls over and over again. Once you enter one of those pockets it's difficult to escape it.

    My observation supports what Kent writes, that you "get the haves linking to one another (and largely only to one another) and ignoring (or at best tolerating) the have nots".

    I put the existence blog pockets down to three things: 1. the blogroll function itself, 2. the need for peer recognition (the higher ranked your peer the better), and 3. the way blog search engines rank posts (most read ranks higher).

    Point 3. highlights the need for quality content to be recognised as such, but who - in an effort to get in with the A-listers - would link to a Z-lister, even if he or she had some good content? In an ideal world such interlinking would happen, but aren't we all influenced by the Technorati and Alexa page ranks?





  • Interesting post, don't give up just yet. Ask yourself if you rather be someone whose voice is heard or just another blogger commenting among 154 comments on a blog. ;-)
  • I think bloggers like yourself take this "business" a bit too serious sometimes. I think your blog on this matter here is a prime example of it.

    Nevertheless, your post was an insightful and well-written read. Thank you for sharing it.

  • The truth is...

    My blog was created in early 2003 and my inability to play well with others has led my weblog to be alone... with a steady amount of readers... the number of which never grows or exceeds 70 viewers a day. A small percentage of them actually read.

  • The stock has gained 150% from Oct 8, 2007 to Oct 22, 2007.
    By the way check this company MDFI. Their stock is set to increase because of their association with Apple iphone and Complete Care Medical. Find more about this company and stock http://www.growurmoney.com/medefile/
  • Quite interesting actually, i'll have to bookmark your site now to check out what other things you might say. ;)
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