I doubt we will ever see headlines like this, but, if you listen close enough, you may begin to hear whispers in cyberspace that there are too many blogs.
But, is there?
Today’s Lesson
Cyberspace reminds me of the small, but growing town, we live in. When we moved here 20 years ago, it was a quaint community, filled with “mom and pop” stores, a barber shop, complete with the red and white pole, one high school, and living in the country, meant you were only a mile or so from the main street.
But soon, more and more people “discovered” our town, and it has seen a real boom (until the recent real estate crunch).
As families began to move in, I would hear some of the new people say, “Close the door, we don’t want any more people here” We want to preserve this small town atmosphere.”
Now, most of the family owned businesses have been replaced by corporate giants like WalMart, Lowe’s Home Depot, and Target. We now have three overcrowded high schools. and living in the country, means you are 10 miles from the “freeway”. The barber shop, with its red and while pole, survived the boom, so all is not lost.
Cyberspace (or us bloggers), could easily develop that same attitude. “I have mine (blog)…. but we don’t need any more.”
Now, I would hate to see that happen. I believe many great blogs are started every day.
Blogs meet our ever changing needs. Just as the headlines change daily, so does what people search for.
Although we may become attracted to certain “types” of blogs, there is a yearning in most of us, to learn more.
Personally, I doubt, there can ever be too many blogs. Good ones, that is.
To prove my point, I would like to take this opportunity to share a shiny, new blog with my readers. The author and blog share the same name: Hunter Nuttall.com Hunter will be posting articles on personal development. A topic that’s near and dear to my heart, and it’s a subject from which we can all benefit. Good Luck, Hunter!
Today’s Assignment
If you are contemplating setting up a blog, what is your greatest concern?
Does it intimidate you that there are so many blogs out there?
If you currently have a blog, what words of encouragement can you share with someone who is thinking of setting up a blog? Or, is new to blogging?
Do you think we could ever have too many blogs in cyberspace?
Barbara – you had me worried when I saw the title. I don’t think there are too many blogs out there. Now I would like to see the spammy ones go – and the same goes for websites.
When I first began using the Internet, there were far fewer sites and nowhere near as much useful information. I built a website on a freehost, got to the top of aol straight away (you didn’t need SEO in those days) nd people began buying from me right away).
Obviously – that doesn’t happen anymore, but progress has been made and the Internet has far more to offer.
Now, advice and encouragement to new bloggers would be: Keep going – even when you think nobody is listening. In the early days, you’re just practising anyway. I look back at some of my old posts and hope that nobody was reading.
Also – only blog on a topic that you enjoy but would like to learn more about. And try to build a community – visit blogs you like – always visit your own regular commentors blogs and also the blogs of their commentors.
Learn about social networking mediums that are available (something I’m trying to do now) as there definitely seems to be something in all this digging and stumbling.
Barbara, I’m learning that your eye-catching headlines are sometimes hypothetical, so I have to read the post before I react. 🙂
I don’t think there could ever be too many good blogs. We do have too many blogs already, but not enough good blogs. And one key component of a good blog is to be different. There’s a good example right here–there are zillions of blogs about blogging, but I’m not aware of any that are similar to Blogging Without A Blog.
Thanks for the link love, Barbara (I’m learning the blogging lingo!). There’s a minor typo in my name though (i instead of l).
Catherine, I think there’s something to Digg and StumbleUpon too. I recently added these links to my posts after a visitor said I should have them.
Catherine,
I’m learning all about “catchy titles” from you. I often laugh when I see your titles, and it makes me wonder how you will tie the title into your post…but you always do.
You have given great advice to new bloggers. Isn’t it amazing how we change as we blog more? Not only are we learning more, but we are able to share what we learn with our readers as well. Isn’t blogging the greatest?
Hunter,
With blogging, your title is often the only thing you have to catch a readers short attention span, so sometimes it helps if you create a title that will make a reader stop and read your post.
I appreciate your compliment about my blog. Over the months my blog has taken on a different “personality”, to become what it is …and that is something that only happens with time. When you start out blogging, like Catherine said, you are practicing, and testing the waters. Even though your traffic counts may not be great, you still “pretend” others are hearing what you have to say. With patience and perseverance, your blog will grow, and often it’s your readers/commenters who will spur you on, and inspire you to be greater than you ever dreamed.
Thanks for pointing out the typo…I have corrected it.
Digg and StumbleUpon are great ways to increase your exposure. Keep in mind though, anytime you begin getting involved in social networking, you are also increasing the time needed to maintain your blog.
You’re doing great on the blogging lingo. Stay tuned, you will be learning lots more 🙂
Like most things, you have early adopters quickly followed by a cycle which ends with the late majority.
For me, bloggs are the “TV channels” of the future.
We may not always tune in for vision or sound, although that is part of the medium too.
But we came from the caves. A pigeon for example hasn’t yet evolved to properly judge and subsequently dodge a car. Its genetic coding hasn’t adapted quickly enough to adapt to a new predator that simply didn’t exist over 150 years ago.
It takes millions of years.
Despite technology, we are still social animals.
I met a guy I really admire today. He is a photographer. He brings to life the most mundane product.
Digital cameras cannot replace him.
To get the right shot takes time. It needs lighting. Perspecitve. Judgement of the proportion of the shot that will be swamped by the irrelevant unless the environment is changed to properly highlight the product.
And yet, “too speedy” evolution has tricked us into believing that anyone can take a mobile phone and take a snap in a few seconds.
Evolutionary-wise, we are all just out of the caves. We’re pigeons which can’t dodge speeding cars because we haven’t yet got the genetic judgement.
Blogs haven’t evolved yet. The genetic jelly is not yet set.
But the medium reflects more favourably with out genetic coding than TV. It is interactive. It is social.
The photographic genius I met today asked me a question. What are your plans? And how big will you grow?
And the answer I gave goes back to something I read which reflected some current, and some ancient knowledge.
We are tribal. We are not genetically encoded to have a more meaningful interaction to more than 150 people at a time.
We have the capacityu for more, but it is diluted.
And those 150 people change too. We move between different tribes at different stages of our lives.
My answer to the guru was – “we’ll get 150 clients and stop”.
Instead, we’ll make that a “branch”. Because that branch between the personnel within it can cope with 150 relationships as a sole human-run entity. Even though we could technically take on more clients, and it would potentially be more cost-effective to do so, we will create a separate branch – even geographically close by – to service the 151st client.
It makes sense to me anyway.
But answering the question, I suspect blogs are still very much in their infancy, but I suspect they will gravitate towards social interaction.
We will all find our tribes and maybe even have a managebale total of 150 – but they won’t all be online – maybe that is our real capacity?
For the sake of round figures – 50 family, 50 online friends, 50 real-world friends. And that’s it.
Maybe you just can’t manage more with the capacity we have genetically inherited?
Wow Ian,
That’s a very thought provoking, philosophical comment.
It’s interesting that you think blogs will gravitate more toward social interaction. I do agree, that when others are allowed to “have their say”, great conversations develop. Out of those conversations, bloggers often realize the power of their written words. With that realization, I think bloggers become more motivated to produce great content, and…their readers begin to expect it.
As an author of two blogs, I gain much joy out of communicating with my loyal readers/commenters,…. always looking forward to hearing what my readers have to say.
And so…..the branch grows 🙂
You got me there for a second too, muah 😉
I like this post. I never really DID think about it.
I don’t think there can ever be too many blogs.
Everyone has his / her own style.
And people thinking about starting one? Hop on.
Give it a go, look around, get happy 😉
And P.S.: Thanks for your wonderful comment on “closer to heaven”.
I never actually thought about educating anyone, especially not with that picture.
But it was very interesting to see what kind of comments I got 🙂
Hello Nicole,
Gosh, I just left your blog, and here you are. Welcome to my site 🙂
Thank you for sharing your opinions for those who may not yet have a blog, or are new to blogging. I think new bloggers need all of the encouragement we can provide.
BTW: Your blog is amazing. I never envisioned that I would be looking at photos of Kuwait, by someone who is living there. You have a great opportunity to teach us that which we will never see in the media.
For some reason, the “closer to heaven” photo moved me to leave a comment before exiting your site…don’t know if it was the photo or the name. But, whatever it was, I’m happy to meet you.
I’m sure we will be seeing more of each other in cyberspace. 😀
Hi Barbara – It’s tough to think of good titles isn’t it? But, as you say, you have seconds to catch people’s attention when they’re using a reader.
I’m finding it useful to go through my stats and try to figure out which titles attract more people.
As for stumbleupon – I’ve tried to rejoin as things went wrong the first time, and hopefully I have invited you to join – if I’ve done it properly; and also Ian.
Ian’s point is interesting. Apparently, only a small percentage of bloggers actually comment and join in the conversation. I wonder what would need to happen to make this figure increase? And I wonder what the new blogs will be like once they evolve? Hopefully not too technically challenging for me!
By the way Barbara – I tried your tip on delaying a post to a certain time this morning and it worked.
Hello Catherine,
Catchy titles aren’t always easy, however, most of the time, they also go against the “keyword” theory, thus increasing our odds of not having our posts found via searches. It’s something I try to “weigh out”, however, I don’t get too hung up on keywords…maybe I should.
My post for tomorrow lacks a catchy title, mainly due to it’s content. It’s more of a “lesson” title.
Stats are great for finding out how people search. If you use “HitTail”, they categorize all of that for you in a neat report.
I got your email from StumbleUpon, however, haven’t had the time to check into that.
Commenting is something lots of people don’t feel comfortable doing, however, if they have a blog, by commenting on other blogs, they will definitely see an increase in their readership. In the beginning I didn’t comment, mainly due to time restraints, but as I began to feel more comfortable blogging, I made time to start leaving comments. I still find myself visiting blogs, but not leaving a comment if I am tired, not feeling creative, or am in the middle of researching for a future post.
Even if my readers don’t feel inclined to leave a comment, I’m just happy they are visiting my blog, and hopefully are able to walk away with some useful information.
Doesn’t that time poststamp work great? Tomorrow’s post takes that one step further.
I can consider my self an internet addict and being online almost everyday I can say that blogging is really a big hit.
If you want to start blogging you must know your objective in creating a blog, is it monetary or just a place to express your self and share information. And what ever reason you have for blogging make sure that readers would love reading it, it is something useful and interesting.
One more thing don’t be intimidated because your new to blogging or your blog is new, it doesn’t matter as long as you enjoy what you are doing and your giving what your target audience needs then everything is fine.
Happy blogging…
Hi Laura,
That is great advice. I agree, when we do something we like, we often shine, and with blogging it’s seen in our articles. Don’t you agree, readers can sense that?