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Everything should be up on January 1st.
Now, I'm looking like a spammer. Oh, bugger.
Who says some don't? :)
Lots of changes are coming here too, but probably in March.
So for example you approached the Scoble Show by saying that I'm going to document and interview all the players who are defining the Web 2.0 business movement, however that period of time may one day wind up being historically defined. Seemed like a lot of people were interested in that. :)
There are so many talented people who are working very hard, but still need to figure out what their show is really about. That's what this past year has been for us with EPIC-FU -- figuring out a way to talk about the show, and figuring out how each piece of content we cover advances us further toward that definition.
Once you have that going, you have to be ready to sustain it for a long enough time to let people find out about it. Around March of 2007 we were getting about 200,000 plays each month. Now we're in the millions, so figuring out that focus and identifying the best places to find the right audience were everything for us.
We are now in our 18th month of the show's existence, by the way. So it took a long time to get to this point. Now we have to work to sustain the audience, keep the show fresh, and really break through to that next level. It's all a grand experiment.
You've done an awesome job of reinvention, which is one of the reasons I love your show.
Scoble...seems are making the same move lead singers in bands think they can. Let's hope you don't end up the David Lee Roth of video blogging.
That, and being in the future headspace is lonely and frustrating.
The amazing thing about the internet is once you post something it is out there to be found by the person who is seeking that information or message. It is almost a spiritual or cosmic thing.
You have a huge audience....but I think it is because you are genuine in your interest about techie things. You have a childlike (I mean that in a good way) excitement and passion for all you study and report. It for this that you now have influence. Some scoff at you for this.... but I think it is an example of how consistency and real passion lead to success in any area. You could not cover all you do if you were faking it. That is the lesson in this whole audience , traffic, eyeballs, followers, etc... discussion.
We'll be looking forward to seeing what you announce in a couple of weeks.
They can sell niche ads on niche networks for a high CPM. The problem is the market is limited to the size of the niche.
It's really easy to fool yourself with how well you're doing. Early growth is fast, because the community is small and insular. But you hit the top of your market size really quickly and then your growth is limited to the growth of your market.
It is about creating conversations and reaching multiple points of gravity. Gravity causes people to move and pulls objects toward it(readers & other bloggers).
It is not how many people you reach... rather... how many people of influence (that you care about) do you reach.
Nice blog post.
http://www.centernetworks.com/scoble-on-audienc...
I sure hope we get a chance to sit down and have a conversation sometime - maybe this year at SXSW as we only shook hands last year.
Maybe this year would be a good year to start a magazine. Heh.
On a somewhat related note, this is similar to my argument for the fact that search engine optimization is not all that important for most - instead, they should focus on creating value and community first, not on google traffic.
And when it comes to advertising, the niche thing seems to hold - it has not been that difficult to sell ads on my fashion/style blog (and I'm not exactly Vogue here) because like gadget blogs, those readers are much more likely to click and purchase. The point - some niches are just much more likely to attract advertisers than others.
I have three on here, giventosound.com and giventoscore.com in addition and whatever the subject, I always write from the heart and advertising or tailoring for sponsorship is not of interest to me.
If we write it, they will come. Reader spikes are nice but shouldnt be essential.
Counterpoints
1. Exclusive content? Maybe there is a REASON why no one else has that material. Start-up exec's running at the mouth on a narcissistic-personality-disorder streak isn't exactly high-dynamic material.
2. Conversations made up of what? If it's just the usual blog drama queen conversations, so much the worse, besides that has a shelf life measured in hours. Quality of the conversation is critical, not just marketing-dweeb manipulated into a fake buzz lather. If a poor conversation, next time around people will be that much wiser, not buying into the reindeer games. And if you abuse the product and conversations for so long, no one will listen, crying wolf too many times (i.e. Realplayer and others of that ilk).
3. Your niche might not be my niche. There is a whole world out there, limiting it to the blog puke or your narrow field of vision, isn't the all.
4. Credible and authoritative? Says who? You? Many differing sources of authority, and they can come from unlikely places. And oft times the MOST credible people aren't even in the limelight glare, you have to hunt them down. Good journalists know that. What's authority to you, might not be authority to me.
5. Size always matters, but returns and results do too, i.e. profit margin's. Basic economics. Things that stay forever niche, are stagnated and eventually salt-poison themselves out. A body of water, needs inputs and outputs, to remain vibrant. And audiences are fickle, one minute you can have an big audience, the next it's gone. Hoarding all the toys be not "elite", it's childish.
6. If no one listens, that doesn't make it art. Media empire always should look at audience size, demographics, programming scheduling factors and advertising results. Quality of product is default. Playing the socialist, "art for art's sake" games, 'fund me just because', will doom you to niche, followed by crash and burn. Quality should be assumed, if you even have to ask those questions, it's not there yet.
And where is the Google PR machine in this debate - if there is commentary from Google/YouTube, please point your audience to the their response - or please press them for one!
about 2 years ago, Susan Mernit and I were discussing audience and blog traffic, as I was very worried that my traffic was too low for my blog to ever make a difference...
Susan said something to me to the effect of that it wasn't how many people who were reading me, but *who* those people are...
So, honestly, I may *still* have traffic numbers that make me appear far less than A-list, but, but I know that I've got some *fairly* influential readers. The proof has been some really interesting freelance work over the past two years (not to mention my short presentation at Supernova and a few other conferences.) For someone with no formal journalism nor marketing background (unless you count 5 years in retail), I can usually generate one link per post and end up on Techmeme. Not too bad for a low-traffic "nobody" :-)
PS. Doesn't everyone know that bashing "The Scobleizer" is the best way to increase your stats... (^_^)/
great post! I have a smallish audience, but I do care about what content I have on my blog, I do care about my art! I would love to have it grow a bit more, but I am more concerned about how it comes off, and who it reaches than its size.
Do you understand the defintion of "counterpoint"?