Is Blogging Dying?

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Are blogs really dying?

Is it still worth it to be “spin our wheels” spending hours upon hours writing great content, when viewer’s attention spans are shrinking to infinitesimal levels?

This is not a new question but it recently has come up again.

Someone recently said you can’t build a business today with text and images and expect to win.


The Facts in 2019

Attention spans continue to shrink. The same strategies that worked before no longer work because blogs are dying.

They say we need captivating ads. And mediums that provide more instant gratification. It’s the only way to capture your audience’s attention and convert them into customers.

They mentioned that trying to grow a business today without this skill of ad writing and effective creation is like trying to run a race with heavily weighted concrete shoes on.

You will be left in the dust.

Even standing out on YouTube is getting increasingly much more difficult. Like never before.

Ageism in Blogging

Is there ageism in blogging? Perhaps blogging has become generational.

For example twenty-somethings prefer the short quickness of Instagram and Snapchat but someone in their 40s through 70s prefers a longer form blog post.

What worked even a year ago no longer may work. There's too much noise out there. Even writing product reviews (that used to be a big thing) won’t work as much anymore.

Can We Live By Blogging Alone?

Do you really feel that blogging is something that can dramatically alter your success? Or do you feel that learning how to implement effective ads creation is something that could be a turning point for your business?

If we are only blogging are we giving ourselves every advantage we can?

Forget about optimizing, if we are only blogging by writing great content are we even monetizing efficiently? Or are we shortchanging our success?

Can we live by blogging alone?

Should we not be investing dollars doing more ads?

Is Blogging Dying? Do We Need a Better Strategy?

They say this is why we need a different strategy that works in 2019, not 2016. We need a sure-fire way to capture our audience’s ever-waning attention and convert them into customers starting right now.

Readers not only have shorter attention-spans, they have become more discerning.

There's high growth in video on YouTube and the spoken word via Podcasts. It’s very similar content to a blog post but executed in a different way.

Devoid of low quality pictures on Instagram, wobbly shots on YouTube, and a plethora of decent sounding and high quality and well-written podcasts captivating our attention, how can captivating well-written blogs even compete?

Which is why even the pundits say inevitably that bloggers cannot last the test of time.


What are your thoughts on this.

Will blogging eventually (if not sooner) become obsolete?


Please feel free to leave some comments.

Cheers,

Kaju

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Recent Comments

168

Thank you for your insights! I agree with your premise that blogging is dying somewhat due to the factors you mentioned. We morphed our site into an educational training resource that we lead people to using youtube and a weekly podcast on itunes as well as social media. This seems to be a better conduit to build trust with our readers. I am in the health and fitness niche and there is so much misinformation out there that is given the same weight as good info leading readers down a path of ignorance and not enlightenment.

Smart moves Stacy, thanks for letting us in on this!

You Tube and Podcasts are the rage these days, people want to their content in smaller and quicker morsels.

Instagram Stories where you create a video of a max. 15 seconds is IG's most popular and engaging tool. Then the IG Stories video "vanishes in thin air" after 24 hours, a concept IG stole from Snapchat.

We live in such an ephemeral society, most people especially the younger generation have little patience, interest, or time reading long form information. They want it FAST and cut to the chase quick.

There is too much noise out there and information "overload".

Thanks for a great comment!
Kaju

You are welcome. I appreciate the sophisticated post. I am fortunate that my hubbie Is a prolific health & fitness writer and has been in the game for over 30 years working for multiple publications from Weider (before sold) to The Washington Post (online show) to several other smaller outfits. His body of work is huge & when googling his name he occupies the first 3 pages of google & the first page of YouTube. WA has been such an incredible resource for me to learn how to leverage this presence.

I was just looking at the IG stories feature to figure out how to plan to use that as a tool for future promotion.

I agree with you on how people are currently consuming content. We were doing a weekly show via FB with video, but transitioned to an iTunes podcast which is easier to produce and fans like it more.

It is hard to rise above the noise to get ideas out there when everyone is considered an expert.

Thanks again for an interest post!

That's our great challenge Stacy, we ALL need to "rise above the noise".

Good luck with your business, it sound like you have "hit the ground running."!

Kaju

Hi Stacey, great to see you and hope your business is going well:)! Here's a great Tokyo story for you on my new YT channel:) Send me your YT link and I will Subscribe. You can Subscribe to my channel here:)

http://bit.ly/2T21P2N

If you don't yet, I will happily return the favor when yours is up.:)

Hi Kaju,
Have you ever watched an informative video and looked for a transcription of it?
Although I agree with the premise of your post (attention span deficit), the natural curiosity of people when given a juicy morsel of motivation, will and has always overcome their attraction towards it. (ASD)
So, in essence, based on the skill of the blogger and the value they're presenting. There will always be a market for problem solvers in all the formats.
Hope this helps

Cordially
Dedo

Hi Dedo,

I certainly hope you are right. I would love to think that based on the skill of the blogger and the value they're presenting, blogging will always be here to stay. And we can continue to monetize off this medium.

After all, if not why are we working our a**s off writing so much content then?

But I am a realist as well. I see the attention spans shrinking to nil, and videos (and other mediums) taking over, and I begin to see why others are gravitating toward other more efficient channels.

Then I think of the LP record, the CD, etc.....all ending up in the tech "junkyard save a few nostalgic enthusiasts.

Hi Kaju,

Your post got me dead on my tracks. I exclaimed, "Finally, someone from the Top 50 posted this! I was waiting for someone from here to post this type of controversy here."

In the multi-level marketing groups that I was once part of, they were discussing how they are changing the way they write their emails---making them shorter than ever! A practice that most WAers abhor. Here, I see people writing book-length e-courses. lol

(You can laugh at the network marketers, but truth is, they're making money out of their emailing style, thousand dollars per week)

But...

Like I said in one of my replies here, "Different strokes for different situations".

To be honest, yesterday, I was in a blog post about penis enlargement. It was a 6,000 words read and you know what? I finished reading the post, to the last word! lol

😂😂 Ohh the honesty!! Love it!

You are dead-on GOM!!
Long-winded journalistic essays simply can't cut it anymore", or rarely will at best. Attention spans are TOO short.

The network marketers got it right. Keep it short and simple. We live in a 160 character society where information is traveling before us at lightning speeds.

Hey, you can't argue with those who are consistently pulling in the "moolah".

But hey, you are right also that "Different strokes for different situations". Long form content can still engage, but the content has to be IRRESISTABLY ENGAGING!

LOL!! It's not a surprise that "penis enlargement" got the FULL 6000 word read. I would have completed that read too!

FABULOUS-nesSSs!!!

Thanks so much again JesusGirl:) Check out our great Tokyo story as well as my Efren match win video play by play:)
Send me your YT link and I will Subscribe. You can Subscribe to my channel here:)

http://bit.ly/2T21P2N

If you don't yet, I will happily return the favor when yours is up.:)

Unfortunately, things continually change, so flexibility is key--typewriters were once king, then computers, now phones! What's next?

Jeff

Yep, I think you are on to something here, Jeffrey. The only constant is that change will always happen, and obsolescence will occur.

Let's slow it down though, I still love to blog!

It seems people will search for information on YouTube more often in the future.

That's already happening right NOW Melani. I hope videos don't totally "take over" blogging. I still love to read!

Thanks again Melani:)! Here's a great Tokyo story for you on my new YT channel:) Send me your YT link and I will Subscribe. You can Subscribe to my channel here:)

http://bit.ly/2T21P2N

If you don't yet, I will happily return the favor when yours is up.:)

I very much doubt blogging will ever die as people are always looking for information online. Providing you use captivating headlines, solve a problem , and follow with an enticing call to action you should be get visitors reading at least some of your posts

I certainly hope you are right, Kathy. The written word is still my favorite medium. Thanks for an excellent analysis:)

Yes.
It's all dying.
Let's close WA and move on.

---------------------------------------------------------

And nobody left.
Why?

Because content marketing still works.
Because people still read.
Oh, and books by the way are also still alive. (2019 - just in case)
And a small but very alive community of DJ's is still working with real records.

Cheers,
Tim

PS: I'm sure I'm not alone with that: I like to read and skim over texts. Almost impossible to do with videos, which are very often unnecessarily and artificially made "long".

PPS: Oh, and another small remark: What is taught here at WA is SEO, not necessarily "blogging" in the sense of an online diary, right?

I totally agree with videos being made unnecessarily long for nothing...my method now is to record them and skip the blah blah...

Excellent comment Tim, true on all counts.
I wrote a blog post here, and it holds lots of relevance to this conversation, and the analogies to DJ's who spin records you make....

That's a good idea Denis, shorter videos work better anyway....
Again, its due to those short attention spans of people.

It is crazy, indeed.

I used to say "shorter than a monkey's attention span", but actually we overtook goldfish these days...

Cheers,
Tim

Yep, spot on!

Thanks again Obdude:)! Here's a great Tokyo story for you on my new YT channel:) Send me your YT link and I will Subscribe. You can Subscribe to my channel here:)

http://bit.ly/2T21P2N

If you don't yet, I will happily return the favor when yours is up.:)

Interesting food for thought. Years ago the optimum was 500 words and then everything shot skywards and 1500 became the minimum. That made we wonder about attention spans in this age of instant gratification. I write my blogs for a very specific audience and refer them to it as part of their treatment. Even so Google informs we my readers spend the average of 90 seconds on the posts. I assume they skim read the material looking for nuggets or else they have all done a speed reading course!
Alister

Haha. Maybe. Graduates of speed-reading courses.

This was the point I was pushing around here before. I was telling people, "What if we're wrong?". But then, the gurus came up with high earnings report saying, "I got all these dollars from writing 3,000 words and above!". That made me quiet and with my head nodding in agreement. "Maybe I should write that long, too."

Great thoughts Alister, the attention spans are definitely shrinking. Thanks!

Yep I heard those same reports Coach. But what I see out there sometimes in r real-time conflict with eh reports. Confusing, eh??!

Thanks again Alister:)! Here's a great Tokyo story for you on my new YT channel:) Send me your YT link and I will Subscribe. You can Subscribe to my channel here:)

http://bit.ly/2T21P2N

If you don't yet, I will happily return the favor when yours is up.:)

I agree that just like books, maybe blogging is becoming less popular with a certain demographic. However as you point out, there is always those (like me ) who like the feel of a book, the experience of it. I also love reading blogs.

I agree attention spans are shorter, the world is getting busier, maybe people, won't spend (or have the time) to sit still and read the longer blogs we now have to write to satisfy google.
However I believe there still will be those who will, if the writing is good quality.

I think there has always been that appeal of the other social media channels. A quick motivating picture, or quip. I agree youtube is only going to get bigger and that is a direction most of us should go. But I believe it is always wise to diversify, so a strategy of 'not all eggs in one basket' is the only way forward, for us to future proof our businesses.

Great post, thanks for making me think and now plan for my future : )

Excellent comment Sara, Thanks!

I certainly agree with you, "... I believe it is always wise to diversify, so a strategy of 'not all eggs in one basket' is the only way forward, for us to future proof our businesses."

Let's keep an open mind and be willing to change with the winds:)

Short answer = no

Long answer = noooooooooooooooooooo

Thanks Dale, I like the long and short answer. Can you give us some reasons?

There will always be a want for information or documented experiences & blogs provide it... They are absolutely not going anywhere & the alternatives you mentioned are not replacements, they are just complimentary channels.

Sometimes you want bite-size information... Sometimes you want detailed information - but there will always be a want for both.

Agree.

Different strokes for different situations. There are times we're not looking for a book-like post. But, there are also times that we wanted to get "detailed explanation" before we finally spend money buying something.

Complimentary channels is the essence of this response🙂

Great answer Dale, Thanks!!

Excellent advice Coach! (I see you changed your name??!!)

Nice one, Denis!

Thanks again Dale:)! Here's a great Tokyo story for you on my new YT channel:) Send me your YT link and I will Subscribe. You can Subscribe to my channel here:)

http://bit.ly/2T21P2N

If you don't yet, I will happily return the favor when yours is up.:)

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