The Role Of Blogs In Social Media

For some reason, many new to Social Media act as though blogs don’t exist. While the number of blogs has not diminished, there’s a lot of anecdotal evidence to suggest that the vast majority of people who “do” social media, don’t have a blog of their own or contribute to a blog.

(As an aside, if you’re interested in learning about the history of blogs and blogging, check out Scott Rosenberg’s classic book called Say Everything. Here’s my video interview with Scott:)

Indeed, this is a pattern I’ve noticed with people I know: they’re quick to post a photo or a comment on Facebook, but tend to ignore blogs, even Tumblr. Tumblr’s a lost opportunity that many Internet Marketers turn a blind eye to, if they turn an eye at all. Most people on Facebook don’t seem to use Tumblr or Twitter or YouTube or Tout, unless they’re under the age of 25. Since I’m generally considered to be in that age range by behavior, my extensive use of Tout.com and Tumblr has to place me in that category.

Here’s Tout:

And blog platforms like WordPress and Blogger are almost foreign to many of the people I’m thinking of. The idea of using a blog as part of a social media strategy is lost on them. Googling “blogs social media strategy” yields more content consisting of “social media strategy blogs” than any instruction on how to use a blog in social media. The lack of good, sound, expressed thinking in this area is alarming.

How To Think Of Blogs In Social Media

The best way to think of blogs in the role of social media is as a key market for search engines that then leads others to your social media content. It takes your “closed loop” social media content and makes it part of an “open loop” system. In other words a person doesn’t have to be your Facebook friend to find the information.

In my case, each blog I run is connected to a Twitter account, and in some cases a Facebook Page. This assures that the content I blog about is basically “picked up” by at least two other social media platforms: Facebook and Twitter. And since my Friend Feed stream also has my Facebook and Twitter content, and my blogs too, the content is repeated there, as well.

This is an important method to increase the chance your content is seen – even if it’s just the title. The moment someone sees the title of what you wrote, you gain an “impression.” Logically, having your blog connected to social networks in the way I describe is to increase the possible total number of impressions generated by that content.

So, let’s say someone sees your impression and elects to click through to it? That means they’ll reach your blog, where they have the option of reading more about the information you present. That’s better than just a photo on Twitter, and also assures that the content will be seen by various search engines more often because, with the social media links, the click activity will cause your content to rank higher in search.

(Assuming that the search engine is designed along modern and generally accepted methods. I must add that there are real-time social network search engines, like my current favorite, SocialMention.com, but they’re not at all widely known and used as of this writing. Moreover, the integration of social network content into current search engines is being done, but not in the whole. There are strategic partnerships, but no widely used method that changes the nature of search as of this writing.)

Blogs Are Real Estate For The Internet

In short, a blog is your key piece of Internet Real Estate. It’s a house or building you own that marks where you are in this vast World. Obviously having more than one blog helps spread your message and considering that content is monetized today, basically more wealthy – even if your blog’s worth just $10. Every blog out there has some monetary value.

And that brings me to my next point: a good, well managed, and regularly updated blog can enhance your Twitter and Facebook followers and friends experience, and in turn make the blog more valuable. Ad advertising banners or affilate marketing links, and you have a pure revenue generator that can grow to be worth as much as a bricks and mortar business – if not more.

Consider that some of today’s top blogs have fetched purchase prices as high as $30 millon for TechCrunch. Mashable was rumored to have been nearly bought by CNN for $200 million, but it didn’t happen.

And Mashable’s Twitter following is, as of this writing, over 3 million people. The question is, does it throw off the kind of cash to justify such an expenditure?

Well, believe it or not, here’s where having an integrated blog and social media platform approach helps increase overall value, yet again. How? Conferences and parties by the blog.

As Mashable has grown, a key part of their total content formation approach has been produced conferences. The blogs serve as a central place for the announcement of these meetups, and social media amplifies the message that they’re happening. Then, the social media platforms act as a way to let followers know “something’s happening” – and if Mashable elects to write a blog post on what’s happening as it happens, that becomes part of the search engine blog content search or news feed as well.

In closing, having a blog and properly connecting it with social media platforms where you have a page creates your own efficient publishing service, capable of being the catalyst for the next viral video.

Many think that posting a blog takes a lot of time – it does not. You don’t need to write the next great novel. Indeed, there’s a general view that more short blog posts are better because you can write more searchable content within a given time frame. (Just look at TMZ.com) Practice writing posts that are not more than 200 or at best 300 words. You’ll eventually learn to write a clear, short blog post that does the job of communicating an idea that’s then seen in search, and on social media platforms.

Do It Yourself Media

In an era where we’re bombarded by content, it’s just plain stupid to beg others to make your content for you, thus risking that they may not give it high priority in promotional efforts. Nope. This is the time of Do It Yourself Media – DIY Media. The way for you is to establish a blog and “hook it” to every social media platform you’re on, and then find the appropriate smart phone apps so you can blog and work your social media content from anywhere.

Get to work!