May 15, 2005
blog as if your life depended on it (for the next three months, anyway)
Back in February, I linked to a rather encouraging post from Tom Peters:
Blog As If Your Life Depended On It!
Blogging, I firmly believe, is the premier emergent marketing-brandbuilding-lovemarkcreating tool of our times! It is the premier way to have intimate-engaging-informative-WOWing “conversations” with Clients and prospects! This all goes double for small enterprises and niche enterprises; and goes triple for the Professional Services; and works wonders in the Public Sector as well.
So if Tom’s life depends on it, why did he decide to cut back on blogging, 3 months later? What, has Tom reverted to typical “Do as I say, not as I do” consultantspeak?
Heh. Probably not. I know where he’s coming from. Life is messy. Been close to giving up myself, more than once. Most bloggers I know well have also said the same. Sometimes real life takes over etc.
The reality is, blogging is hard, even for famous business gurus like Tom. It’s like figure skating– it looks easy, but it isn’t.
Expect a corporate backlash against blogging in about six months, once all the meatpuppets who read the recent Businessweek front-pager start finding this out the hard way.
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I remember when I first started out (3 months ago) — ‘Blog as if your life depended on it!’ were words of motivation and Tom Peters blog was one of the first on my RSS aggregator.
Now that TP’s blog has been deleted (the man is clever but I want to hear from him not his minions) I understand that my blog has been a great exercise in understanding my ‘space’ and creating conversations and contacts. It has been incredibley hard but so fruitful and educational.
At its root blogging will succeed if the focus and purpose is right — if a backlash does come it will be from people who like you describe, haven’t the time or patience to invest.
“Expect a corporate backlash against blogging in about six months, once all the meatpuppets who read the recent Businessweek front-pager start finding this out the hard way.“
Heh, grownups having sudden revelations that getting good, winning, etc. requires hard work, ain’t that funny, really
Just back from 104 hard, uphill kms on the bike, still probably going to be beaten in next Sunday’s timetrial. Have to increase training… I’m thinking… ahh, if I only had the time… sigh.
there is more to life in cyberia continent, than blogging.
blogging, podcasting & social boomarking will be hyped for while and than like the platimium decinium of the dotcoms be normalised and like ben & jerry are bought by unilever.
may the hype be with you!
SOON, “Blog” will be a dirty word. Expect the corporations and media to make it out to be the NEXT papparazzi or gossip columns…
Blog As If Your Life Depended Upon It… because it may change your life forever.
And lose a girlfriend.
But then you’ll have a coffee in West Village with a Swedish blogger who pinged you because he liked your blog and he was in town. And then you’ll come up with new ideas together and those ideas may change your life forever.
Keep up the good work; we need you.
Blogging backlash??
With all the recent hype about blogging, we are definitely going to see a spate of corporate blogs over the next few months. As well as negative commentary when blogging isn’t as “easy” as it seemed. Not surprisingly, some will
Business Blogs Explained
Hugh at GapingVoid is not only one funny SOB, he’s also wicked smart. Reach him explain why blogging matters/works and you’ll see what I mean. And he’s not afraid to discuss the tough realities of blogging either. Also worth looking at: The Seven Busi…
Blogs are conversations.
If you have someone else speaking for you,
why would anyone want to listen?
Hugh gets it. Tom Peters, for all of his talent, didn’t.
Authenticity is as important as originality. Blogging is different than old media.
Well, to be fair on Tom, David, he’s got an insanely busy life, flying all over the place. My day-to-day is far more low-impact (for now), which in blogging terms gives me a considerable advantage.
Like I said, real life sometimes takes over. And blogging’s not for everybody. The fact that it suits me well is no reflection on somebody less suited to it. We all have different tools in our toolbox etc.
Agreed.
Everybody needs down time.
Just be careful not to constantly say,
“Pay no attention to the man behind the curtains.”
Blogging, the opportunity engine
Hugh MacLeod’s “Blog as if your life depended on it (for the next three months, anyway)” is worth a read. Applicable here as well — I’ve been at this for about three months now, and just like Tom Peters, I can see myself slowing down. It’s not becau…
Ummm … while agreeing with a lot of people that yes, everyone needs downtime, and life is more than blogging, technology, or gasp! the web … we also need to remember that blogging is much more an underdog strategy to hit it big than an established titan’s strategy to — um — still hit it big?
I chat about it here:
http://www.gilgamesh.ca/?p=263
I am also discovering that blogging — both the (hopefully) creative activity and the logistic exercise of sitting at the PC and DOING it — is not easy. BUT if you see some benefit (and I already do) and you still think it is a good idea, why wouldn’t you find the time to do it — even if it is less frequent than before (and less frequent than you would like)?
As DK and David mention above, I started reading the *Tom Peters* blog, not to hear from others, but to hear from Tom — even if it isn’t frequent.
Still — “let he who is without sin cast the first stone…”
The porous membrane
When should you stop blogging?
If you are Tom Peters, you stop blogging because blogging took over your life. Sounds OK to me. Others stop blogging because they run out of things to write. Also sounds OK. Then there are a bunch of us who seem to blog like there was no tomorrow. It h…
Guess I’ve been skating on thin ice for more than year now, but I confess I’m still not weary. There are times when I have to be away but not for long and when I do return I do so with the proverbial vengence.
Hey Hugh, yes, life does seem to get in the way. I blogged a lot more when I was shutting down a company and looking for work! Then work came along and of course, I started pushing for my new company to .… yes, start blogging. So I should be back at it soon, both on the personal site and hopefully on the corporate site. But I have to say that there is a lot of fear and confusion in the company about “how to do it”. Funny.