Really, it depends. Some people say they don’t have time. There is a hyper-overload of stuff to consume online. Are we really getting to the point where we have no attention span?
I still read blogs that are useful to me. I use Flipboard to discover content or I receive an email alert, I don’t proactively check because…. there is too much to consume. Sometimes if I feel like I am getting too many emails and the info in the emails are not useful, I unsubscribe. I get fickle.
Some successful entrepreneurs stand by blogs. A good friend of mine, Jennifer Ballard is case in point. Jennifer has been consistently blogging her wedding photography site since 2009 and gets tons of business from it as she can showcase her work and the blog ranks high for SEO.
Back in the day, blogs relied on SEO optimization and RSS feeds for people to discover and read their blogs on a consistent basis.
For anyone who is new on the scene, content is discovered differently now:
- Through news aggregators
- Through your own mailing lists
- Others sharing your post on social media
- Inbound links from other blogs
The way people consume content has changed too. People still read content and they also are very receptive to video and podcasts. Someone may be able to read a blog post at work and not video or listen to podcasts only on their daily commute. Changing up the way you speak to your audience can help with engagement:
And frequency? The more you post, the better your exposure/how others perceive you. This can be hard (ahem, I am speaking about myself) as life can take over. There are tons of ideas all over the internet in finding content ideas.
Back to the main question though, do people really still read blogs? Yes, they do. Blogs for businesses are seen as valuable for customers to self-educate and here are the top 50 list of blogs about any topic imaginable. The way people discover blogs though has changed.
