But I Don’t Want To!

“Sir, is it really necessary to blog three to five times to week as we have been told by so many?” I began our weekly conversation.

“Do you have a problem with that Watson?” The Effective Detective asked in return, with that annoying habit of answering a question with another question.

“At times, sir, it can be difficult to come up with interesting and engaging topics so often,” I ventured.

“And of course the time involved,” The Detective finished for me, with a slight grin. “Watson, you are describing a problem that plagues many of us. The direct answer to your question is: No, but.”

“But, what sir?” I knew better than not to ask for clarification; it was going to come anyway.

“But, if you are not going to blog at least three times a week, and be constantly marketing your blog to possibly interested people, you need to be doing something with it,” The Detective began, and then continued on before I could interject anything, “You see Watson, blogging as a way to get, shall we say, known, is by itself an impossible task. There are millions, if not hundreds of millions of blogs out there, and the only way yours will get noticed is if you go out there and strenuously market your blog to others. In a way you need to market your blog as ferociously as you would your business. The question then of course, is why shouldn’t I just market my product or service and forget the blog?” The Detective paused at this point, giving me, quite deliberately I might add, an opportunity to interject.

“Indeed sir, why blog at all then?” I said, opening the door for him.

“Ah, Watson, you know the answer as well as I do, but quite polite of you to allow me to finish the thought. The blog itself can become your content! In fact even if you are blogging three times a week, you can still use those entries as content without overwhelming your followers. To start, let us assume that you wish to blog only once a week. Perhaps you are lazy, or more likely as in our partnership, we tend to go into detail on a subject, and would prefer not to bore our readers. If you are using one of the more popular email marketing programs out there – indeed if you are not, you are already woefully behind in the game, then you almost certainly can feed your blog entries to it automatically, format them as you do your regular correspondence with your subscribers and have them sent out shortly after you create them,” The Detective paused, a fact I was thankful for, since I had a burning question at that point.

“But, sir, why not just write the message directly and send it out to the list?”

“Watson, think! If you create the message as a blog entry, it is out there for all time, for all – not just your list, to see! As you get known, there will be a wealth of information for others to review, which can then send them to your list! Not to mention the potential for a book based on that content. I must give a caveat though. If you do have the inclination to blog multiple times per week, you should be considerate of your readers and set up your email system to only send out entries when there are several ready to go. This way you can still use the blog as content but not overwhelm your list with emails,” The Detective concluded.

“Sir, do you think we will ever go to multiple conversations in a week?” I asked.

“We will have to see what people desire from us Watson. Now on to other work,” The Detective said, concluding our conversation.