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Sometimes we as voiceover business owners are so focused on the operations of our business, the business of doing business, we neglect to paint our stores and sweep our steps.
The âstores and stepsâ references our web sites. We often look at our sites from the back of the house instead of standing out front and looking at what the visitors see.
A while ago I wrote a blog post about checking out what your web site looks like by going to electronic retailers and calling up your web site on various computers, tablets and phones.
While that applies to web sites, that advice also applies to blogs.
Iâve had a blog since 2005 and in those 12 years, Iâve written a lot about voiceover, marketing and advertising (over 1,300 posts). Thatâs why I named the blog voxmarketising. In all those posts there are some real golden nuggets and some absolute crap. Trial and error, baby!
But one of the areas of blog management I had fallen way behind in was managing all the links I had listed on my blog to all my fellow voiceover bloggers. It was my way of sharing the blog love by listing their blog link, in the hopes that they would do the same. Some did, some didnât.
But recently, I did a complete review of all the blogs I had listed on my site to see what blogs were still active and what blogs had given up the ghost.
Over 80 (EIGHTY) voiceover blogs were just cut from my web site because they hadnât published in 3 or more years or because their bloglink just went nowhere any more.
There were probably 10 or so links that needed to be updated and they have been.
But 80 dead blogs was an amazing number.
Why so many? Based on what I saw and what I know, here are my theories
- Some folks started blogging about voiceover because they thought they were supposed to for better web traction â they had no desire to blog and no point of view in their writing so they just quit
- Some people clearly didnât not make it in the VO business — so why blog about voiceover when one is now selling life insurance?
- Some folks just got bored with the process of blogging
Sure there may be a myriad of other reasons and all of them are legitimate. Blogging is not mandatory in the voiceover or any other business (unless youâre in the blogging business, then I suppose itâs pretty mandatory.
But does blogging help or even impact a voice talentâs business? That depends.
From a broad perspective, blogging should help a voiceover talentâs business for SEO. If one is blogging about their industry, using a widely accepted blogging platform like WordPress (either as a blog or as part of an overall web site), that alone should generate attention from search engines like Google and Yahoo.
Digging down a little further, if a bloggerâs content gains enough interest from a targeted audience and the blogger builds up a dedicated readership, that subsequent attention also generates positive SEO notice and builds the credibility of their brand and reputation.
So SEO is the only reason to blog? No, but itâs a big one because depending on what you write, you may enjoy some unexpected organic word search success. Sure you can buy word search, but organic is less financially cumbersome.
I think in voiceover, there are primarily two types of bloggers â thought leaders focused on SEO (and listening to myself, âer, um THEMSELVES speak) and then coaches who want to sell services and also enjoy some SEO love. Neither is bad. Blogs are a marketing toolâŚjust decide what you are marketing what your audience wants to hear.
But what if you arenât a coach and you donât think you have a thought that worthy enough to lead anything? Should you still blog?
Thatâs a personal question.
Blogging requires some sort of commitment. Obviously time but, maybe more importantly, thought.
For bloggers, I think the smart foundation for having a blog should not be âwhat CAN I write aboutâ but rather âwhat do I WANT to write about?â. Because if you donât have a real desire to write about something at least about 6 times a year, then blogging is not a tool for you.
Donât worry, there are other marketing tools, but blogging will not be one of them for you. 80 of my voiceover peers, many of them well known to voiceover community, found that out the hard way. It was not the end of their careers, it was just the end of bloggingâŚ.for them.
For the rest of us…full steam ahead.
P.S. If you check my blog page and see I’ve gotten the wrong link for your site, you can contact me at peter at audioconnell dot com. Of course, you DO have a link to my page on your blog site, right?!
P.P.S. If you have a voiceover blog that I do not have listed on my blog site and you would like it listed there (and you’re going to offer me a link to my blog as well) please let me know.
Tags: blogs, branding, commentary, marketing, voice talent, voiceover, voiceover advice, voiceover blog by peter k. o'connell, your friendly, neighborhood voice-over talent
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