February 11th, 2006
Zero Growth in US Blog Readership
The most recent Gallup Lifestyle Survey reports that growth in the number of US blog readers was zero, or perhaps even negative. But that probably isn’t as bad as it sounds given that the survey’s results also showed that Americans’ overall online habits haven’t changed much over the past two years.
Then there is the increase in time spent online recorded by Gallup (the number of people spending more that 1 hour online has increased), which they use to conclude that “…the online public is simply doing more of the same activities, rather than branching out and trying different Internet offerings. It is within this broader context of set habits that a rapidly expanding number of blogs must compete for readers.”
Well, I feel that the results are a good confirmation of a somewhat disturbing trend I first learned about when Nandini addressed it about a month back. Nandini’s post ends with the suggestion that blog network owners should:
…increase the readership-pie rather than concentrate on getting existing readers only. It is clear that 1 billions blogs also means 1 billion blog readers. We must encourage and nurture more and more bloggers, wherever they reside.
But while blog networks have substantial clout in the blogosphere (to the extent that they can change history), I believe word-of-mouth by bloggers to non-bloggers is the most effective way of increasing blog readership. We’ve seen this occuring for the rest of the internet, why not blog reading?
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1 Comment
August 7th, 2006 at 9:52 am
[…] But while everyone is going ga-ga over the growth in the number of blogs, let’s not forget that blogs are two-way things. We’re going to need more, more, more, and more readers to feed our growing monstrosphere - something that doesn’t seem to be happening fast enough. […]
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