And why it might pay to start posting about industrial descalers.
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| SEO spike: Yari pulls in the readers, at least on this blog. |
Bottom line is: If you’re serious about building a blog with genuine reach, start with a self-hosted WordPress.org setup from day one, like David’s own. Or, if technically adept, like Emma Goto, you could build your own static site.
This leaves the free and easy-to-use Google Blogger/BlogSpot solution somewhat out in the cold. The problem, David says, is visibility. Since Google tends to demote blogspot.com subdomains, you’ll get less attention, lowering your blog’s earning potential.
To which I’d add another beef: Blogger’s limited range of templates and design options won’t let you max out your mountain photography, as a more bespoke platform might. With similar effects on attention and earnings.
Before you brush off Blogger, though, you have to ask whether any of this matters. If it’s revenues you seek, then you need to blog about food, beauty tips, or technology. Blogs about hiking in Japan limit themselves to a niche.
And if you further limit yourself to just One Hundred (Japanese) Mountains, then you shoehorn yourself into a superniche. So costs need to be kept commensurably low. Which means that Blogger will do you nicely.
As for a blog’s look and feel, you might be better off with Behance, flickr, 500px and their ilk if photography is your main thing. You could even write a bit more under your images on Insta.
Or, to turn that idea on its head, you could use Blogger to write well-regarded photography posts without ever publishing an image. Andrew Molitor’s been doing (or did) just that for years.
What about attention? Revenues or none, there’s no point writing a Japan blog for the applause of just one hand clapping. Of course, it depends what you want to achieve. This blog, One Hundred Mountains, was started back in 2008 with a single purpose in mind – to find a publisher for a forthcoming translation of Fukada Kyūya’s Nihon Hyakumeizan.
Until then, we’d drawn a blank. About thirty publishers had been approached in the traditional way, via email or letter. But all found the book a bit too superniche. One said it contained too many obscure Japanese place names. Another quoted five thousand pounds, which seemed generous. Until it dawned that he wanted me to pay him, not the other way round.
Then a sample Hyakumeizan chapter was posted on this blog, during its very first month. This soon caught the attention of an American academic – thanks David F. – who sent over a list of about ten US publishers who he thought might be interested. And the first one on the list spoke for the book.
Always, you should be careful what you wish for. At a stroke, the blog was deprived of its prime reason for existing. And since then it has strayed hobbyhorsically off-topic, into realms as unrelated as cats, photography tips, and arctic expeditions.
Blog mavens counsel against such hobbyhorsicality:
“Blogs should focus on one topic to build authority, trust, and a dedicated audience, making it easier to monetize and rank in search engines. A niche focus allows search engines to understand your site's purpose, boosting SEO, while offering a cohesive experience that keeps visitors engaged and encourages them to return.”
Thus Google AI, no doubt riffing off many a human blogger's posts.
To which Project Hyakumeizan retorts, riffing off Tristram Shandy, that “so long as a man rides his Hobby-Horse peaceably and quietly along the King's highway, and neither compels you or me to get up behind him – pray, Sir, what have either you or I to do with it?”
In deference to Google AI, it has to be admitted that this blog’s most-viewed post is impeccably on-topic. This is Life and death on Japan’s Matterhorn, which concerns Yarigatake, probably the most prominent of the One Hundred Mountains after Mount Fuji.
But the reason for the post’s popularity has more to do with manga than with mountains: it features Katō Buntarō, the solo alpinist who posthumously became the hero of a best-selling graphic story series. Stands to reason that the blog’s second most popular post also concerns Katō and his soloist's philosophy.
Here’s the thing, though. The blog’s third most-read post, Legends from the Alps, doesn’t deal with Japan at all. Nor does it say much about mountains. It reviews an exhibition at the Swiss National Museum about folk tales and superstitions. Why this post should be so popular is entirely mystifying.
To which Project Hyakumeizan retorts, riffing off Tristram Shandy, that “so long as a man rides his Hobby-Horse peaceably and quietly along the King's highway, and neither compels you or me to get up behind him – pray, Sir, what have either you or I to do with it?”
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| Manga sell better than mountains... |
In deference to Google AI, it has to be admitted that this blog’s most-viewed post is impeccably on-topic. This is Life and death on Japan’s Matterhorn, which concerns Yarigatake, probably the most prominent of the One Hundred Mountains after Mount Fuji.
But the reason for the post’s popularity has more to do with manga than with mountains: it features Katō Buntarō, the solo alpinist who posthumously became the hero of a best-selling graphic story series. Stands to reason that the blog’s second most popular post also concerns Katō and his soloist's philosophy.
Here’s the thing, though. The blog’s third most-read post, Legends from the Alps, doesn’t deal with Japan at all. Nor does it say much about mountains. It reviews an exhibition at the Swiss National Museum about folk tales and superstitions. Why this post should be so popular is entirely mystifying.
It does suggest, however, that if you write something that interests folk, they will find it. Even on Blogger.
And here’s another thing about attention. You won't believe the number of hopefuls who try to post comments advertising their industrial descalers. Luckily, Blogger’s filters do a good job of screening them out.
And here’s another thing about attention. You won't believe the number of hopefuls who try to post comments advertising their industrial descalers. Luckily, Blogger’s filters do a good job of screening them out.
Then again, if you ever get bored of life in a superniche, you could do worse than to start blogging about One Hundred Industrial Descalers.
Success would be guaranteed. Yes, even on blogspot.com. Or do I mean especially on blogspot.com?
Success would be guaranteed. Yes, even on blogspot.com. Or do I mean especially on blogspot.com?
2 comments:
Thanks for the shout-out, PH, another thoughtful musing on this whole blogging game.
First and foremost, you’ve got to write about what you actually find interesting. In our case, that just happens to be mountains. And honestly, niche is exactly where you want to be, though maybe not too niche.
The trade-off, of course, is visibility. More mainstream topics will always win out in search, and even if we were writing in that space, some of our best posts would probably still end up buried on page three of Google, where few will ever find them.
That said, I do think the hiking niche here has expanded in recent years. One FB group-that-shall-not-be-named is pushing close to 90K members now and no doubt helped along by the surge in overseas visitors.
Well, the thanks are on my side, David. Your article introduced me to the concept of "Domain Authority" (which I previously thought had something to do with feudalism) and how to measure it.
When I applied the DA yardstick to this very blog, it confirmed that "One Hundred Mountains" has pretty much dropped out of Google searches altogether. Partly, I think that's due to the lack of topic discipline, as mentioned in the above post.
Also, as you observe, the vastly increased number of other blogs and posts on Japan mountain topics, most of which offer some kind of practical advice.
In addition, I suspect that the Google algorithm dislikes lengthy series of posts all with the same title ("A meizanologist's diary..."), as such titles don't give any hint of the underlying content.
So - in this case - the problem may be less with the Blogger platform than the way that this particular blogger goes about using it. I can only hang my head in shame ... : )
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