The power of ONE
June 11th, 2008
Voltron. The power of one big cat.
After reading this story on CNN, I thought about the upcoming Wine Bloggers Conference and the challenges and opportunities facing wine bloggers. There is an ironic parallel between the lay of the land in today’s TV and wine blogging: While television is seeking to move its entertainment content past the conventional and traditional medium and into the digital ether, many bloggers are looking to expand their brands, presence and visibility to the off-line realm and monetize in both spheres. In both mediums, though, there is an overabundance of choice, and the CNN piece suggests TV viewers may be feeling overwhelmed. Perhaps the same is true for seekers of online wine information.
This boom in wine blogging will undoubtedly be followed by some sort of settling or involution and (as discouraging as it may sound) a weeding-out process. That can have good and bad consequences. One argument would be that diversity of thought and opinion would be lost. Another would be that those left standing were “fit” enough to survive. I personally believe that there is strength in numbers and the loss of those who are currently minor players will be a detriment of the wine blogging genre.
And here I will commit what some wine bloggers consider heresy: As blogging is increasingly poised to be the next mainstream medium, I suggest that wine bloggers should consider consolidation. Why not take a cue from the wine industry itself? I don’t mean creating one global wine blogging conglomerate, but banding together in larger confederations on the basis of geographical locations, topics of focus, etc.
Sure, there is a possibility that individual (blogger’s) brands will be diluted or obscured. However, each of us who operates some sort of wine web site does so with a ‘beat’ or a niche in mind. How thorough can one blogger’s coverage of that beat really be? How much market share or web traffic can one single person gain blogging from a laptop while watching John Stewart (or not) after a long day at their ‘real’ job?
Consolidation (in the United Methodist way and not the Roman Catholic way) would not curtail originality. By potentially giving each member blogger more momentum and visibility, it may give them greater access to ways of monetizing their content. This seemingly communist model of a bloggers’ cooperative to monetize blogging is not my invention. It is already offered by several entities in exchange for content. Why shouldn’t bloggers band together to monetize their intellectual property without a middleman?
I agree with Gary Vaynerchuk, when he says: “Legacy is greater than Currency”. But (as counterintuitive as it may seem to some) consolidation, by giving more immediate monetary returns on content, would also allow bloggers to focus on the quality of their content. As Paul Stanley said in Decline of Western Civilization II - The Metal Years: “Money gives you the opportunity to not worry about money”.
A blog author suggested, some months back, that attempting to implement this consolidation concept is like herding cats. As much as I respect him, I really hope he is wrong.
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June 13th, 2008 at 9:13 am
I agree. There are many blog-sites that tend to say the same thing, but differently. Just like radio, there is alot of noise but not much content.
June 16th, 2009 at 2:58 pm
Anyone who throws out a Voltron reference is a friend o’ mine!
September 9th, 2009 at 9:00 am
[...] months ago, I wrote that bloggers should consolidate to increase their exposure and potential for revenue. A few months ago, I became involved in Palate Press, The Online Wine Magazine. In many ways, this [...]