Why You Should Have a Blog in 2022 and Beyond? (And Focus Less on Social Media)

In this post, let's talk about why blogging isn't dead, why it's not yet late to have your own blog in 2022 (& beyond!), why we should actually have at least an official blog or website or Youtube channel, and why you need to focus more on making long-form content on your own blog and channel instead of focusing too much on social media growth. Updated on July 7, 2022 - added link to other people's bad experiences with Instagram.

Disclaimer: This is for those who are content creators (or planning to be one) as well as those who aim to thrive better in the influencer economy and get fairly compensated for the value they bring on brands instead of being contented on ex-deals/freebies. It's a different story if you're a shop owner selling aspirational products.

With traditional social media getting more and more crowded these days, several changes have been made in their algorithm (including their notification system) to lure people to stay on their apps longer, BUT only actually reward those who post often (quantity instead of quality), and those who engage in pay-to-win scheme (ads, baby lol!).

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Let's take Instagram for example. 

Instagram now is vastly different from how it used to be 4-5 years ago. Back then, it's easier and faster to see actual relevant posts and also for your content to be organically discovered.

Now, I have to scroll through either 1-2 sponsored posts or someone's non-relevant post for the day (I don't follow this person or account, nor am I interested in the topic-- why am I getting.. ahh another sponsored post) before I can see more relevant and higher quality posts of people and topics I actually follow that are worth engaging on.

And it's not just me: check out other people's horror stories about what Instagram has become these days.

Yo, Instagram... are you ok?! 

The fact that I'm getting suggested to follow MY OWN personal account in my gaming account lately, along with non-stop notifications that so-and-so has new posts, is just a clear sign of how Instagram is broken and now desperate to bring back the level of genuine engagement it used to have years ago.

Oh Zucc, what have you done to my favorite social media platform?

There, there...

Me-- Us -- being the product -- their product -- instead of customer, I'm not surprised that Instagram's own founders left. Though thankfully not all, but most of the people I had fun talking and sharing stuff with years ago have either deactivated or deleted their accounts, or simply just left, and moved on to establish their own presence elsewhere: their own blog or website, or their own Youtube or even Twitch channel.

But having social media accounts is still important, so later on let's discuss how to use them better.

TABLE OF CONTENTS I. Is Blogging Dead in 2022? Why You Should Have a Blog? II. Which Is The Best Platform for Blogging?      A. When to Use Blogger?      B. When to Use Wordpress.org?      C. When to Use Medium?      D. When to Use WYSIWYG Site Builders?      E. Are Serverless Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) Worth It? III. Why You Should Still Have Social Media But Use Them Differently

   

I. Is Blogging Dead in 2022? Why You Should Have a Blog?

Is blogging dead in 2022? No. Blogging isn't dead -- and will never be, because people always have stories and helpful content worth sharing to others. Having your own blog or website is actually still one of the best ways to get discovered too.

Believe it or not.

There had been a notable shift from traditional blogging to social media -- and then to podcasts and now to videos. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't blog anymore, or that it's already too late to start a blog.

Before, I mistakenly thought that it's ok to grow and produce content on social media than spend time crafting blog posts if you're trying to be a social media influencer or aiming to be some beauty, fashion, travel, or some other gurus. 

I mean, it sure seems easier and faster to do so and see instant "results".

The dopamine rush of getting new likes and followers on social media, and better yet, coveted sponsorships (never mind that most just pay you with freebies instead of actual money), are surely encouraging too.

But are those "results" enough?

I was wrong.

A. The Power of Search

If people want to search for something: a product review, a travel guide, a cooking recipe, whatever it is -- what's the first thing that comes to mind?

Google.

Well, a few privacy-savvy folks use Duckduck Go -- which is powered by Yahoo Bing. 

The point is that they're traditional search engines. Not social media.

Even Youtube is actually more of a search engine than social media.

The majority of traffic for all my sites -- including this blog, comes from search engines. 

There had been rumors that Facebook is improving its own search engine. But since they have this closed eco-system similar to Apple's which requires one to sign up and sign in an account first, in my opinion, Facebook is gonna have a hard time competing with traditional search engines.

There are forums too like Reddit and Facebook Groups where people can ask questions, but they're more hit and miss really -- sometimes you get fair proper answers, oftentimes just biased opinions.

Though some social media posts can show up on search results, it's blog posts and Youtube videos that rank more often.

Case in point for this small blog ^^

It hurts but that well-edited photos, well-crafted descriptions, and well-curated feed on social media? 

Easily forgotten and swiped on. 

Unless they reach the viral stages like memes or pet photos or get featured by aggregation accounts (usually these are also memes and pets accounts), our social media posts have a very short "shelf" life, compared to a blog post or Youtube video when, who knows in the future: a trend, a share, or some algorithm change just suddenly make it suggested to more people and make it blow up.

Even if it doesn't (and hoping for virality is never a great strategy), it's better to choose a more SEO-friendly platform so that when people search for something related to your content, you have a higher chance of getting discovered.

And that brings us to the next point.

B. The Power of Algorithm

Even if you don't rank on search right away, or at all, you still have a high chance of getting discovered through being Suggested.

Search engines are constantly improving their algorithm so the more relevant and useful your content is to other people, the more they get recommended to others either through Search (like the featured snippets and answers) -- or through Youtube, if you vlog or create video content too along with having a blog.

It's highly recommended that blogging and vlogging go hand in hand if you have the time to do so because there are shameless web scrapers that steal either video or written content and make one or the other and pretend that it's their original content even if they merely copy your blog post or closed caption verbatim. 

It also gives your audience a nice option of which type of content they want at the moment: written or video form.

Google Panda and Penguin recent updates in the past few years also penalized a lot of websites that participated in Black Hat SEO backlinking schemes, content farms, and private networks. If you know you can provide in-depth valuable information for other people and don't engage in those shady tactics, you have more chances now of getting your content discovered and even ranking on Google.

Assuming those websites and blog owners who participated in those schemes have given up by now, then there's even less competition in running a blog, compared to trying to get discovered on social media, especially ordinary people don't even bother maintaining a blog or running a website.

 Less competition = less noise = less difficult to find valuable content

Sure, it feels nice to go viral on social media though. But having your own platform like your own website or blog that will benefit from that virality is way better and keep people engaged, hold their attention longer, especially we don't know until when a certain social media app will last (remember MySpace and Vine?).

And speaking of attention...

C. The Power of Attention

Unless you livestream on social media like Tiktok, IG, or Facebook, there's no denying that regular blog posts including the ones on Medium, as well as well-edited regular videos on Youtube hold people's attention longer than regular social media posts.

Longer attention = more time and emotional investment from your audience =  more connection

This is why when you see a blogger or Youtuber or streamer, you don't usually actually see them as this untouchable celebrity on some pedestal. You see them as someone relatable, like a friend. 

Sometimes a brother or sister even.

A family.

This is why, in general, it's actually easier to grow organically in your social media (and have regular Twitch viewers too), once you already have a certain audience from either your blog or Youtube channel (or if you're just really popular in real life).

Except for social media like Tiktok thanks to its "burst" algorithm.

Also with the exception of certain niches too like those that are into adult content and focused more on using social media like Instagram to grab attention and funnel the audience into some pay-walled services (you know what I'm talking about lol).

I guess it also explains why most social media posts tend to focus more on being aspirational, instead of being relatable like in blogging and Youtube. Social media is perhaps the best way to market something that is being sold traditionally, instead of marketing someone's content in a blog or channel.

Having social media is still important though for content creators and we'll talk about it in the 3rd section. 

First, let's take a look at which platform is the best for blogging.

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II. Which Platform Is the Best for Blogging?

Though a lot of bloggers and website owners recommend that you should pay for your own hosting to have an official valid platform for blogging so you're not at the mercy of some tech giant, unfortunately using paid hosting services subjects you to the mercy of some service provider already -- whether they will provide hosting at the least downtime and most secure way possible, it's all up to them! 

Also as mentioned above, we're all at the mercy too of the search and discovery algorithms.

Harsh, but true. 

So it really boils down to finding one that actually matches your needs.

A. When to Use Blogger?

Blogger lets you take advantage of having free Google hosting, which again I find more reliable than other hosting especially it has almost 0% downtime.

Speed is another factor too especially on the mobile version. Google already added an option to select a more optimized theme for mobile. They have completed moving Blogger a few years ago to their new Cloud Spanner, so that definitely helps with speed and security too.

Speaking of security, you also automatically get free SSL even if you use a custom domain as long as you use Blogger itself to host your blog. 

I'm actually using Blogger to host this blog and the most important reason why I chose to do so is that I don't have to worry about backdoor security. 

Google takes care of that for us.

Of course, we still need to be careful in managing our passwords, avoid phishing scams, and be careful of suspicious scripts hidden in themes or ads that load malware.

You are screwed the moment your website has these kinds of cookies. I've seen this in someone's hacked blog. Needless to say, she gave up on blogging already and funnily enough went on to rage in social media about why blogging is a scam. Sad.

Sure the people who tell us that we can install a bunch of plugins in WordPress insist that our site is already secure enough. But the moment you get lenient in updating to the latest version of WordPress, or if you're like me who only knows basic IT, you won't be able to fully defend yourself from security problems enumerated here.

You can also use Google Search Console to check for any security issues on your site by typing the following on your search bar:

https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/security-issues?hl=en&siteUrl=REPLACE-THIS-PART-WITH-YOUR-WEBSITE

Lastly, Blogger also has a one-click button to easily integrate Google Adsense in your blog later on if you choose to include that as part of your monetization.

Related Post >>> How to Get Approved for Google Adsense

Overall, when you use Blogger instead of hosting your own blog somewhere,  you don't have to worry too much about the things mentioned above and can simply focus more on writing content.

You don't even have to worry too much about promotion either since:

1. as long as you format your blog post correctly (right headings and subheadings), 

2. have valuable content (again, Google's AI is getting smarter and can differentiate sheer spam and legit content),  

3. your content is something that people actually regularly ask or search for (and find valuable enough to share on their own social media feeds, so they help market for you instead of doing it all by yourself)

4. and you use a website theme that is speed, SEO and mobile-friendly

Your blog is already automatically search-engine optimized and it's just a matter of time before your content is discovered.

Of course, it's not instant. It depends on your content, supply-and-demand in the market, and site niche and authority.

But as they say in the Law of Attraction: time, like money, is an illusion too.

The When doesn't even matter if you're blogging for the right reasons and in it in the long haul anyway.  

The rumored downside of using a free blogging platform like Blogger is not being seen as "professional". 

But that's just a matter of blogger pride and personal opinion because professionals like Dr. Ernest Chan of algorithmic trading, Mr. Larry Greenberg who summarizes everything I need to know about the currency market for the week, as well as Mr. Marc Chandler who regularly provides a comprehensive analysis of macroeconomic news and events: they too still use Blogger up to this day and that in itself doesn't make them any less professional.

To reduce the risk of being mistaken as a spam site though, I highly recommend setting up your own domain.

Disclaimer: The link below is an affiliate link that gives me referral earnings when you sign up but at no additional cost to you.

I use Namecheap for my domains -- I've been using them for 3-4 years now. They're highly reliable and accommodating with their 24/7 live chat customer support, as well as free WhoIs Guard already bundled in your order if you choose to buy a domain from them. So far, no horror stories or any major issues with them *knocks on wood* (just had a forgotten password issue in one of my accounts, which was resolved quickly after contacting live chat support) so I highly recommend them!

Affiliate Link: >>> Get your next domain or transfer your old one to Namecheap

 

The real downside of using Blogger though is if Google suddenly one day decides to shut it down like Google+ and others. 

Though they will give a heads up months before, it sure is a hassle to move hosting providers while making sure that the transfer doesn't impact your ranking and SEO (hard to tell really despite using the same domain).

But that's least likely to happen at least in a decade's time because Google itself use Blogger as its official blogging platform.

Another real downside is if your content involves very mature or adult themes and other topics that are against Google's Terms of Service.

Overall it's best to use Google's Blogger if:

• you simply want to blog right away without too much hassle, especially when it comes to speed, security, and search engine optimization
• you're new in blogging or a very busy person in real life (or both)
• you don't feel the need to add some database in the backend
• you're not trying to convert your blog into some e-commerce business (or you have a separate e-commerce site like Shopify or a landing page for your business already)

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B. When to Use WordPress?

If you're running a large business and want a website for it, or are already experienced in blogging and planning to transform it into some scalable business, and have the technical know-how to run a content management system (CMS) such as wordpress.org, then, by all means, go for it.

If you want to create a very basic website for your business, there's an option to do so for free using Google My Business.

Most long-time bloggers out there advise newbies to start with Wordpress.org right away.

Don't.

Unless you know what you're doing, you can easily get screwed, like some people I personally know, and get a headache from experiencing the security issues mentioned above.

Hackers love targeting Wordpress users. Be warned.

However, these are the benefits of using wordpress.org:

• has access to the .htaccess file which you can use to easily create 301 and 302 redirect links
• assuming you self-host your WordPress blog in the same hosting site and never change your domain, you don't have to worry about moving, screwing up your domain authority, and risk losing traffic
• you have full control of your website, say whatever you want without having to worry about being censored (unless you're into affiliate marketing -- the ad companies will actually prohibit you from talking about sensitive topics)
• ability to create dynamic pages (such as fortune teller tarot sites, if you're into that) and other things PHP can do that HTML can't

Also if you don't mind the regular cost of self-hosting a WordPress site which ranges from the cost of a cup of coffee to the cost of weekly groceries, and you're really into this in the long haul, then choosing wordpress.org is the way to go.

Its market provides several widgets which you can easily add to your website -- but do be careful though and still try to manually check the codes for any questionable scripts injected there and other security risks.

Speaking of security, you also need to pay for SSL, unlike Blogger which provides it for free. However, you can get free SSL here, and you can follow the steps here.

To check if the SSL works, you can run a test here. 

It's also recommended to have a domain provider separate from the one hosting your site so you're not at the mercy of one company. 

Also contrary to what most bloggers out there suggest, DO NOT host your blog to any of these EIG brands. 

Do so at Your. Own. Risk.

When you search "How to Start a Blog", you'll often see hosting sites being recommended under EIG -- the main reason is their highly competitive affiliate rates.

But do these bloggers even use what they heavily promote?

I highly doubt it.

Budget Hosting

If you want peace of mind and on a budget, you might want to try SiteGround instead. Long-time serious bloggers and webmasters swear by them, and they're not bought by EIG.

If you like more speed, they suggest A2Hosting -- also not under EIG.

Another option is Namecheap. They're not bought by EIG (and no plans, thankfully). They started out as a domain business a decade ago (and I personally prefer them over GoDaddy), and have recently branched out to hosting. I haven't tried their regular shared hosting, but I am currently using their Easy WP cloud hosting on another site which is a managed WordPress hosting in the cloud which is so far really good and reliable too.

Pricey Hosting

For those who don't mind spending on a reliable hosting or VPS being run on the cloud, you can first try out the new Google Cloud. It's more secure, has less downtime, and similar to the notorious Facebook-- Google is just too big to fail.

I'm not sure if they still have that 1-year trial to host your WordPress site for free or not anymore (I don't see it anywhere now), but they do still offer that $300-worth credit for any add-ons you might wish to use.

Though you can also use Amazon Cloud as a host or VPS, and also gives a free 1-year trial, it's only for static sites and isn't recommended for Wordpress.org.

Another alternative is Digital Ocean. It's been around for a long time (one of the OG hosting companies out there), and companies like Hewlett Packard, LinkedIn, Samsung, and Xerox use it. You can also resell it as shared hosting and run your own hosting business.

All these suggested hosting overall are a little pricey compared to the EIG ones, but rest assured you won't get a headache from constantly being hacked through your site's backdoor and other hosting scams.

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C. When to Use Medium?

Blogging in Medium can be a good option-- in fact, a better one -- if the type of content you write about isn't something that many people regularly search for in search engines, like boring technical stuff about say, coding lol, or a certain style of writing like storytime, or certain niches that usually fall under psychology, motivation or even law of attraction.

Medium has its own recommendation algorithm that is kinda similar to Youtube, which actively suggests your posts to readers who are most likely interested in them, instead of readers actively searching for them.

However, to grow on Medium and have more people actually read your content especially if they're not something people actively look for, a lot of seasoned writers on that platform suggest joining and getting accepted in existing publications there to gain traction faster, especially if you're also aiming to join and earn from its partner program (be sure your country supports Stripe payments though since there's no option to receive earnings from Paypal or check there -- at least during the time of this writing).

You have to submit original blog posts though and pre-publish for these publications instead of merely reposting your content from your own blog.

You can't repost the content you publish for them in your own blog though, or else your own blog will take a hit for duplicate content.

It should be the other way around.

Contrary to what I initially thought, reposting on Medium won't actually get your blog penalized for duplicate content as long as you use its built-in import tool that automatically adds your blog's link as a canonical link.

I still believe in this insightful article though that it's not a good idea to use Medium as your main blog. If your niche or topic is not something that a lot of people search for and you don't have much experience or time in maintaining the back end of a website, fine. Medium it is.

Unless you get accepted in big publications with active readers and gain active readership too as well, Medium still isn't a great way to drive traffic to your site because despite having the ability to add your website link there, readers are more interested to go to other articles in Medium itself. 

Articles are curated in a way that the main focus is for readers to stay in Medium longer, instead of veering away from there and going to you.

What about its import tool and SEO impact?

In theory, it seems like reposting content there using the import tool can help boost your blog post's ranking and SEO if it so happens that people stumble upon and engage with your reposted content there.

But I've never personally reposted content in Medium though -- not yet at least. I'm a regular reader there so I kinda have some idea what types of posts "work" -- and unfortunately the type of content I post here in my own blog doesn't seem to fit in the typical Medium audience that's why I'm still on the fence for a few years now.

But we never know until we try.

I don't know if I'll ever bring myself to test some old blog posts, and see if reposting them there will help boost readers here in this blog: as of the time of this writing, I only get 9k-15k views a month -- let's see if that can double and be the same as Benji's blog mentioned above -- or even more.

That would be nice.

But also wishful thinking.

Unfortunately, another major concern for me is which one will actually rank on Google: my original blog post or reposted Medium content? 

It already initially felt highly unnerving to see a simple Reddit link to my blog ranking higher on Google (i.e. my Jollibee custom content lol). However, I took a sigh of relief when Google finally eventually indexed and ranked that blog post higher. 

I don't know if that's gonna be the same case in Medium or not, especially since it's not just a title with a link like in Reddit, but actual content reposted -- there's just no way for me to beat Medium's site authority.

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D. When to Use WYSIWYG / Drag and Drop Site Builders?

If you're not good at coding but don't want to spend for a web designer, and want an easier and safer way to customize your blog or website than both Blogger and Wordpress.org, then WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) site builders can be a good option, like Weebly, Wix, and Squarespace.

They have certain limitations though with the level of customizations you can do without coding them yourself -- they're definitely an upgrade from Blogger but fall short compared to Wordpress.org.

If you know how to code and design a website well, it's pretty much a waste to use them unless you want to save time and enjoy ready-made templates that you can easily access and customize on your own.

WYSIWYG site builders are like Canva, Blogger is like Photoshop, and Wordpress.org is like GIMP or some other open-source editing software out there.

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I personally haven't tried Squarespace but I'm shocked to learn that there's no capability to add more cookie banner options and even filter your blog posts. 

With Weebly and Wix on the other hand, they are relatively ok. But the biggest drawback is the lack of options and support in case you want to migrate your blog to another hosting provider, unlike with Blogger and Wordpress.org. 

That means creating your blog or website again from scratch.

Ugh.

That's all after spending a lot to upgrade to their paid versions not only to remove their annoying banners and have more customization features but also to have the basic ability to add your own custom domain.

Aside from that, there's also the headache you get when their servers seem down or their backends are just plain glitchy or laggy -- at least that was my experience 5 or more years ago. I don't know if that's still the case now or if they've massively improved through the years.

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E. Serverless Hosting (aka Content Delivery Networks): Are They Worth It?

There's a (relatively) new kid on the block called CDNs or content delivery networks.

One of them is Netlify.

They are sometimes called headless CMS because they are technically serverless. The way I understand it, these networks automatically form a cache of your site and don't have to request info from the server where your site is hosted every time someone visits your site from anywhere in the world.

Hence, they pride themselves on being blazingly fast.

.
But these CDNs don't support PHP, because they only support static sites-- HTML and CSS. However, there's a workaround in case you need dynamic elements in your blog or website by using Javascript.

You can launch a new site or blog in Netlify by simply dragging and dropping here.

Easy peasy, lemon squeezy.

If you also want an automated version-control of your site, you can connect a Github or Gitlab account, and use Netlify's CMS instead. This part got me stuck for now though because Git is new to me, and Gitlab's FAQ page isn't very non-developer friendly. So I create my own backups manually instead and continue manually dropping in the link above every time I change something on my site.

Netlify has a Youtube channel too with videos that I find easier to follow.

Though I'm only a hobbyist when it comes to web design, blogging, and such, I like tinkering around there especially I believe CDNs will become the next big thing in web development.

Update: This is ok for purely static websites or mere landing pages only. Avoid Netlify when your main focus is blogging because Netlify creates multiple versions of your blog including mobile versions, and you can get penalized for having "duplicate content". Plus it can get too technical at the backend if ever you need to troubleshoot something.

If you're like me who wants to focus on blogging itself and don't have enough mental energy to deal with web dev details that seem more complicated than setting up a wordpress.org site, especially there's also social media that you have to deal with, just don't even bother with this.



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III. Why You Should Still Have Social Media But Use them Differently

There are countless blog posts and videos out there promising to help you grow your Instagram, increase engagement on Facebook and boost followers on Twitter. 

Do not, I repeat, DO NOT engage in shady tactics like engagement pods and buying followers and likes. You're better off running ads instead -- at least you're on the good side of these social media platforms and you don't risk getting banned.

A. Building the Right Mindset in Growing Social Media

Doing any fake activities also harms your brand especially when people see that you have a lot of followers but very few engagements in your posts.

This is actually one of the reasons why sometimes you don't wanna go viral on social media either especially if that content that went viral has little to do with your branding and is vastly different from what you regularly upload.

Case in point: I have shared a post on my Facebook page that went on to get 5M views (and counting now), and (shamelessly lol) helped me double the followers I've gained through livestreaming -- from a humble 5k to jumping all of a sudden to 10k in just a matter of 2 months! 

(As of the time of this writing, I now have 13k followers even if I don't livestream anymore because I now want to focus on highly edited content: initially on Youtube, but looking forward to uploading on Facebook too once again).

But those follower count actually harms my image or "branding" since I can easily get mistaken as having just bought them because my regular videos only get thousands of views on average-- some even just stay in hundreds, depending on the type of game or topic, as well as video length.

It's not all bad though because at least I got approved for the Story swipe up feature where you can put links in it-- great for announcing that I have a new Youtube post or custom content, and also promoting other people's content if I like them enough. 

Overall, trying hard to grow your social media to funnel audience to your content like blog post or Youtube or Twitch channel is the wrong tactic to do: it should be the other way around. 

Except for Tiktok! I'll talk about that below in a bit.

I learned that the hard way especially, as I mentioned in one of my posts, I actually started on Instagram, before having my own channel (thanks to my S.O.'s advice) and then eventually expanded to having this blog.

It's a different scenario though if you're trying to market your shop or some paid services you provide. 

But for now, let's focus on social media connected to blogging and also vlogging as a bonus.

The proper way to grow your social media account is the way actual celebrities and influencers do it: either by being popular and influential in real life or consistently sharing valuable content on their own platforms like their own blog or Youtube channel, and let the search and discovery algorithm and their new fans help do the "marketing" for them too.

They merely use social media to better engage with fans or online friends who are loyal (or obsessed) enough to follow them across different platforms and also make announcements whenever they have new content or merch released. 

If you have that type of loyal fans or friends (or both!), you don't have to worry about growing your social media: they just grow organically over time, with high engagement too!

If you create enough valuable content, these social media sites are even the ones that approach you to create content for them and help keep people longer on their sites.

Even companies who want to sponsor you will actually start fairly compensating you like they do with usual influencers and celebrities, instead of giving you the short end of the stick by convincing you to only accept ex-deals aka freebies (more so if they demand multiple revisions in your sponsored post).

Emma here has a very useful guideline how to price your sponsored content better.

B. Why Even Bother to Use Social Media

Leveraging social media is actually a great alternative to outdated e-mail marketing.

A lot of gurus out there swear by the efficacy of e-mail marketing and I know that this isn't a popular opinion, but:

E-mail marketing doesn't work as much anymore.

Yes, e-mail is still helpful as a means to get people to confirm that they've officially signed up for a certain webinar, or confirm the delivery of a certain product or service. 

BUT using e-mail to find cold leads? Nah. 

Aside from harming your brand by being pushy and annoying, your e-mail barely gets read and is usually marked as spam. 

I personally don't read any marketing e-mails for the past few years especially since I'm already constantly bombarded with sponsored posts on social media and rarely open my emails unless I get really important notifications. 

I thought only fellow millennials and Gen-Z hate it, but it turns out that even my parents and older ex-office colleagues don't read those e-mails anymore.

A lot of marketing gurus out there still swear by e-mail marketing because you're able to get hold of people's e-mails and perhaps even other contact information -- which I know a lot of marketers (and scammers alike) want to get hold of and some even pay for that.

In the event that your blog or website gets pushed down or punished by search engines' algorithms, or that your social media accounts get taken down or *knocks on wood* get hacked and disappear overnight, at least you still have people's emails so you can contact them about your announcements and any other updates.

But that is assuming your audience read your emails. Once again:

People barely read their e-mails nowadays.

Usually, we just open and read it when there's a notification about any security issues, or when there are major interesting announcements about big platforms or brands we use like Google, Unreal Engine, Medibang Paint, and the likes.

Thrilled about receiving this email last time. But my followers kept commenting about the time I received this email instead lol.

Also when there are any webinars we signed up for or deliveries we're waiting for, those are the only instances we care about opening our emails -- and we barely even read them, just a quick glance and off we go scroll away in chosen social media for a few minutes, lurk to our favorite Youtube channels, check out the creators' website or merch shop for any new posts or sale, jump back in a group chat or Discord channel or "troll teh forums" over at Reddit, perhaps even watch a Netflix show or 2, or listen to some podcast, audiobook or music.

So what do we do now as backup?

Host your main website or channel (or both!) to a different provider. Invite people to join your Patreon, Discord or Viber community (it's a whole new headache managing a community though so I tend to shy away from this -- for now). 

You can also create a 2nd social media account. That's what a lot of young savvy people do nowadays. Some even create a Finsta account where they post more real, candid photos, and limit their access to their close friends only to avoid obnoxious meddlesome parents, relatives, and other boomers creeping in and trying to meddle with their life.

Even Kendall Jenner has a Finsta account called @pizzaboyzzz to share her love for pizza (relate much! Even this website's icon used to be pizza too lol! But decided to change it because annoying conspiracists blemished pizza's wholesome reputation.)

Pizza by Pablo Macedo

Pushing people to sign up and join your marketing list, especially most people's inboxes are already overflowing is not only annoying but also borderline desperate.

You don't wanna look desperate.

You're better off focusing your energy on your blog and channel and telling people to bookmark your site in their browsers and even on Pinterest, and subscribing to your Youtube channel instead. 

Nice if again, they follow you too on social media so they get easily notified of any future updates regarding your content and other soon-to-be projects you have in mind. (Yey!)

A lot of gurus advise that you should only select the social media where your core audience hangs out the most to not spread yourself too thin -- which is a valid point!

But the thing is, you're not really making extra effort in actively growing your social media anymore by posting at an ideal time, and all other "ideal practices" to be in their algorithm's favor (unless it's directly part of your monetization strategy too like earning "passive" income through ads in Facebook if already eligible, or through selling merch, or through the creator fund being offered by Tiktok and Instagram for example).

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Be on different social media as much as possible, not only to serve as an opportunity to meet like-minded people (and perhaps even early fans there) and additional venue for sharing updates but also to have an official account early on to minimize possible issues that may crop up if ever you get popular enough and scammers out there start making fake "official" accounts (this is the usual issue I see with tarot influencers). At least you can prove to that social media platform that you're the first and official one. 

However, save your time and energy by producing better content on your main sites, on top of any other business you're in. 

These days, it's all about enticing people to come follow you instead of you chasing them.

Speaking of enticing people to follow you, here's where Tiktok, Youtube Shorts, and IG Reels come in.

C. Leveraging Short Attention 

With the disappearance of Vine, Tiktok now comes in and taps that underserved audience: people with short attention spans and those who are very busy and just have a few minutes to spare on social media.

Unlike the traditional modes in social media, the way the algorithm works on Tiktok -- and its equivalent in other platforms, namely Youtube Shorts and IG Reels, is a whole new different beast.

But basically, since it's relatively new, they're enticing its users to use them by rewarding them with burst views (at least as of this writing). 

This is totally different from what's discussed in Section A above where you barely get any eyeballs and traction unless you already have an existing audience somewhere else and they're following your social media too. 

Or run ads. That's what these platforms want.

But Tiktok -- and its other spawns -- are different.

It's a great way for budding content creators and music artists to get discovered.

You can even have additional means to get monetized through their creator funds for eligible countries, or through the number of plays in your music if you're a music artist.

Some may argue that since the audience there mainly are those who barely have enough time to spare on you and your content, then most likely it's not worth getting bothered posting there too.

But not everyone there is actually like that (that includes me lol). I've seen a couple of YouTubers, shop owners, musicians, and webcomic artists who grew faster thanks to Tiktok, Youtube Shorts, and IG Reels.

Related Post >>> Everything You Need to Know About Youtube Shorts

The more eyeballs the better -- another great backup too and a better alternative to e-mail marketing.

That's the core essence of the influencer economy nowadays. Yes, social media may be gone tomorrow but you don't wanna be intrusive of people's privacy by snatching their e-mails and constantly bombarding them without even knowing if your content is still relevant for them a few years down the line.

Let people find and follow you instead.

Also use social media better, and most importantly have your own space on the internet.