Visibility Week

Update: Robert Scoble weighs in:

Yeah, the thing is, I have given up trying to link to everyone. That's impossible for one person to do. And, it's unneeded anymore now that we have Feedster, Pubsub, Technorati, along with the whole tagging thing.

In fact, I believe that my blogging style will become irrelevant very quickly. It's just not sustainable unless all you do all day long is blog blog blog and that's really not my passion. I enjoy meeting people face to face and having conversations.

Me: Aren't blogs a conversation?

End Update.

I guess I am not the only one fighting the Long Tail Black Hole.

Ethan "Effern" Johnson has an interesting experiment going on called "Visibility Week" where he is exploring the issues around enabling new voices in the blogosphere. He's got some interesting observations:

• Prominent bloggers are rated as such based on the number of inbound links that they receive.
• Prominent bloggers often have a blogroll, and listings on these blogrolls are prized by people who want an increase in traffic to their weblogs.
• As I mentioned in my previous post, true “whuffie” comes from receiving multiple links from the same source.
• Blogrolls are a passive link delivery system, compared to links that are used in the context of a blog posting.

Ethan also goes on to play with pubsub's new tool comparing the number of inbound and outbound links to a blog. Take a look at Seth Godin and Robert Scoble and you'll see where all the links go. Then there are people like Doc Searls that give and receive quite equitably. Then, there are the rest of us that give a lot more than we receive.

Along these lines, I think the problem is that we are all giving to people that don't appreciate the gifts. Linking to Rober Scoble (or Seth Godin) is like giving Bill Gates $50 for his birthday. 

So, what is needed to change this?

I have a few ideas, but I'd like to hear from others on this.

Comments

[paxton]

I hate to be the bearer of bad news Pete. But this is the part of the movie where you are forced to accept that content IS king. The people that are getting the crazy traffic are either content producers or mavens; please forgive my moving from long tail on to tipping point here, but you’re focused on the wrong catch phrase. It’s just that simple.
You can’t blame Seth Godin for being first on the block to publicly bust up internet marketing, or just the most vocal depending on who you talk to. And until you or anyone else comes up with bigger and better ideas (content), on a consistent basis, or become the first to report on someone else’s genius you’re forced to sit on a lower, albeit still higher than most, level of the totem pole.

[peter caputa]

Now, we're really mixing up the posts. Great points, Buck. All true.

The only distinction I'd make is that I am not blaming Seth Godin or Robert Scoble. They've earned the right to be were they are. I don't expect Seth Godin to start linking to you and I just because we linked to him.

What I am saying is that Seth isn't the only one with very very smart things to say about marketing. And he is certainly very good at coming up with great metaphors and entertaining antecdotes that get ?his? points accrossed.

The problem that I see is that many people continue to link to Seth Godin even though he'll never engage most of us in a conversation. Taken one on one, your posts or my posts are just as good as his. They reveal something unique. But, his posts get 20 links and ours get 1 if we are lucky. Why is that? Because we let these people stop the conversation.

It is like going up to the same pretty girl in the bar every week. With persistence, she might go out with you. But, you might meet 5 nicer girls if our attempts were made on better targets.

It is the same thing with music. Since I've gotten involved with the Netmixer, I've been listening to Kaz, Cookie Eatin Satan Haters and other local band's mp3s. There are great musicians around here. But, they don't go anywhere. Why? Because they are playing to the same damn people every week. And noone comes down here to "develop" the musicians unless they can put you on MTV and sell a million records. But, the record labels/promoters/the system stops the conversation.

What if we stopped letting them? What if we woke up and realized that a one way conversation with Seth Godin wasn't as productive as a one way conversation with Seth Goldstein. In fact, I've already decided that. The issue is how do I find out about Seth Goldstein unless he stumbles upon my weblog and sends me an email?

If I were to make an analogy to sales, linking to Seth Godin would be like me trying to sell WhizSpark to stadiums and arenas. Not gonna happen. They think they're all set. They don't need me.

So, what do I do? I'll call-on/converse with the people that are interested in me and that are on my level.

We have to go out and find the right people that are interested in the conversation.

I have to go out and find people that are 1) interested in the same things that I am (Like both Seth's are) and 2) which is more important: I need to find someone that is interested in talking to me as much as I am interested in talking to them... like Seth Godin isn't (he just can't feasibly talk to all the people that are linking to him).

If we all do that, then things will happen a lot faster for all of us.

[peter caputa]

Oh.. and I am still picking "ad technology/networks" over content in the longer short term. Will you give me 57:1 odds?