The Technorati Family Feud: Survey Says!
Technorati released its State of the Blogosphere for 2008. Being a survey of 1000 bloggers, a rather small sample, it poses more questions than 'facts' for me.
Let's start with gender.
The survey says more males are blogging.
And more men describe their blogs as professional, "about your industry and profession but not in an official capacity for your company"; while more women describe their blogs as personal, "about topics of personal interest not associated with your work."
As this matter of definition is purely subjective, I can't help but wonder about each gender's own bias here.
I did not see any information regarding the gender split in corporate blogging.
While women are more likely to seek to monetize their blogs, it seems they invest 50% less money in their blogs and make 50% less money in return.
However, women also stated they had benefited in other ways from blogging, with 9% more saying they had converted business leads from their blog.
Interestingly, women are said to have participated in more traditional blog networking (blogrolls, linking to other blogs, etc.) than men ~ including producing more content for other blogs. No number was given, but it makes me wonder about this in terms of blog investment...
Writing may be "free", but the sweat equity isn't noted in the discussion & in fact seems to have little payoff in terms of annual revenue. However, this sort of promotional writing could account for the conversion of business leads. I'd love more information on that area.
As far as topics go, Technorati calls them "diverse."
It appears that Technorati did not include "sex" (or "adult" or "mature") as a topic in their survey; I'd gather that with those choices many sex bloggers would identify their blogs as "Personal/Lifestyle" blogs ~ or use the "other" category.
"Sex" is still not listed as a response in the "other" category. I have no idea if Technorati opted not to include "sex bloggers", if they edited/censored such responses when they published their findings, or if there were too few "sex" responses to qualify for a mention. Those surveyed may consider their blogging part of another category. For example, sex workers may state "business", authors "books", and sex positive feminists who discuss sex regularly might classify their blogs as "political" or "media/journalism" just as others who are not sex positive might (may also include "religion" as well).
Or perhaps survey respondents with sex blogs who noticed the "sex" option missing felt stating "sex" would mean they'd be excluded from the survey data.
The omitted options for "sex" and the lack of stated identification as "a sex blogger" does make me question the survey responses. As sexuality is just part of a human being's existence, I wouldn't throw the survey out completely; just keep the omissions in mind when reading & digesting.
Which poses more questions...
For instance, as the most popular sex bloggers are, collectively, female (no doubt due to photos, descriptions of personal actions etc., which draw many male readers), what does the possibility of censoring/ignoring sex bloggers mean for the simple "more men are blogging" data? Does this account for the "more females have personal blogs" finding?
I don't know; I'm still mulling it all over.
In terms of privacy, only 1/3 stated a concern for their privacy; I believe this would likely be much higher among sex bloggers.:
Of those concerned about exposing their identities on their blogs, 36% said "other" ~ which included, "I've chosen to blog as a character." Maybe those with pen names, online identities, whathaveyou, answered the privacy/popularity questions from the point of view of being a character?
Now onto popularity...
There sure seems to be a connection between a blog's popularity and ad dollars, but this begs several questions...
1) If a Technorati Top 100 blogger is posting 10 or more times a day, with all the research & writing that implies, are the ad sales fair compensation for the number of hours a blogger works?
2) Are readers satisfied with such a saturation of posts? Lots of eyeballs do not automatically grant things such as loyalty & trust, nor translate into company endorsements & branding.
3) Are advertisers happy with their conversion &/or branding at these sites? Customer & potential customer impressions of the company /product/service are more important than number of ad impressions.
If all three are not satisfied the old "blog bubble" (at least as far as a business model) bursts.
For more anecdotal & theoretical conversations about this, I again refer you to Slate's piece.
Other tips included in Technorati's survey results: Technorati Top 100 bloggers are twice as likely to use tags in their posts, and they use the "news" tag more than two times as much as the next 500, and 19 times as much as the next 5000. (And, of course, their list of top tags for June does not include anything sexual.)
As for the results regarding branding in the blogosphere, there's a lot of chatter about how important bloggers think blogs and other bloggers are. I'm not saying I disagree with these findings, just that business might want to keep in mind that people within the group often are rather high on the group; your results may vary.
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Let's start with gender.
The survey says more males are blogging.
And more men describe their blogs as professional, "about your industry and profession but not in an official capacity for your company"; while more women describe their blogs as personal, "about topics of personal interest not associated with your work."
As this matter of definition is purely subjective, I can't help but wonder about each gender's own bias here.
I did not see any information regarding the gender split in corporate blogging.
While women are more likely to seek to monetize their blogs, it seems they invest 50% less money in their blogs and make 50% less money in return.
That ROI is something to think of when keeping things on-the-cheap ~ and far more informative than most of what is discussed in Slate's coverage of this Technorati survey, Blogging for Dollars: How do bloggers make money?. (That article is really a more theoretical conversation on popularity ~ which does affect ad revenues, but we'll get back to that later.)Global Bloggers by Gender
Demographics Female
(N=438)Male
(N=852)Personal Blog 83% 76% Professional Blog 38% 50% Median Annual Investment $30 $60 Median Annual Revenue $100 $200 % Blogs with advertising 53% 54% Sell Through a Blog ad Network* 16% 7% Have Affiliate ads* 41% 32% Have Contextual ads* 61% 73%
However, women also stated they had benefited in other ways from blogging, with 9% more saying they had converted business leads from their blog.
Interestingly, women are said to have participated in more traditional blog networking (blogrolls, linking to other blogs, etc.) than men ~ including producing more content for other blogs. No number was given, but it makes me wonder about this in terms of blog investment...
Writing may be "free", but the sweat equity isn't noted in the discussion & in fact seems to have little payoff in terms of annual revenue. However, this sort of promotional writing could account for the conversion of business leads. I'd love more information on that area.
As far as topics go, Technorati calls them "diverse."
Blogging topics are diverseYou probably see what I see ~ an absence of "sex" as a topic.Both personal and professional topics are equally popular. Forty percent of bloggers consider their blogging topics outside of these categories. “Other” blog topics include: 2008 election, alternative energy, art, beauty, blogging, comics, communication, cooking/food, crafts, design, environment, internet/Web 2.0, Jamaica, and media/journalism.
Three-quarters of bloggers cover three or more topics. The average number of topics blogged about is five.
There were some global differences. Music is more popular and politics is less popular in Asia, while personal, lifestyle, and religious topics are less popular in Europe.
It appears that Technorati did not include "sex" (or "adult" or "mature") as a topic in their survey; I'd gather that with those choices many sex bloggers would identify their blogs as "Personal/Lifestyle" blogs ~ or use the "other" category.
"Sex" is still not listed as a response in the "other" category. I have no idea if Technorati opted not to include "sex bloggers", if they edited/censored such responses when they published their findings, or if there were too few "sex" responses to qualify for a mention. Those surveyed may consider their blogging part of another category. For example, sex workers may state "business", authors "books", and sex positive feminists who discuss sex regularly might classify their blogs as "political" or "media/journalism" just as others who are not sex positive might (may also include "religion" as well).
Or perhaps survey respondents with sex blogs who noticed the "sex" option missing felt stating "sex" would mean they'd be excluded from the survey data.
The omitted options for "sex" and the lack of stated identification as "a sex blogger" does make me question the survey responses. As sexuality is just part of a human being's existence, I wouldn't throw the survey out completely; just keep the omissions in mind when reading & digesting.
Which poses more questions...
For instance, as the most popular sex bloggers are, collectively, female (no doubt due to photos, descriptions of personal actions etc., which draw many male readers), what does the possibility of censoring/ignoring sex bloggers mean for the simple "more men are blogging" data? Does this account for the "more females have personal blogs" finding?
I don't know; I'm still mulling it all over.
In terms of privacy, only 1/3 stated a concern for their privacy; I believe this would likely be much higher among sex bloggers.:
The majority of bloggers openly expose their identities on their blogs and recognize the positive impact that blogging has on their personal and professional lives. More than half are now better known in their industry and one in five have been on TV or the radio because of their blog. Blogging has brought many unique opportunities to these bloggers that would not have been available in the pre-blog era.And, I find the connection between "openly exposing identities" and "better known" murky. I'm certainly better known in both my personal and professional life; but the name on my birth certificate, my legal name, is neither Gracie Passette nor The Marketing Whore.
Of those concerned about exposing their identities on their blogs, 36% said "other" ~ which included, "I've chosen to blog as a character." Maybe those with pen names, online identities, whathaveyou, answered the privacy/popularity questions from the point of view of being a character?
Now onto popularity...
Technorati 100, Next 500, and Next 5000 comparisonsWhat's missing from the discussion here are contextual issues such as monetization &/or business conversions and intent of the blog. Without knowing those variables, how can we call a blog successful?We analyzed the Technorati index data to see whether higher-authority bloggers behaved differently from other bloggers.
Posting by Technorati Authority
Group Average Authority Avg Days Posting
(June 2008)Avg Monthly Posts
(June 2008)Top 100 6,084 23 310 Next 500 1,551 20 125 Next 5000 439 13 25 Blogs with higher authority are typically updated more frequently than blogs with lower authority. The Technorati Top 100 blogs had more than twice as many postings in June 2008 as the next 500, and more than 12 times as many postings as the next 5000.
There sure seems to be a connection between a blog's popularity and ad dollars, but this begs several questions...
1) If a Technorati Top 100 blogger is posting 10 or more times a day, with all the research & writing that implies, are the ad sales fair compensation for the number of hours a blogger works?
2) Are readers satisfied with such a saturation of posts? Lots of eyeballs do not automatically grant things such as loyalty & trust, nor translate into company endorsements & branding.
3) Are advertisers happy with their conversion &/or branding at these sites? Customer & potential customer impressions of the company /product/service are more important than number of ad impressions.
If all three are not satisfied the old "blog bubble" (at least as far as a business model) bursts.
For more anecdotal & theoretical conversations about this, I again refer you to Slate's piece.
Other tips included in Technorati's survey results: Technorati Top 100 bloggers are twice as likely to use tags in their posts, and they use the "news" tag more than two times as much as the next 500, and 19 times as much as the next 5000. (And, of course, their list of top tags for June does not include anything sexual.)
As for the results regarding branding in the blogosphere, there's a lot of chatter about how important bloggers think blogs and other bloggers are. I'm not saying I disagree with these findings, just that business might want to keep in mind that people within the group often are rather high on the group; your results may vary.
Labels: adult industry, advertising, blogging, commentary, culture, gender, news
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posted by Marketing Whore at
6:13 PM
2 Comments:
Damn girl, you know the stuff. Can we have some fun now :) No really, gracie, great post. More people need to look to you than pop culture icons. Best of luck.
Great analysis of the Technorati report. Only 1000 bloggers surveyed? From a statistical analysis POV, that report shouldn't carry any merit. Not without full disclosure of how the 1000 were selected and who they were. I'm not buying it as a legitimate report on the state of the blogosphere, at any rate.
Technorati, Digg, Stumbleupon - they can all be effective marketing tools, but they all seem to treat adult sites like a disease.
The adult industry has attempted to duplicate these social bookmarking sites, but all attempts are half-hearted or obvious attempts at making money.
Do you know of any adult social bookmarking sites that are similar to Technorati, et al, that are effective?
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