Why People Blog

I have been thinking a lot lately about the different motivations for blogging. Several articles and postings have brought this top of mind. What I have noticed is there are several different types of bloggers.

1. Bloggers for money. This is discussed in the current issue of Business 2.0 in the article "Blogging for Dollars". The article references sites like TechCrunch that bring in $60,000 per month in ad revenue! Now that's real money. What bothers me about this community is what's the difference between them and mainstream media? Both are building an audience for the benefit of profits. While the new media platform allows for two way conversations vs. the traditional one way editorial, blogging for money loses something for me. Once money is involved, it's a slippery slope from honest, unfiltered communication.

2. Blogging for page rank. This is where I place people like Robert Scoble . He hasn't sold out for advertising dollars yet, but he is extremely diligent about frequent postings and continues to grow his rankings. For me he posts too frequently and fills up my Google reader so I have to wade through the postings to find those that are most relevant. Recently he had a posting that seemed his popularity is both a blessing and a curse. Don't get me wrong, I think Robert is a great guy. When you meet him in person he is charming, engaging and "real". I just don't find his content as relevant to me and my interests.

3. Blogging to share your prospective on issues you are passionate about. This is the blogging community I value the most. It's people like Andy Lark, Pete Blackshaw, Max Kalehoff, Shel Israel that I enjoy reading frequently. They are relevant to me and discuss issues I'm interested in. For me, this is the real value of blogging. No commercial messages, no jumping internet ads, just thoughtful comments in a domain area they are experienced in.

4. Blogging to share with family & friends. This is the MySpace and Facebook crowd. A social platform for communicating with your friends, sharing pictures and posting notes that everyone can see. This is the world my 15 year old daughter lives in and where these is a tremendous amount of insight into consumers preferences and interests. It's a virtual world to communicate with your friends, find new friends and share personal interests.

For me, I live in the later two categories. I enjoy sharing my experiences for my friends and colleagues in a way that I hope to be relevant. Last week in the Wall Street Journal there was an article "No day at the beach" where they discussed bloggers so concerned with rankings that they can't even take a vacation. To that form of popularity I say "No Thank You!".

For big time bloggers that may run across this posting, you may think my segmentation is a "duh", but for many of my colleagues I'm on the leading edge of this new media. As I have had the opportunity to participate in the blogging community I have learned a lot about the value to me, to my business and to my clients. I enjoy sharing that experience with others. That's why I blog.