Have Blogs Killed Conventional Websites?
An Interview with Andy Wibbels
It’s a question that’s been bugging me profoundly since I got into blogging a year ago. Blogs are cheap, easy, efficient, wildly easy to find on the Net, super marketing-friendly, and just plain fun. They work rings around websites.
So are conventional websites no longer necessary? To find out, I interviewed Andy Wibbels, the original blogging evangelist and author of the excellent new book, Blogwild! (Portfolio Books). Here’s the short version of what I learned.
Hear the audio download of this 18 minute interview (MP3) or listen here:
- Websites are clunky and expensive; blogs are lean and cheap. Here’s what a website costs annually:
| Hosting |
$132 |
| Design |
$800 - 2000 |
| Maintenance |
$600 + (unless you know HTML coding or invest in software to maintain it yourself, which runs $125 - 350) |
Here’s what a blog costs annually:
| Hosting |
Free to $110 |
| Design |
Free to $350 |
| Maintenance |
Free (unless you hire someone to do it for you, which isn't really necessary) |
- You have to wait for someone to make changes to your website; your blog can be changed easily by you.
If you don’t have html translation software like Front Page, or the know how to do it yourself, you’ve locked into using a helper to make changes to your website. Meanwhile, making changes to your blog is as difficult as typing a Microsoft Word document. Type it in, and it shows right up. Interfaces like Typepad and Blogger can be used by anyone.
- You have to wait for someone else to set up your site; your blog can be set up by you in 15 minutes.
If you can answer a few simple questions and click a few buttons you’re in with a blog. Not so with a site.
- You can update your blog at an airport, while you’re on the run. You have to call your webmaster … and wait … to update your site.
- You can collect email addresses, and download free reports and bonuses off of a website. Same with a blog.
- You can use a shopping cart to collect money for e-commerce of a website. Same with a blog.
- You can set up a press room with all sorts of cool links and forms on a website. Same with a blog.
- It takes three to six months for the big search engines to find you with a website. It takes two or three days with a blog. And some, like Google sites, are indexed immediately.
- You can easily track stats of who has visited your regular website. Same with a blog.
- The media are more likely to find you on a blog. 79% of them are reported to find all of their experts and sources from blogs.
- You can learn more about your audience from a blog. Every time you post, you invite comments to what you wrote about. And you get them.
- You market automatically with a blog. But not with a conventional website. Every single time you post, systems like Typepad send out a little message to the directories that you’ve put up a new comment (called ‘pinging’.) And other systems, like Feedburner, advise folks by RSS feed or email that you’ve posted. So you generate automatic traffic.
- You can make a lot more friends with a blog. You go on their blog and comment on their posts. They drop by your blog and comment on a post. You like their stuff and put them on your ‘blogroll’ – your list of friends. They do the same. Incoming links are set up to your site and theirs. That increases your search engine traffic … and makes life more fun.
The list appears to go on and on, but you get the picture. Blogs are, quite simply, the next wave. So if you’re thinking about setting up a site, stop in your tracks and turn towards blogs instead!
Want to reprint this article in your ezine, blog or website? Email Lorraine Carol for permission at lorraine@getknownnow.com.
She'll send along Suzanne's bio to attach at the bottom. Thanks!
