 | Bob Gabordi is executive editor of the Tallahassee Democrat and Tallahassee.com. He can be reached through this blog, at bgabordi@tallahassee.com or (850) 599-2177 |
You are reading this at this very moment in one of two ways: old media or new media.
Maybe you clicked on the link from my Facebook page. Maybe you follow me on Twitter – if not, I hope you will: @bagbordi. Maybe you stumbled across me on Tallahassee.com or are one of my regulars and have me bookmarked. Maybe you look for me on our fancy iPhone app.
Or maybe – and is this is where it gets interesting – you are reading me in the newspaper on words printed with soy-based inks on recycled newsprint.
Here’s the point (and thanks for your patience in waiting): It doesn’t matter. You are here and we’re connecting and that’s all I was trying to accomplish. It is as simple as that.
What’s the point in spending time writing if no one is going to read it? If you are in business, another way of saying that is if the people you need to read it aren’t reading it, why are you doing it?
I spent part of my weekend listening to lots of good advice (and some bad, frankly) on how to use media, new and old, to get your message out. You can spend a lot of money to get someone to tell you all that, set you up on a Web page, get your blog going and help you tweet.
All good stuff.
But here’s my advice: Go where your audience already exists. Go where the people you want to notice you are there looking for you.
Sounds simple, right? So how do you do it?
I’ve been writing this blog for three years on Tallahassee.com. If you want to reach a local audience with your message, that’s an easy and local place to start. I’ve said this before, but if I owned a local business, I would write a blog on Tallahassee.com. Why? Last month, more than 630,000 unique addresses accessed the content on Tallahassee.com. Obviously, that’s not just local people, but most are, and I’d bet those who are not local have close local ties. It is the biggest audience of local people you'll find, much bigger than even Facebook.
Worried about the Internet flame throwers writing on your post? Just turn on the monitor-comments feature and post only the comments that are relevant and civil.
The point is making your message interactive and topical. Write stuff that people want or need to know; not a sales pitch, but establish your expertise and professionalism.
Some 1,430 blogs were posted on Tallahassee.com last month, with nearly 7,000 posted comments. That’s interaction.
As I said, if I owned a business – nonprofit or for-profit – in this market and was trying to connect with local people or people who care about this area, that’s where I would start.
But there’s much more to do, too.
Once you have a blog, you have to work at building your audience. I talk about my blog on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook, and I post a copy of it on Blogger.com, among other places.
It builds audience and creates community.
Some of the posters on my blog have become friends, both virtual and in real life. A group of them, for example, had a baby shower for another one of our posters who, I’m happy to say, has since had a beautiful baby girl who will learn to say Uncle Bob in due time.
Some of the posters have become my Facebook friends, some follow me on Twitter and so forth.
Every time one of my followers retweets me, my message gets out to their followers, and some of them might retweet that. For example, I have 368 followers on Twitter. When my tweet get retweeted by TDOnline, it goes out to my followers and TDOnline's 2,170 followers.
So, by all means, get on Twitter and tweet your blog out. Do the same with Facebook, LinkedIn and whatever else you want. But if you are looking for a strong home for your blog, start with Tallahassee.com and don’t forget about good old ink on paper, either.
You can follow this blog on Twitter @bgabordi on this link.
You can also find links to my blogs on Facebook.com, but you have to request to be my friend.
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