As I read blogs, articles and media on a regular basis online media has become a big part of my life. When I wake up in the morning I usually check my social accounts, then move on to checking my emails, then reading a few top news outlets...this is a typical start to the day (and it doesnt stop there). After this the majority of my day consists of working, apart from lunch time when I get a chance to catch up with my blogging.
This amount of social and media interaction always makes me curious about other peoples online habits. I have a few friends who are involved in the social side of the web, however the majority rarely leave Facebook. I started talking to LogicalJack SEO who is a lot more involved with online media than me, and we got to discussing the Facebook / Blogging competition. With the upcoming IPO everyone is talking about the value of Facebook and whether it can maintain that level of growth for the size it is. After Facebook recently published a slow-down in expansion (only a 50% growth rate in the last quater) I started wondering what the figures would be for independent blogs. I have a theory a lot of people have evolved from Facebook into bloggers, this way they can interact with people based on their interests rather than their background or locality, and the internet is an easy place to make these connections.
I started doing some research with a couple of top UK bloggers and site owners and quickly learned that there were some areas of massive growth, and some of recession. It seems that business blogs have started to decrease (many blame Google) in readership, whereas niche blogs like family & parenting have seen massive increases.
According to the stats the New Mum and Son published an article on Ideal Garments For Your Infant. This baby clothes blog post was shared by over 300 Twitter users and nearly 500 Facebook fans...however the real surprise was the amount of traffic it had received after just one month - 64,000 visits!
The guys were even nice enough to share some of their Analytics data, and it seems the majority of this traffic was referrals from similar baby, fashion and parenting blogs.
If you are thinking of starting a blog then dont be shy, get out there and get blogging! We found many of the authorities and notable bloggers in the parenting and baby niche were very helpful, they even gave us some of their own tips on baby clothes.
