There is finally proof that blogging is still a dominant medium for transmitting information on the web. While many analysts pronounced blogs dead 3 years ago, and then two years ago, and again last year, blogs are here to stay. Facebook likes and Twitter tweets are strong forces still, there is no downplaying that, but their value is very different from that which a blog can provide. By analyzing data culled by Netbase, we can clearly see what value Twitter, Facebook, and Blogs have and how each is most effectively used.
Twitter and Facebook are about instant gratification. They are about the here and now and creating a major buzz in the moment – not over the course of weeks, months or years. Blogs on the other hand are in it for the long haul, they are the marathon runners standing next to a team of sprinters.
Tweets have a lifespan that can be so fleeting that a tweet’s proverbial lungs never even inflate. It is dead on arrival. A very small portion of tweets actually gain traction – and they are usually those which come from users with a huge follower list or a user with a smaller follower list whom tweets are specifically targeted to. Facebook posts have a longer shelf life, but the “likes” they generate can often be misleading or even meaningless as many people will “like” an item without ever following the link that actually goes to the item. They only like posts in some cases to be supportive to friends that placed them.
Blogs are slow out of the gates but they have massive staying power that truer social platforms do not. On hot topics they grab less than 15% of the daily share of traffic on a topic, but over the long haul they win out. Blogs can have conversations in the comment section on a topic that last weeks or even months. That in no small part plays a serious role regarding how they can attain and hold very high search rankings even with low or nonexistent PR. Over the course of a month, a topic twitter and Facebook dominated for traffic the day of the event will be nearly irrelevant whereas blogs will show a better than 40% hold on that traffic.
What this all says is that if you are looking for an immediate rush, Twitter is where you go. If you want the SERP equivalent of a sugar high, you go to Facebook. If you want a seven course meal, you go to your blog. You can effectively use all three mediums together, you just have to realize, or hire someone who realizes, how to conduct the orchestra.
