(Limor Peer)

Last week, Nielsen//NetRatings released a study that showed Web traffic to the blog pages of the top ten online newspapers more than tripled in December 2006 compared with December 2005 (an increase of 210%). Overall traffic to these newspapers grew only 9%, suggesting that all that blog traffic doesn't necessarily translate into overall gains for the newspaper sites.

Still, this is phenomenal growth. But how you interpret it can make all the difference for your site. So, keep this in mind when you think about what these data mean:

First, one reason for this growth in audience is that many newspaper sites have been adding lots of blogs recently. The baseline for this study was low to begin with. If you have more blogs today than you had yesterday, it is not surprising that your blog audience today is larger than it was yesterday.

Second, and more importantly, what are all these blogs that people are flocking to? What are these blogs in USA TODAY, for example, that generate so much traffic? I suspect that, as Jeff Jarvis points out, many newspaper blogs are used merely "as a means to get up news updates and such; it is the world's lightest, easiest, cheapest content management system." That makes it a good thing for newspaper sites. And what makes it appealing to users is the casual writing style - it's often punchy, short and to the point. And you can use links to dig in if you want to.

In other words, many of these are not blogs in essence, but blogs in format.

But I would argue that the true reward - your users' engagement and loyalty - lies in the essence of blogs, not their format. At its core, a blog has a character of its own, it is based on personality, it fosters conversation, it lets people be heard, and it attracts and helps form a community.

Newspapers should remember that the circumstances for the development of blogs means that they carry some baggage: blogs started out as tools of those who have no means of distribution. Now they are being co-opted by major news and information companies that do not lack these means. Naturally, there's going to be some tension.

This issue has come up several times in the last few years. One example is Bob Cauthorn's slightly hysterical piece from 2005 called, "Note to mainstream media: You don't get to blog." In it he wrote,

"The DNA of blogging is a complicated matter that touches on being outside voices and taking personal control of the media. But at minimum the DNA of blogging has to do with distributing the conversation. Contrary to that, the DNA of mainstream media - to date - is all about dominating the conversation."

Martin Stabe replied that "newspapers do get to blog if they use blogging tools to read as well as write - in other words, if they chose to participate, as equals, in the conversation among other bloggers."

In other words, if newspaper companies remember (and respect) blogs' raison d'etre - conversation, community, giving voice to the voiceless - they will stand a better chance at making real gains with their users.

So, should you add more blogs to your site? The answer is "yes, but." But to get the long term reward, you will have to make them meaningful and than means being there for your community (see Rich Gordon's posts about Huckleberries Online and online communities on this blog).


By Limor Peer (l-peer@northwestern.edu)
Limor Peer is research director for the Media Management Center and Readership Institute.