Is The Trend Going Towards Data Quantity Over Specialization? How This Affects Your Online Website/YouTube/Blogging Business

I was watching a YouTube video by Adam Enfroy titled: Blogging is dead... here 's what I'm doing now. As the title suggests, it’s about the so-called death of blogging.

The video is highly helpful for many bloggers especially those who are struggling or are just planning to start a blog. But I’m not here to talk about the so-called death of blogging which I have a separate blog for titled: "Is Blogging Dead Or Does It Have A Life Of Its Own?".

Instead, I’m here to talk about what Adam Enfroy and some others call as “authority”. Adam used a product called the “theragun” as an example. He discussed this in minute 4:28 of his video.

In the short segment of the video, he stated that for example Rolling Stone Magazine has an article about theragun alternatives. Of course anyone who is familiar with Rolling Stone Magazine would balk when they learn about this.

This is because Rolling Stone Magazine is a music themed magazine. Growing up reading Rolling Stone Magazines even before the age of the internet, I can attest that many fans of the magazine would be disheartened by this development.

But this is the reality now for Rolling Stone Magazine in the age of the internet where their revenue is not all about customers paying for their printed magazines. They are now just like many other websites on the internet who make a bulk of their money by selling digital ads.

This is not helped at all by the development of affiliate marketing which has further made digital ads more profitable by embedding links and placing banners on websites. I for one believe this would soon be the reality for all websites who have monetization strategies.

In case you’re wondering, other websites like VICE magazine is doing the same thing. The interesting fact though is that these websites are at the top of the search results while other websites who specialize in theraguns are not ranking at all.

If you tried to Google: “theragun alternatives” you would come to a similar result. The websites of the big and mainstream media companies like Rolling Stone, VICE, CNET, WIRED, Esquire, NYTimes and so on top in search rankings.

Adam explains this as “Authority”. According to him and to my analysis as well, people gravitate to the companies who have been there for a long time. Somehow their longevity has equated to authority.

This means that people have developed trust in their media content such that it enabled them to go far beyond their original theme contents. I think for some or many, they would find it funny that a music themed website would branch out to theragun articles.

But as I have said, content is where the money is and more content means more potential for views and therefore more ad income or affiliate marketing income. Of course there would be bloggers who would balk at this way of blogging thinking.

But let’s take the case of news media. News media doesn’t have a particular theme of course it has segments like headlines, sports, entertainment and so on but this doesn’t stop it from reporting almost anything under the sun.

And why would news media companies restrict themselves to specific themes? We are already seeing several cable news companies branching off to as many popular segments as possible. This is because they want as much viewership as possible.

If they had restricted themselves to a particular narrow group of news subject, they would either run out of news to report or their viewers would soon get bored with their news content. Such is the way of media entertainment.

The same thing is true also for news websites online. If they had stuck to a narrow group of news subjects, the other specialist websites would defeat them in sheer authority. This is true if the online news website hasn’t established an authority aura to it.

So are all monetized websites heading towards a news media like format where the most popularly queried online subjects like “theragun alternatives” would be a featured content? I believe so.

For example, a person who blogs like me regularly reads online articles and watch YouTube videos about blogging. But blogging as a subject matter can only go so far. This is the reason why so many digital content creators are branching off to new subject areas.

As I have said, many digital content creators especially those who started so long ago have exhausted or will be exhausting the digital content that they would produce for their readers and watchers.

Many bloggers and website owners have remedied this situation by creating entirely new blogs and websites. For example the owners of the website Avocadu have branched off to another website called Create And Go which specializes in blogging as a subject.

Perhaps the most glaring example of digital content creators branching off to newer content subject can be found in YouTube. If you do a casual research of some digital content creators in YouTube, you will know that they have several YouTube channels different from each other.

Of course, not a long time ago when the internet was still in its infancy and even when it gained significant traction already, digital content producers who produce different content themes were considered highly doubtful.

This is because the way of thinking then was that: “No one can be an expert at a lot of things”. But times change. People now realize that digital content is just what it is: digital content. This means like the digital content creator is reporting data and is not likely a complete expert.

I’ve reported about the YouTube Video Channel Viva La Dirt League before on two occasions. They are a good example of content creators who were able to diversify their digital content without much problems.

They started out by making video game themed YouTube videos like songs, dances but later branched out to making short comedy skits still related to video games. I believe their theme video game was PUBG.

They branched out successfully to other video games, still making short comedy skits. Then they branched out into non-video game related videos like their tech store skit which is also very popular. To date they offer both video game and non-video game short comedy skits.

If you would notice, they have successfully cracked not the video game enthusiasts but the millennial segment who grew up with video games and home IT technology. In fact, one of their main sponsors is a tech company.

To date, they have successful crowdfunded their own physical studio where they promise to backers that they would produce more and better content. Their success as digital content creators is worth noting.

Canadian Lewis George Hilsenteger first became a famous YouTuber with his Unbox Therapy YouTube Channel. In this channel, as stated in the title of his channel he “unboxes” and reviews the latest products but mainly concentrates on electronics.

He has branched out and created other YouTube channels like his LewLater YouTube channel which discusses a variety of subjects. Although still focusing on technology, he has made videos about animals, society, celebrities and anything you can think of under the sun.

His video content forays outside of the subject of technology doesn’t seem to hurt his popularity as shown by the hundred of thousands of his subscribers. While other YouTube content creators are fast running out of content to produce, he seems immune to this.

Depending on which website you believe, his net worth is believed to be between $20 to $50 million. He has clearly profitably developed an “authority” among his millions of followers which is reported to be 1.7 million.

This got me thinking, the profits of many news media companies especially printed newspaper producers severely declined and were almost destroyed with the advent of the internet and online news content.

But actually, those that survived the switch from printed news media content into online digital content are not only surviving but are actually thriving. Of course for them, the landscape has changed.

The days where news media companies mostly derived their income from paying customers is gone. Today, many of these news media companies are relying on ad revenue or online subscription revenue.

Just to show that this situation is not only happening to the US but is also happening in other news media companies outside the US, I’m going to use “The Hindu” as an example. It is a news media company from India who now produces digital online news content as well.

The news media company saw its profits increase by 20% in 2022. If you would visit their site: The Hindu, you would notice that they have online ads prominently displayed on their pages together with their news content. They also offer subscriptions.

A very good example of how ominous and prolific is the online digital content production of some news media sites is CNN. In case you are not familiar with American media or CNN hasn’t reached your country yet, CNN means Cable News Network.

If you looked at their website, you would notice that their news content is very varied. But you’ll notice something, instead of a news media format, they seem to be a gigantic digital magazine containing a mix of all kinds of subject matter.

The digital content in the website could be a news, an article, a documentary and so on. They even have paid promotional content. It’s highly likely that one of the information you’re looking on any specific day would be in one of their content.

They don’t only have global news content or America specific content like articles but country specific countries. In fact, CNN has a presence in many countries and continuous to reach other countries. This is how much mixed digital content CNN has.

It is advisable early on in your career as a digital content creator to establish the scope of your subject matter. You might reach a point in your career when you have nearly exhausted all content to be made regarding your chosen subject matter.

As shown by the previous example of digital content producers and media news companies profiled, offering a diversified content to your readers or viewers can be very profitable if you create "authority" or trust first among your viewers and readers.

You might also like to read the article:

Is Blogging Dead Or Does It Have A Life Of Its Own?

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