I wrote this article in BlogFuze the other day:
I saw this domain name over at TDNAM and had to have it. I didn’t know why, just had to have it. So I grabbed it.
What am I going to do with it?
Eating my own blogfood (that is, following my own advice) means that because I am serious, I need to find this blog’s logical niche. I went through the process and came up with the following niches for this blog:
- domaining (that is, buying and selling domain names),
- marketing your blog,
- using a blog to promote a business/product, or
- a mini blog empire hub.
I then brainstormed on the name fuze - it means either a wick-like fuse used to light an explosive charge or to merge things through heat. This gave me the following images:
- exploding blog traffic,
- blogs fusing and merging together,
- expansion-contraction, and
- light the fuze.
I then did some research on the history of the name. The Internet Time Machine search yielded no results. Maybe someone bought the name and didn’t renew it?
So what am I going to do with this sucker? Leave me a comment and let me know
Here’s the deal: best idea for using BlogFuze wins a copy of Bob Sutton’s book The No Asshole Rule. Leave me a comment here with your idea to enter. Multiple entries/ideas are fine by me. I’ll judge the result on Friday 13 July Australian Eastern Standard Time and advise the winner here and on BlogFuze.
I don’t mean to be a wet blanket - ok maybe I do - but you’ve been writing a bit recently about the high impact of trying to balance several blogs plus your real job and family life. Are you sure that adding one more blog to the mix will help? Or will it break the camel’s back?
Maybe you could consider consolidating some of your existing blogs onto it rather than trying to spread yourself just that much thinner.
That said, to me, the name fuze seems to be representative of electronic media marketing. I’m thinking of viral ideas and trend explosions, like Seth Godin and other marketing gurus talk about, but it can really be a very broad area.
Hi Jeri,
thank you for your comment, and thank you for your concern. It is something that only a friend would say, and I appreciate it
I know that starting another blog when I don’t have time to feed the others that I have sounds like total insanity. In this particular case, there is a method to the madness - I’m trying to get more niche-specific with a couple of blogs that I can support and get rid of the rest at a profit. With BlogFuze my evil plan is to find a niche (and thank you for your entry!) and take it to its logical conclusion - either it is something that I can see myself doing for the next few years or I’ll sell it - in talking about the blog, the domain name itself becomes more valuable, let alone the blog as a separate entity. I’m doing the same with the canberrablog.org and canberrablog.net names - I’m interested in how the real estate “flipping for profit” concept works with blogs.
Does that make sense? If not, please let me know, because maybe it is something that I need to think through more myself.
Best regards, Andrew
It does make sense from an overall perspective - I’ve seen Darren Rowse and others write on the concept of blog flipping.
It still seems to me that the confluence of luck, viral lightning, good marketing and the requisite hard work means that the payoff is chancy. And - it’s kind of a second law of thermodynamics thing - your effectiveness with that last factor decreases the more thinly you distribute your work.
There’s probably a sweet spot somewhere, where you have enough breadth of coverage to catch the right trend, but also have limited & focused yourself enough that you can give due diligence to all of your endeavors.
Good luck!
Hi Jeri,
thank you once again for your thoughtful comment. I started today feeling rotten and overworked - then I read this article by Penelope Trunk. The bottom line of the article was that without friends the money doesn’t mean as much. So I went to work with expectations of something better than yesterday, and sure enough, I was right.
I’m just back from my consultancy area branch meeting having recieved confirmation of a raise, and a confirmation of the power of good intentions and a heap of elbow grease - I can make BlogFuze work. The great thing about Facibus On Blogging is that it has taught me a lot - I have a heap of articles that I can re-use and build upon.
I like the idea of the Art of Focus - there are some analogies to physics there that fit nicely with niche blogging.
Thanks once again,
Best regards, Andrew