Is blogging dead? Here's what you need to do instead.

Welcome Indie Brand Builders!

Last week we spoke about beating overwhelm and focusing on the stuff that’s going to have the most impact on your business.

We're going for 80% of the benefit for 20% of the effort.

While content can be a HUGE driver of business, it can also be a big source of stress, overwhelm and time wasting.

The Five Star Focus for this week is all about being smart with your time and making a big impact with minimal effort.

FIVE STAR FOCUS ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ 

This Week's Best Content:

1. Is blogging dead? 📉 
   This isn't click-bait. After Google's Helpful Content update last year a multitude of blogs and businesses lost up to 70% of their traffic. How has this affected you? My thoughts are at the bottom of this email.
   

2. Modern Millie - Plan your content for the next year 📆 
   Start your year with a content plan and save yourself from content overwhelm and burnout! This is a super practical guide and will give you everything you need to get your content planned fast!
   

3. Ali Abdall - Why time blocking is the best thing since sliced bread.
   Ali is the king of productivity on YouTube and he presents ‘The Trident Calendar System’. A really straightforward way to plan your time and get the most out of your day. ⏱️ 
   

4. Content strategy to grow your audience from ZERO ❤️ 
   The internet can be noisy and chaotic for solo business owners. It's really difficult to get noticed and to make sales when you are first getting started. Having a great content strategy will make this process so much easier, and this article lays it all out in a super simple format.
   

5. Reduce, reuse, recycle - Buffer's guide to reusing content ♻️ 

MY TAKEAWAYS 

Blogs are NOT going away. They are just changing. In 2023 Google was overwhelmed with millions of new blog posts auto-generated by AI, and lots of it wasn't very helpful for readers.

It hit my blog hard too, but I'm learning from it and making my content better.

Google is not against AI content. They are against content that has no soul, content that is repeated on every blog post across the web, and content that doesn't directly answer the question people are searching for.

While it does suck. This is actually great news - Google search results are getting better.

All of the people who create good content (but don't know how to work the system) actually have a chance to rank. Whoop! Let's go! 🚀 

The moral of the story - algorithms change, so don't put all your eggs in one basket.

2024 is not the year to just show up on one platform. It's the year for building a diverse online presence on blogs, social media, newsletters, podcasts and Youtube.