Should you kill your blog after three years?

October 5, 2006

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In the publishing industry, a magazine is usually killed if it has not turned profitable after 36 months in the business. First year gains visibility, second year makes up for year one and hopefully third year at least breaks even.

Case in point is GamesMaster strong yet unprofitable 3 year-reign.

So my question is, does the same apply with blogs? OK wait, I’m referring to blogs that are there to make money. If significant traffic cannot be generated after three years of posting, what do you do?

Again, if blogging is just a hobby, then it really doesn’t matter. In fact, if you’re earning “one mocha frap a month” from your site, then it still makes sense to continue.

I guess the best factor to consider would be that commercial publications have huge liabilities while blogs don’t. You can say that your blog is in the red, by losing the invested P2,000 per year on hosting and domain registration, but it’s also like saying that your multi million dollar company is losing one dollar a month. Blogs, at least independent non-network ones do not have huge liabilities.

Therefore, no, you should not kill your blog after three years. Maybe you should get writing lessons. Hehe.

Comments

9 responses to “Should you kill your blog after three years?”

October 5, 2006

Majandi

Or start cooperating with other blog writers. I can imagine that a collection (team blog?) of different sources may raise the level of interest. Especially if the authors keep commenting the latest posts and taking care of some dialog for the reader to follow. Blogs are not forums but I am sure blog readers love reading forums too and so a one man show could become something like a live reality show featuring different points of view and ideas.
October 5, 2006

Marc

Cash shouldn’t be the default ROI metric. This is especially true with blogging. Charlene Li has something to offer.
October 5, 2006

Ann

Hi there,

That was an interesting article. I was wondering if you would like to sponsor links within your blog posts. We will pay for every link posted. How does that sound to you? If you’re interested, please mail back at blog[dot]ph[@]gmail[dot]com. I’d be happy to discuss details with you. Thanks!

-Ann Laureano
October 5, 2006

noemi

The older your blog domain is, the better its google ranking becomes. So don’t kill it as it can earn potential revenue. The mysql database size for text driven blog isn’t that much to require a lot of hosting space.
October 5, 2006

Jayvee

hey noemi, i actually neglected that aspect. i guess i was referring to frustrations about people not reading your blog, thus causing you to explore and stop altogether.

so the other option is to sell your domain 🙂
October 6, 2006

noemi

@jayvee- yes old domains start at $200. I have a customer who neglected to renew her domain. It’s only a year old but it was auctioned off at a starting offer of $200. I can just imagine if it’s a 3 year old domain.
October 6, 2006

ade

I agree. Trying to build on an already existing site makes more sense than trying to raise a blog from scratch. It’s much more SEO friendly.
October 8, 2006

markku

If it’s a blog meant for money-making only, three years is a long wait before you kill it. Before that time you should’ve realized that it really has no potential or you’re simply doing everything wrong. 😉 Hehehe. The good thing about blogs, minimal lang ang losses. 🙂
February 23, 2009

qarla

Wow, in 3 years, sarap na siguro ng traffic non lalo na pag on track naman ang SEO mo.. yumyum na ang revenue non ha! You Should not kill your blog! Correct si Jayvee!