You likely noticed that September 1, 2015 was Diabetes online Social media Burnout Blog day. I chose not to participate (I will explain). But before I get into the whole issue, I want to clarify it is great that everyone blogged on the same day about the same topic. I am a big fan of doing that activity. It gives power and spirit to what we write.
However, I did not participate for two reasons. First, I was burnt out, I had been away all weekend and I just did not have the strength or will to sit down and tackle a blog. I suppose you could say I was burned out, not on social media, but more on life itself. I was just plain tired. Second, I was promoting Kathy’s great blog about her life with diabetes, which, if you missed it you can read here. It is true I could have postponed the presentation of Kathy’s blog, but my vision for www.RADiabetes.com has always been about finding ways for one off bloggers to present their items. I started as a one off blogger in the DOC and I am grateful to those who gave my work a place to be seen/heard (I am posting a link to those blogs, if they still exist, at the bottom of this narrative). So the fact is, when Kathy gave me a cool piece of work, I had to get it out when I could.
Once an item is published, the second and in some ways more important part of blogging starts. That is getting it read by as large an audience as possible. When I was blogging at TUDiabetes I wrote for that audience and cared little about getting it in front of others to read. I had a built in stable audience. Yes, I might collect 1 or maybe 100 readers, but I always knew someone would read it. When you operate your own blog, (at least in my case) I have no such guarantee. During last year’s #Dblog week we had about 100 blogs filed each of the seven days. That represented over 600 blogs written in one week. Assuming those same bloggers (there are more) are filing a blog a week, that means I am competing with over 100 sites (plus commercial sites, plus large communities, plus bloggers who did not participate in #Dblog week) to get content read. I call it competition, but it is not for something material, rather it is competition to capture reader interest.
So back to Kathy’s blog once published on Sunday I had to work to get it into the reading cycle. Since I was traveling on Monday I needed to do that on Tuesday. Here is a rundown of what I do once I post an item and I tell the world about it.
I use two main services Twitter and Facebook. I post on Twitter because that is the doorway to the rest of the DOC as well as the Rheumatoid Arthritis community. I post it on 3 pages on Facebook: RADiabetes, ‘the Betes’ and my personal Facebook page. I use Facebook because I have some loyal readers on that platform and I want to encourage people to remember I am still out here. I also post on Goggle+, Pinterest and occasionally Instagram. These give me far less readership, so I am less active and concentrate less effort on those sites.
I then repost whatever I publish here on Diabetes Daily, and TUDiabetes.net. I do this because I want to increase readership and theses two sites are large enough that posting gets more attention. However this is a gamble as neither of these sites are optimized for blog posting.
Anyway, that all circles back to the question at hand, is the DOC creating Diabetes Burn Out? The answer is, of course it is Mine is one tiny little website in the sea of hundreds and for me to get noticed, I must be everywhere. I have nothing to gain or lose if folks do not read my content, it is simply a point of personal pride to try to gain readership. But if I am doing it for vanity or pride, then imagine what those who do it for other more material means must stress about.
The end result is that our online community is in hyper drive to gain readership. Is that bad? I doubt it. Frankly, if I tire of doing it, I will stop, but if I am doing it, I will want to get the most readership I can get. For a relatively new site, readership comes from all those sources and those not yet exploited. Readit comes to mind. The thing is, content will chase the reader and that is the nature of our age and our community. So on this September 3, 2015 I want to report that yes, I am contributing to online information burnout. I am using social media to chase you, the reader and others that blog are doing the same.
One last point, whatever invited you to read my blog, I am glad you chose to do so because while I blog for myself you are my customer. Trust me, it is much more fun to write for people who read it, than to write just for me, me, and me. After all, I am a fairly one dimensional audience.
Web sites that supported my writing before www.RADiabetes.com
TUDiabetes www.TUDiabetes.org
Scotts Diabetes http://scottsdiabetes.com/
Bitter~Sweet http://www.bittersweetdiabetes.com/
Test Guess and Go http://testguessandgo.com/
Stronger than type 1 strongerthant1d – strongerthant1d
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