Blogging, From Daily Personal Journal to Profitable Business Enterprise

Few paradigms have seized the Internet the way blogs have. Beginning as simple personal diaries, blogs have evolved into web publishing enterprises. Enterprises that are making real money and turning personal blogging into business blogging.

Loosely traced back to 1993 when Dr Glen Barry started publishing a political blog to campaign for forest protection and document his PhD project. Since these early days of hand coding updates to Web pages in a manner similar to a journal, blogging has evolved into the central platform for managing dynamic content on the Internet.

Early blogging seemed more like personal journals, but now blogs are powerful web publishing platforms. The blog has become so pervasive that it even blurs the lines between professional and amateur. At first glance you may have trouble drawing distinction between Huffington Post and the New York Times, Real Clear Markets and Bloomberg, or Perez Hilton and Yahoo! Entertainment. Business blogging now takes on meaning in both professional and amateur publishing.

What is a Blog?
There are lots of definitions and the line between a blog and a content management system are blurring. However, the simplest and perhaps the most accurate is a website containing content entries displayed in reverse chronological order.  This blog, www.MarketingProfessor.com is a an example of this as well.

Although founded in text, modern blogs are a rich mixture of text, images, videos, sound and a multitude of interactive widgets and features. Blogs are shaped into a broad range of Internet objectives from personal commentaries to business enterprises.

History of Blogs
The earliest blogs were more complex technical implementations. Earlier bloggers were people like student Justin Hall writing while attending Swarthmore College, Dave Winer a perennial technology entrepreneur and developer, and research projects like the Wearable Wireless Webcam project at MIT.

However, the real power of blogs didn’t become apparent until 1999 when several entrepreneurs made the concept simple. Here are some of the first hosted blogs:

• Open Diary, launched in October 1998
• LiveJournal, launched in March 1999
• Pitas.com, launched in July 1999
• Blogger, launched in August 1999

These hosted and very simple blogging platforms brought this technology to anyone and everyone. At the same time it made business blogging more viable. In fact, small business blogging now makes an easy replacement for the classic website.

Rise in Popularity
Now that everyone could have a blog the only thing left was for them to become compelling. In early 2000 the Internet was rapidly reshaping with the implosion of the dotcom bust. Power on the Internet was shifting from bloated, venture-backed companies to individuals leveraging simple tools. Web 2.0 was being formulated.

A variety of technologies like blogdex (an MIT research project) and later Technorati began to track and rank various blogs and their popularity. This gave readers and publishers some benchmark of quality. It also expanded the awareness and exposing blogging tips on what makes a site popular.

Meanwhile, the business of blogging starting to land on the front page. Amplifying news of Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott’s racial comments at a celebration for retiring Senator Strom Thurmond, led to the unraveling of Senator Lott’s political career. Likewise, another blogger blowing the lid off of Rathergate a story of forgery and flawed traditional reporting.

Now we increasingly see the blurring of mass media and personal media. The blog is transforming into a default content management platform from the personal to the enterprise.

Making Money with Blogs
This evolution is increasing the opportunities and possibilities for business blogging–specifically monetizing these blogging platforms into real enterprises. One of the most recent small business blogging successes was demostrated in the acquisition of Bankaholic. This far from corporate blogging, one person and WordPress operation, sold to Bankrate.com for $12 million.

Business blogging or corporate blogging, whatever you want to call the new business of blogging it has certainly evolved from the personal diary into serious web publishing. Small business blogging is a click away with simple blogging platforms abundant. By following just a few simple blogging tips and you could be on your path to big success.

Turning your blog into a business, a true money maker is virtually limitless and bounded only by your creativity.

Technorati Tags: Blogger, business blogging, content management system, journal, making money