Who will miss you when you are gone?
That is a question I often ask clients as they contemplate challenges such as the profile of their ideal customer.
Last week I was gone. Laid low by flu such that for the first time in the almost 15 years of writing and posting on StrategyAudit, averaging 2.5 posts a week, there was nothing.
Nada.
Part of the logic of regular posting is that those who follow you get used to a regular communication, it becomes part of their day to absorb the messages sent. Break the pattern, and you risk losing their almost automatic attention, and once lost, it is a hard pattern to re-establish.
Fair time to ask the question of myself, I thought.
Should not have done that, the answer is a touch depressing.
While StrategyAudit is little more than a pimple on the arse of the blogosphere, I did think there would be a few who missed the experience on strategy, marketing, and business improvement built up over a long commercial career that I put out there.
One person emailed me to let me know a link in a recent post was broken, and one other who I know quite well, rang to accuse me of ‘retiring’ without telling him.
There was the usual level of traffic to those existing posts that typically attract readers, mostly via Dr. Google, but often via referrals, which you can easily pick by the sudden peak of readership.
‘Who will miss you when you are gone’ remains a great question as you contemplate the investment made in marketing. It does pay however to have a thick skin as the answer may not be what you had hoped.
Agreed
Part of the issue is the massive volumes that are fed per day (hour). I ask that question of people who are addicted to work, leaving little in the tank (and days) for family, personal well-being and so on. Ensuring balance!
Gaining and keeping attention, and having that attention make a differance to peoples lives such that they return for more seems to me to be the marketing challenge of the 21st century.