To Chase or Not to Chase

I have a cousin who writes for a video game site --none of the ones in MMO space, in case you're wondering*-- and back in 2015 the pageviews frequently reached the 50,000-100,000 mark. Given the average pageview of an MMO blog is measured by a much smaller number (and PC, in particular, seems to have a relatively loyal audience of 30-40 people), I was curious about how the site he writes for got that big.

"I don't know," he said, "we just write about what people want and we promote ourselves a bit, and things just took off."

In 2015, that meant MOBAs and console games. But still, the sheer size of pageviews caught my attention.

And really, if I thought that was big, I hadn't seen anything yet.

***

I'd been reading up a bit lately on Influencers and "Influencer Culture"**, because I've been trying to understand the appeal that influencers draw upon. They aren't celebrities in the purest sense, but some of them have become de-facto celebrities in their own right. They have their own followers and detractors --I mean, look at Asmongold for one obvious example-- but a lot of the influencers', well, influence comes from being perceived as a source of trust.

Truth is somewhat malleable, depending on the influencer, but trust is the engine of the influencing process. You don't even have to trust in what the influencer says, to put it another way, but you have to trust that you'll be entertained in some manner. Quite a few people may put eyeballs on controversial influencers, not because they believe in what bill of goods they're being sold, but because the influencer can pull on their emotions.

That's why, love him or hate him, people watch Asmongold's videos. If you didn't give a whoop about him, you'd not be watching.

***

But I think one thing that my cousin mentioned, about writing what people want, is highly important.

In an age of AI generated posts based on what will generate the most clicks, finding what people want isn't exactly rocket science. The blandness that permeates most AI created written content, however, will turn people off. I know I don't like anything that resembles a poorly written technical manual, no matter how tailored the content is toward my interests, and I work in IT. 

What my cousin missed was that it's more than just promotion and writing relevant content, but writing relevant content that people enjoy reading. It's that human element***, the writer's voice, that will keep people interested and coming back for more. 

Yes, there's a "lightning in a bottle" aspect to some website or person hitting it big, but that emotive element has to come from somewhere. And once people know they can expect you to provide that element, that's when you've got them.

***

Sounds easy, right? Heh. If you've ever tried to make creative content before, you know how hard it can be. Or how much self doubt can cripple you. I can actually speak to this with some experience here, given that PC is pretty long in the tooth as far as continuously active creative content goes. So if you think I can look at the success of my cousin (or others) and only feel jealousy, you're sadly mistaken. I have a lot of respect for what they accomplished, and I realize that what they've been able to do does come at a cost. My determination to do things my own way is a reflection on what I feel the personal and professional cost might be if I decided to start chasing clicks and generate content at a level I don't feel comfortable with and with a personal slant I disagree with. And those that actually can pull that off and generate eyeballs? My hat's off to them for what they've accomplished.




*Not my place to say which one, because he goes by a pseudonym.

**Sadly, MMOs were not on the radar. That would have been in 2005 rather than 2015. But the book that kicked off this interest is Influencer by Brittany Hennessy.

***For the time being, anyway.

EtA: Corrected the "**".