If you haven’t heard of blogging yet, where the hell have you been?

The word blog is a shortening of the term web log. A web log is simply an online journal. A journal can be anything you want it to be so anyone can blog. If you want to fill your blog with stream-of-consciousness prose, that’s your choice. If you want to write about politics and world issues, that’s okay. If you want to load a blog with your freaking shopping list, go for it. Whatever strikes your textual fancy, with a little HTML and a webhost, you too can blog.

"The blog fad is with us and as adult webmasters; we should embrace the fad and make some green."

Not long ago Forrester Research surveyed about 4000 surfers on the subject of blogging. According the Forrester, only 21% had ever heard of blogging. However, a Google search on the word “blogging” returned a result of almost two million documents. In the DMOZ category Computers > Internet > On the Web > Weblogs, there are 14 subcategories and 3801 listed sites. During one week last March, online host BlogSpot.com reported they received half a million visits. The Forrester survey goes on the surmise that the average blog reader/poster is an Internet veteran of six or more years.

So is blogging really and Internet phenomenon? Or is blogging an activity of the few, over-hyped by the media? My belief is blogging falls somewhere in the middle between societal trend and passing fad. My theory is the popularity of blogging will increase for a while and eventually level off. We have not yet grokked the fullness of blogging. I predict the prevalence of blogging will multiply before it tapers off. The blog fad is with us and as adult webmasters; we should embrace the fad and make some green.

Forrester claims that blogging has no business relevance. I say, Forrester doesn’t know the porn business. The problem with mainstream ventures is they see trends like blogging as a direct source of income. They still don’t understand the surfer. Watch. There will be all this mainstream money spent on blog hosting and paid access to blogs. Mainstreamers will attempt to charge for blogging instead of using the activity as a marketing tool. A lot of money will be wasted and as a result, the mainstream world will bail out of blogging the same way the have with other Internet crazes. Mainstream will exploit blogging but they won’t make any money because they just don’t know how.

The adult webmaster knows what to do with a good blog. The adult webmaster understands the different between free content and paid content. Blogs should be free. Access to blogs should be free. The profit comes with marketing the blog concept effectively.

Take another look at Google search results on “blogging” and the amount of sites listed in the DMOZ category Computers > Internet > On the Web > Weblogs. I typed the word “blogging” into the Google search box. After clicking the submit button, Google comes up with 1,940,000 related documents. Presumably that means there are almost two million HTML pages with the word “blogging” on them. Yet -according to DMOZ listings- only 3801 have managed to successfully list their blog sites. 3801 out of two million tells me that bloggers might be passionate but they know little about search engine optimization.

Granted, quite a few bloggers aren’t really in it for the money. They do it because they like it. They are perfectly happy to use someone else’s server and someone else’s software in order to get their blogs online. They aren’t concerned with dominion over META tags and ad placement. If anything, the earnest blogger wants to sell themselves. A handful of them have achieved that goal but most of them are blogging for as many hits as they can get. The truth is most of the traffic ends up benefiting the blog host/service provider.

You’re an adult webmaster. Imagine what you could do with all those blog happy surfers out there. You could build an erotica blog. You could pepper it with luring language and tantalizing softcore pics. All the while, you could place sponsor ads anywhere on your pages.

With an erotic blog, you could sell adult classified memberships or subscriptions to paysites. If you are an amateur porn performer, you could draw them in with your free blog and tease them into to paying to join your program. Go even more mainstream and create a manly blog full of manly advice for manly men. Then fly banners for penis pills in conspicuous positions within the blog. The adult webmaster can work financial wonders with a blog.

What’s even better is that blog content has more artistic merit than some free image gallery page. Therefore a free-access blog is harder to prosecute under the aegis of anti-pornography law. Blog content is safer content in these fickle times. Add to that the fact that (according to Forrester) most blog fans are Internet veterans of six years or more. When it comes to cyberporn, web veterans are harder to attract as an audience. Yet other studies have shown it’s the web veterans who are more likely to spend money on the Internet.

A blog can build trust and obtain a clientele that is less likely to make foolish purchasing choices. Foolish purchasing choices result in buyer’s remorse. Buyer’s remorse equals chargebacks. Chargebacks are evil.

So let Forrester downplay a legitimate social trend. The adult webmaster knows what to do.