If I was going to continue this blog, there are definitely some areas I would want to focus on to boost my readership. The first step is to identify the aspects of my blog that appeal the most to my audience. Let’s see, someone that reads a sports bar blog is most likely going to be a smart and sophisticated individual, a person whom the opposite sex finds simply irresistible. Good, now that I’ve got a starting point, what does this cunning fox, this renaissance man (or woman) want to read about? I know! The answer is beer and food.
The most common question I get when I talk about a sports bar is, “How is the food?” Though I’ve tried to mention my favorite dishes (the quesadilla at Fergs, the stone crab at Pincher’s and the wings at Norman’s), I fear I’ve not delved deeply enough into cuisine to satisfy the critical culinary curiosity of my reader’s refined palates. Going out for a meal is a unique social experience. One of my favorite elements of contemporary sports bars is that they are rapidly adding restaurant quality meals to a menu that used to consist only of “bar food” like nachos and pizza. Those comfort foods are still immensely popular, but grilled chicken, seafood and salads are gaining a foothold in today’s family sports bar. Combining the restaurant experience with the bar experience is what makes a sports bar so uniquely appealing, and in the future I promise to dedicate a good portion of my blog to reviewing the menu. This way my readers will be able to plan their dinner and their night out all at once!
To keep my sassy, sexy readership coming back for more I have to stay on the cutting edge of culture. I don’t have the energy or desire to review every single sports bar in the state myself (however, there is another way which I'll get to in a moment). Nay - to stimulate such rich and complex minds, I can’t fill pages with dry content, I need bubbling liquid news that hits on the many things my readership is curious about, and splashes up on adjacent topics that they might also enjoy. Maybe a new seasonal beer has just dropped; I want bar patrons to turn to my blog to see if it’s worth ordering. When there’s a major event like that, I’ll need to have a video review ready. I can interview people drinking the beer, I can set up a blind taste test and have a little fun with it, and I can inform my discerning audience of some reasonable alternatives. I need to illustrate how the new beer is best enjoyed in both a colorful and dynamic way, through the liberal use of multi-media.
In my class we talked about the differences between what we call web 1.0 and web 2.0. In a nutshell, web 1.0 represents the old way of doing business on the internet, where websites are basically encyclopedias of information created by “the man.” Web 2.0 is more organic: content is often personalized and is created, at least in part, by the end user. Web 2.0 has really taken off in the form of social networking, file sharing and sites like Pandora, which generates custom music playlists for you based on your personal taste. I think one way to increase long-term readership of my blog would be to infuse it with some elements of web 2.0. For example, instead of a calendar of events, happy hours and specials, I could add a widget that generates suggestions based on criteria that my sexy readership enters on their own. Say you have a craving for chicken wings and there is a big hockey game on TV, type in “chicken wings” and “hockey,” and you will get a list of hockey bars - like Dave Andreychuk’s Grille in Channelside - that have wing specials. Or perhaps you enjoy Champion’s League Soccer and dark beer; my widget could notify you when Guinness is 2-for-1 at O’Boobigan’s.
The best part about a true web 2.0 widget is that every sophisticated socialite out there can add their own favorites places and meta-tags to the database, just like on Wikipedia. After all, my readers (Sports Bar Junkie fans) are so smart that they already know what they want, and my job is just to facilitate them. Of course, if none of the things I’ve mentioned help me boost my readership, I can always resort to gratuitous compliments and pandering!
The best part about a true web 2.0 widget is that every sophisticated socialite out there can add their own favorites places and meta-tags to the database, just like on Wikipedia. After all, my readers (Sports Bar Junkie fans) are so smart that they already know what they want, and my job is just to facilitate them. Of course, if none of the things I’ve mentioned help me boost my readership, I can always resort to gratuitous compliments and pandering!
No comments:
Post a Comment