b5media Deal with Newstex Illustrates Power of Syndication
In conversations with a number of business owners who are thinking about blogging, I usually reach a point fairly quickly where, if the conversation is going to progress, I need to explain syndication or RSS.
Here’s what I’ve done to date.
I generally explain syndication first by referring to something people are familiar with offline - syndicated cartoons or articles in newspapers. Then I explain that this way of sharing information has been adopted and automated on the Web via syndication. Up till now I have then explained the process in terms of single users subscribing to the blog’s RSS feed, whether by way of an email-delivered feed like FeedBlitz or a web-based service like Bloglines or NewsGator Online, or a service like BlogBridge.
In a formal presentation, I like to show people the enabler of syndication, the xml-coded page, so they get the story that this is a link for machines to read. Then I explain that it’s like having your own robot to assemble and deliver your daily news from the Web and especially from blogs.
Which seems to work. At least, people tell me it makes the process clear.
Then today I read a press release, about a new deal made by the b5media network, of which this blog is part, which shows me I have been presenting an unduly modest picture of what syndication can achieve. The press release, b5media Provides 164 Blogs to Newstex Blogs On Demand, explains that b5media, a global network with 2.5 million unique visitors a month, has now been linked into the Newstex Blogs On Demand ™ product, suddenly providing those of us who blog as part of the b5media network with a potentially far greater readership.
Newstex Blogs On Demand offers blog networks and individual bloggers a syndication business model, which enhances the exposure and makes blogs easy to use for employees working in companies, financial firms and government agencies. Newstex licenses influential blog content directly from bloggers and blog networks including b5media for Blogs On Demand and delivers the full-text blog content to information distributors and enterprise customers worldwide.
And it’s not just a matter of numbers of potential readers. It’s about how the synergy of compatible brands can deliver a quantitatively and qualitatively better result for both parties than would be the case if b5media and Newstex worked independently. And that can provide a better flow-on benefit, in terms of readership, for our individual blogs.
I’m not a military person, but the expression force multiplier seems an appropriate way of illustrating the power of syndication used for collaborative ventures like this.
The principle can be applied for companies and industry development bodies wanting to promote a particular State, region or city. It can be applied for professional and industry organisations and community organisations. It can be applied for franchise groups and for conglomerates, national or multi-national. There are many possible applications of syndication, where the overall effectiveness of the bloggers’ efforts and the return on investment should be greater than the sum of the individual bloggers’ activities.
Tags: syndication, rss, b5media, Newstex, Blogs On Demand, b5biz
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POSTED IN: General, Policy, RSS, Resources, Syndication
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