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SEO elder abuse

According to research by Neil Patel, 59.2% of traffic to blogs is driven by SEO. It’s the biggest single driver of traffic by far. He also reports that your SEO decreases over time, if you’ve published a lot of posts that no longer get the traffic they

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Recommended Reading

No one goes north this time of year, so I took a weekend off and headed up north with my son on a road trip to Door County. A whole bunch of new books were released, so the timing was perfect to catch up on some reading. Alex Van Halen’

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Revenge of the Essayists

I was wrong. In my last post, I explained where the biggest companies were going with AI, on the backs of creators. But I assumed the biggest corporations in the world had legal teams that understood the basics of creators’ rights under the law. But Microsoft proved me wrong this

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What’s with the hostility towards personal publishing?

It's about money, of course. Google may have a problem with us. A few weeks ago, Google had a big leak. While details are still lacking, it seems like there’s a bias against personal sites when it comes to search results. From Mike King: “Google may be

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Embrace the carnage.

The web is back. Or, is it on its back? Google and OpenAI have been racing to see who can replace the web for you. Google isn’t even hiding it anymore. From Platformer via Daring Fireball: “This new approach is captured elegantly in a slogan that appeared several times

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Notes on The Newsletter Conference 2024

I went to The Newsletter Conference last week in New York City. Some have posted notes from the event and Dan Oshinsky has even posted the text of his keynote. The first thing I learned was that Dan has been crowned “The Oprah of Newsletters.” I endorse. As one of

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This will sound obvious in 3 years

From Digiday: “Newsletters are the darling of the digital media industry again. Publishers like Axios, Eater, The Guardian, theSkimm and Snopes are either growing or revamping their newsletter offerings, tailoring new emails to specific audiences with more personality-driven content…” This was the one of the most important predictions from my

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Create like an Icelander.

What a month! Thanks so much for all the messages about the new book. For everyone who asked: yes, it will be available physically. I’m working on it now. Here are a few of the things I thought were worth sharing in the meantime. 1. Dan Oshinsky of Inbox

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Everything is an essay.

I get this question a lot. From Tim Stoddart’s personal newsletter: "I love newsletters. They are great businesses, I enjoy writing them, and they are lucrative. However, I’m still unsure about the format. I have two options… Do you prefer the lighthearted and more entertaining style of

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Easier books and handsome home screens

I think there’s still a place for books in 2023. I consider them the place for the “why.” Courses and posts cover the “how.” I’ve been privately updating my 2022 post 35 Lessons from 35 Years of Newsletter Publishing with new lessons, revisions, and research. It’s a