Trade Blogs Should Recognize Trade Blogs

As a trade blogger I'm always interested in other trade blogs, whether they're focused on entertainment or on business, that's while you'll find both music industry and business blogs listed in my sidebar link lists. Not all of them carry news or commentary to which I'd link at ProHipHop, but they provide a sense of the range of material I consider in putting this blog together and the kinds of sources that inform my commentary at ProHipHop. They also represent my interest in building the trade blog scene, because I think that's a really cool phenomenon.

One of the things I find worth paying attention to is who picks up on what I'm doing and who doesn't. For example, I simply assumed that the Coolfer kids would be interested since they are into "music and the industry" but my emails were ignored back when I was trying to reach out and there were a couple of writers active at that blog.

B to B blogger David Shaw at B or Not 2B got it right away. However, I'll have to admit that he caught me on a good day cause I definitely have my ups and downs.

I was a little surprised that Rich Westerfield of the Trade Show Marketing Report seemed a bit bemused by his inclusion in my business link list, which I can understand if you don't check out my blog for things like Conference coverage. Although I haven't done as much as I'd like of that kind of thing, I do see covering industry gatherings as an aspect of ProHipHop's mission.

On the other hand, since he's obviously an intelligent man who says that he "decided to create the TSMR blog to bring to light interesting thoughts on technologies and strategies in B2B and consumer marketing that could work for event marketing", I would think he would see connections to hip hop that go beyond my own interests. The reality is, the people from outside of hip hop who check me out the most, some of whom are starting to contact me for interviews, are mostly involved in marketing or are journalists writing about marketing.

However, I should make it clear that I'm not trying to give Mr. Westerfield a hard time. The truth is, I tend to make connections between things that other people don't and sometimes my explanations are convincing and sometimes they're not. Nevertheless, I think that trade bloggers should raise their awareness of each other and do what they can to support each other's work because we're doing something new, in many respects. We could all benefit as individuals from some simple group awareness.

Think about it guys and gals and feel free to be in touch on how we can build together:
clyde(at)prohiphop(dot)com

Update: David Shaw of B or Not 2B wrote about this post and about Rich Westerfield's off the cuff reaction saying:
"The community of b2b bloggers is woefully small, as I've noted in the previous post. And that's why it's incumbent on those of us doing it to encourage as much quality b2b blogging as possible. . . I'm not in the HipHop business, but I read Clyde's blog regularly, for his insights into business and business media."

Since then Rich has dropped comments both here and at David's blog letting us know that, understandably, he just didn't immediately catch the connection between what we're doing. Actually, ProHipHop seems to catch a lot of people by surprise and I can see why the relationship to a blog on trade show marketing would be a puzzler.

I'm glad to say our blogged dialogue has been another small but positive step in building the rather odd world of trade blogging.

Comments

[Rich Westerfield]

I have to get in the habit of doing more ego checks... only coincidentally stumbled onto David's post which led me back here.

As I mentioned on David's blog, I had a referrer from ProHipHop, first time I'd seen one. I was surprised, so I took a look around trying to find any references other than the blogroll and didn't see anything. Obviously I missed noticing your entire 'conference' category.

I'm still amazed daily at who reads my stuff. Shows the paucity of commentary on trade shows, I suppose.

Anyway, no disrespect intended. Was just pointing out one of those oddities of the blogosphere in my usual glib manner. Upside is I found another place that carries out-of-the-ordinary conference coverage that may be worth commenting on at a later date.

[Clyde Smith]

I can fully understand how that happened and it's all good. I'm glad I'm on your radar now.