This isn’t an article I wished to write down… however right here it goes.
Running a blog as a enterprise mannequin isn’t simply dying—it’s already useless.
In latest months, we’ve seen main blogs shut down, course creators abandon ship, and even individuals who made hundreds of thousands from search engine marketing declare it recreation over.
However right here’s what nobody is saying…
This isn’t nearly Google updates or AI. The way in which folks eat content material has essentially modified, and blogs are not a part of the equation.
So the actual query isn’t simply “Is running a blog nonetheless value it?” It’s “If running a blog is useless, what truly works now?”
Let’s get into it.
Why Even High Bloggers Are Strolling Away
For years, running a blog was an extremely profitable enterprise mannequin. Excessive-ranking weblog posts introduced in regular natural visitors, which might be monetized by means of adverts, affiliate internet marketing, and digital merchandise.
However in 2023, that each one modified. A few of the greatest names in running a blog began pulling out. Even we had been provided over half 1,000,000 {dollars} for our weblog—however we turned it down. After which, issues took a flip.
Site visitors disappeared. Income plummeted. And previous search engine marketing methods stopped working in a single day.
So what occurred?
The Brutal Fact About Why Running a blog Tanked
This isn’t simply one other fluff story just like the hundreds of different clickbaity articles on the web proper now. I’m not going to let you know running a blog is useless, after which later on this publish say… except you do it the way in which I train in my programs.
No. I’m going to present you my actual, trustworthy tackle the state of search engine marketing, content material websites, affiliate internet marketing, and running a blog as a enterprise mannequin.
In the event you’re at present a blogger and also you’ve been holding on optimistically dreaming of your visitors coming again, or should you’re a model new blogger and also you’ve simply put a ton of labor into your new web site… or should you’ve at all times wished to start out a weblog however now I’m sitting right here and shitting all around the total enterprise mannequin… don’t fear.
There IS a silver lining right here. It’s part of this story that nobody is speaking about… a shift that really opens up the most important on-line enterprise alternative we’ve ever seen.
And those that adapt now are going to win greater than ever earlier than.
Be sure to learn to the top of this publish as a result of I’m going to speak about precisely what that shift is and how one can leverage it to blow up your personal on-line enterprise.
So how did we get right here? Why has running a blog taken such a drastic downturn in such a short while? It wasn’t only one factor—it was an ideal storm of adjustments that hit suddenly. In the event you’ve been questioning why blogs are shutting down and search engine marketing methods are failing, listed here are the most important culprits behind the collapse of running a blog as a enterprise mannequin.
1. Google Modified the Guidelines
Google rolled out AI-generated search outcomes, which suggests fewer persons are clicking over to precise blogs. On the similar time, they prioritized boards like Reddit and Quora over impartial web sites.
In the event you seek for one thing like “Finest Journey Credit score Playing cards,” you’re extra prone to see a Reddit thread or TripAdvisor publish on the high of search outcomes than a well-researched weblog article.
And this wasn’t an accident—Google struck a $60 million per yr take care of Reddit to make use of their boards to coach AI fashions. In return, Reddit’s content material will get precedence in search rankings, successfully pushing smaller blogs out of visibility.
This all began with the Useful Content material Replace in 2022, and continued with the Hidden Gems Replace within the fall of 2023. As a substitute of rewarding high-quality weblog content material, Google handed the search outcomes over to boards.
Bear in mind these visitors graphs of your favourite journey bloggers tanking? Properly, Reddit’s visitors elevated by over 650%, hitting 1.3 billion in that very same timeframe. This was no mistake.
For small bloggers, that is devastating. Even should you write one of the best publish on the web, you’re preventing an uphill battle simply to get seen.
2. AI Flooded the Web with Junk Content material
When ChatGPT launched, bloggers didn’t suppose, “How can I take advantage of this to make higher content material?” They thought, “What number of AI-written posts can I publish per day?”
Because of this, search outcomes turned flooded with generic, AI-generated content material. Google responded by rolling out updates that penalized AI-heavy web sites, however even high-quality blogs obtained caught within the hearth.
And right here’s the issue… most bloggers didn’t use AI to enhance their content material, or to assist them analysis their information, or make their websites extra user-friendly—they used it to spam the net.
Because the launch and mainstream adaptation of ChatGPT, analysis exhibits that as many as 7.5 million weblog posts are being printed each single day. The search outcomes have was a wasteland of soulless, regurgitated AI content material. Google knew this was an issue, so their response? Burn all of it down.
Sadly, that meant even high-quality blogs obtained caught within the hearth.
3. Google’s AI Solutions Took Over Search Outcomes
Google now generates AI solutions proper within the search outcomes—pulling info straight from blogs with out sending any visitors again to them.
In the event you search “Finest Locations to Go to in Thailand,” Google’s AI summarizes one of the best choices on the high of the web page. Customers get the data they want with out ever visiting a weblog.
For bloggers, this implies they’re not simply getting buried in search rankings—they’re getting erased from the equation solely.
If UGC and AI spam had been the storm, Google’s AI-generated solutions had been the ultimate tsunami that worn out every part left standing. It’s like taking part in a recreation the place you do all of the work… and another person takes the trophy.
Right here’s the opposite brutal fact nobody is speaking about—even when Google wasn’t killing blogs, shoppers already moved on.
Give it some thought. When was the final time you made a purchase order determination—whether or not it was for a visit, a brand new telephone, or a course—by studying a 3,000-word weblog publish?
You didn’t.
As a substitute, you in all probability:
- Watched a YouTube assessment
- Checked TikTok for fast professionals & cons
- Checked out Instagram reels for real-world examples
- Requested in a Fb or Reddit group for suggestions
- Learn Amazon evaluations and checked testimonials on social media
That is simply how folks purchase now—we would like fast, visible, and trusted info from folks we truly observe and interact with.
You may suppose that this can be a direct results of folks shedding belief in blogs as a result of so many are simply written with AI, however that’s not the case. The reality is, this modification began occurring lengthy earlier than bloggers had instruments like ChatGPT and Claude.
Is search engine marketing Completely Useless?
Not solely—however for many impartial bloggers, it’d as nicely be.
Huge manufacturers with large budgets will nonetheless use search engine marketing. Though ChatGPT just lately turned one of many high 10 web sites on the planet, at present at quantity 7, and is climbing shortly, Google remains to be the god of on-line visitors for now. It’s on the high of that record, so large corporations with some huge cash will nonetheless struggle for these high spots.
However the days of recent bloggers rating with nice content material alone are gone. The struggle for search engine visibility is simply too aggressive, and Google’s fixed algorithm adjustments make it inconceivable to depend on natural visitors.
So should you’re nonetheless attempting to develop your enterprise by means of search engine marketing running a blog in 2025, you’re not simply competing with Google—you’re competing with how folks truly eat content material now.
In the event you’re writing search engine marketing weblog posts and attempting to rank in Google for key phrases…. Cease it.
In the event you’re doing a little variation of that, like attempting to rank for Bing or ChatGPT… Cease it.
In the event you’re engaged on the technical search engine marketing to your web site and attempting to optimize it. Cease it.
It’s an entire waste of time.
There are different issues you need to be engaged on if you wish to construct a sustainable, future-proof enterprise, and we’ll get to {that a} bit later.
What Really Occurred to Our Running a blog Companies (And How We Pivoted)
We nonetheless make passive revenue from our web sites, however solely as a result of we’ve been round for a few years. We have now 4 of them, and (fortunately) they’re nonetheless bringing in over six-figures a yr from adverts and associates.
We’ve invested in search engine marketing and hyperlink constructing through the years, and constructed up our viewers, which gave us some cushioning as every part collapsed.
However we knew we would have liked to pivot years in the past. Greater than 7 years in the past, we realized that we had been placing WAY too many eggs within the running a blog basket.
We relied utterly on Google search engine marketing, Associates, and Advertisements to pay us our wage. But it surely didn’t take lengthy to understand that Advertisements dropped as a lot as 50% seasonally or relying on the political state of affairs, and associates? Don’t even get me began…
I already wrote a publish on how Airbnb cancelled their associates program with out warning, costing us $100,000 per yr. And that was simply one in all MANY occasions that occurred to us.
Principally, we had been making unimaginable cash, however we had no management over our visitors sources, or the revenue coming into our financial institution accounts.
That’s why we began specializing in constructing our e-mail record (a visitors supply that we OWN) and promoting our personal merchandise—one thing we had management over. This took me down a rabbit gap and years of analysis into studying the best way to create an superior course, the best way to promote a course, the best way to create e-mail gross sales automations and funnels, and mainly the best way to earn cash promoting our personal merchandise by means of emails.
That a part of our enterprise was actually profitable and it obtained us to the place we are actually. However now, for the previous 2 years, as a substitute of counting on weblog visitors and search engine marketing to usher in leads, we’re doing it by means of social media.
Now earlier than you say what I used to say again then and be like “I hate social media”, let me let you know that for one, you’re in all probability 40+ like me, and two, that angle will seemingly be the only cause you in all probability received’t have a profitable on-line enterprise in 5 years.
What This Means for the Way forward for On-line Enterprise
Running a blog is not a viable enterprise mannequin, however that doesn’t imply on-line enterprise is useless. In actual fact, there has by no means been a greater time to construct a worthwhile enterprise.
One of the simplest ways I can clarify that is by means of a browsing analogy. No, I’m not a surfer, however simply bear with me for a minute…
We had been using this large wave of search engine marketing and Running a blog. We made hundreds of thousands of {dollars} on that wave and on the time, we thought it was one of the best wave within the sea.
However whereas we had been cruising on that wave… a much bigger, extra lovely, and extra sustainable wave was constructing momentum behind our wave.
That wave was Social Media.
In enterprise, it’s a must to know when to get off the wave. As a result of should you journey it too lengthy, it’ll crush you. And in companies that contain know-how, these waves can come extraordinarily shortly.
Within the tech panorama, the search engine marketing wave was like a large tidal wave. It lasted SO lengthy, and we’re extremely grateful for that.
However now, the brand new wave is right here, and it’s been right here for a very long time, us older technology simply didn’t see it.
The Way forward for On-line Enterprise: Social Media, Digital Merchandise, and E-mail Advertising
If running a blog was the previous wave, social media is the brand new one. And it’s the most important alternative for natural visitors and monetization we’ve ever seen.
This wave is the most important alternative we’ve ever seen within the on-line world:
- It’s the most important alternative to construct a large viewers without cost
- It’s the most important alternative for natural visitors
- And it’s by far the most important alternative to monetize and make hundreds of thousands of {dollars} from promoting digital merchandise
1. Construct an Viewers with Quick-Kind Video
Platforms like Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts are the place persons are consuming content material now. As a substitute of writing 3,000-word weblog posts, creators are constructing large audiences by means of short-form video.
2. Promote Your Personal Digital Product
In contrast to running a blog, social media enables you to monetize quick—if in case you have the proper product. As a substitute of incomes $0.002 per customer by means of adverts, you possibly can promote a $37 digital product and make actual cash immediately.
Folks like Natalie from Boss Babe have revamped $100,000 per 30 days promoting a easy digital product. And we all know of a lady who revamped 1,000,000 {dollars} in a yr from her tiny viewers of lower than 3,000 folks.
This simply wasn’t doable with running a blog. There may’ve been some off likelihood that you just obtained picked up by an enormous TV community or one thing and also you went viral in a single day, however for 99.9% of bloggers who had been simply writing weblog posts for search engine marketing, it might take months, usually years, earlier than they’d see any revenue.
Even me. I constructed a fly fishing web site from $0 to $8,400 per 30 days in a single yr. However for the primary 6 months, it earned subsequent to nothing. And I knew what I used to be doing!
3. Use E-mail Advertising to Automate Gross sales
Your weblog must be an internet site—not a content material hub. It ought to:
- Construct authority
- Seize emails
- Promote your product
E-mail advertising and marketing is the place the actual cash occurs. By main social media followers to a freebie, you possibly can construct an e-mail record that nurtures leads and automates gross sales.
After all, you possibly can’t simply become profitable on social media by posting humorous cat movies. You create extremely focused content material that speaks to a selected individual, helps them obtain a selected transformation, and that content material sends them to your e-mail record the place they enter their title and e-mail to get your tremendous beneficial freebie.
It’s from that freebie, and from the magic of e-mail advertising and marketing that you just’re in a position to promote your digital product to them and become profitable on autopilot.
Look, making $17 on a $500 Airbnb reserving was nice, and incomes 0.002 cents per customer on our weblog was additionally cool, however there’s nothing like the sensation of waking up and seeing that somebody bought your $500 course or your $4,000 teaching program. It’s validation, it’s thrilling to have the ability to have a actual impression and assist folks, and it’s the primary steps in constructing an actual, loyal group.
The Future is Right here—And It’s Not Running a blog
Running a blog was an unimaginable enterprise mannequin, however occasions have modified. Google and AI have made it practically inconceivable for brand new bloggers to succeed the way in which we did years in the past.
However that doesn’t imply the chance is gone. It’s simply moved.
Writing search engine marketing blogs had change into monotonous and boring. Ask any profitable blogger, we had been uninterested in writing the ten greatest issues to do in Bangkok and the 15 greatest funds microwaves.
Do I miss the passive revenue from running a blog? Completely, however that very same passive revenue is on the market with short-form video and nice e-mail advertising and marketing.
Blogs take a TON of labor. So to do all that work simply to have a Google Algorithm replace or AI utterly wipe you out in a single day? That’s simply not value it.
The longer term is short-form video. The longer term is making a beneficial product. The longer term is having an epic e-mail record that folks love being subscribed to. The longer term is being an actual human being, and actually connecting along with your viewers on-line.
That is the long run. And the individuals who embrace this shift now are going to win large.
If you wish to construct a enterprise that really works in 2025, give attention to short-form video, digital merchandise, and e-mail advertising and marketing. That is the way you create an actual, future-proof enterprise.
In the event you’re able to cease losing time on outdated methods and begin constructing a worthwhile enterprise, seize our free coaching under that exhibits precisely how we—and our purchasers—are doing it.
The largest on-line enterprise alternative we’ve ever seen is going on proper now. The one query is—are you going to take it?
