Thinking more about this blog post from Nick Radcliffe about effectively rebranding Micro.blog. I want to turn Micro.blog into a sort of bundle (think Apple One) because it does several things. But I don’t know if I can give up the “micro” name as much as redefine it. Small name. Big features. 🙂

@manton IMO transitioning to Macro.blog makes the most sense without making it feel disconnected from the original brand. Even if you go for some other name, I fully agree with Nick that Micro.blog does not make sense as a name for all that it does.

@manton Could you not have your own “Alphabet” and the micro name is retained within? You have microblogs, longform blogs, podcasts, notes, book tracking, photo pages, etc… many individual items that could just fall under certain packages just like your reference to “Apple One”, please just don’t charge me $45 a month.

@manton the Micro.blog macro bundle/featureset …

@manton Macro.blog takes a macro view of the web.

@manton Agree about the ‘micro’ part. But in fact, I would move away from ‘blog’. It’s an antiquated term. The term among the masses evokes CMS-like interface and a semi-professional setup. Compared to how it started, blogs are now considered ‘informal news’ sections of corporations, organizations, large groups, etc. What we, in the Micro.blog, community mean by blogging is writing and sharing. Smarter minds will come up with a pithy term.

@manton - I feel the “micro” name is ?well? known. Gaining similar recognition for a new name will take time and be possibly costly, it also may not be as successful as you’d like. Personally I really like the “micro” name.​

@timapple We will never charge $45/month. Strongly feel the pricing should be accessible to almost everyone. (Even $5 is tough in some parts of the world.)

@moonmehta Thanks. Someone else already got macro.blog so that’s out at least, for better or worse. 🙂

@pratik @manton I think you make a good point here, it could be the blog part that is off putting. There is a certain stigma associated with blogs in the wider world, I know I prefer to refer to my blog as a personal website because it’s received much more “normally” than a blog is. I think the hub angle from the current home page is probably more marketable than the blog angle. Creating your own website is daunting, I think you can help take away a lot of the stress and anxiety with what you have already got.

@Ianbradbury Thank you, that’s really helpful feedback.

@manton I have faith in you Manton, I was picking on Apple not you.

@philbowell Yup. I also like to consider my ‘microblog’ as my personal website. I like the ‘hub’ angle because we do collect all things digital

@manton I think ‘micro’ is the unique hook that everything could hang off: Micro blog, Micro note, Micro cast, Micro book etc. And with ‘micro’ as the collective name, blogs can be seen as long or short! Furthermore, ‘micro’ is then positioned in opposition to ‘big tech’.

@Ianbradbury @manton I really like the micro name, too. As in, my little space on the internet. But I can see how it’s confusing for people who don’t look into all of Micro.blog’s features.

@manton Suggest looking at it from the point of view of the person you want to be using the product. And then if you find something compelling, something a lot of people want to do that your technology can do, think of the features and product name so that it conveys your values relative to that idea. I can explain the choices I’ve made for most of my products over the years, not saying they all worked, but some of them did. I learned this by reading books about marketing and positioning, and having a father who taught marketing at the university b-school level (and he loved my outliner so shared a lot of his thinking for free).

@manton One of the best features of micro.blog is that it makes almost no distinction between short-form microblogging posts and long, structured posts. They’re all just posts. (Mastodon, Bluesky and Threads force a distinction between the two types of posts, but that’s a whole ‘nother issue. I don’t know if Micro.blog can do anything about that. Extending ActivityPub and AT to support HTML and embedded images and other media would be a big help.)

I would not want to see a wall put up between Micro.blog’s support of microblogging and macroblogging.

If Micro.blog wants more visibility, it needs to do marketing, PR and advertising. That’s it. That’s the whole formula. Changing the messaging will do nothing if the messaging is not getting out. Manton, get yourself on podcasts other than Core Intuition. Pitch some of your ideas to The Verge — Nilay Patel loves the Fediverse. Pitch yourself to talk about whether blogging can make a comeback and replace or augment corporate social media. Get yourself into the local Austin news media.

@manton ‘Micro’ also suggests microcomputer, the 80s and a more experimental and optimistic time in terms of personal technology… and for Brits my age, the BBC Micro. ‘Micro’ is the thing!

@manton My own two cents which I have shared with you privately that you solve a problem a lot of people have for which there is no good solution, writing for cross-posting to lots of social networks. This is functionality where you are leading the market, but have buried it in a very feature-rich environment. It’s hard for people to discover it. But once pointed at it, they seem to figure it out. It should be much easier and more direct and not be part of the micro.blog brand. It should have a name that conveys the simplicity and ease of use people want in that function. Today they’re ALL doing it by hand. Think of all the gratitude out there to be had. Just my thought. Worth about $0.02. ;-)

@paulrobertlloyd I like that! Now lost on the web reading more about the BBC Micro…

@paulrobertlloyd @manton I really like the idea of Micro being the „company“ name. Like Meta. And then you have a bunch of interconnected products. And the dot is just your company’s quirky way of writing the product name. Micro.blog. Micro.photos. Micro.bookmarks. Etc.

@AlexKucera @paulrobertlloyd Thanks! If only Amazon would let us use .book, we’d be in business.

@manton I think you can fix this with better copy and a few tweaks to the UI.

Of the folks I’ve pitched on joining MB, they didn’t see it as a “real” alternative to their existing site because the app doesn’t show things like categories or save as draft, which they’d use frequently.

@manton I agree that the name belies the breadth of “internet things you should have for yourself” you offer. TBH, if you think your marketing isn’t hitting, don’t listen to people like Nick (no offense). You have to talk to people who you think would be your customers, and find the words they use.

@manton I appreciate that you emphasize blogging and have the word “blog” in the name. I love everything you have done with it. I hate how WordPress has become essentially portal and commerce software.

@briandigital Not sure we’re disagreeing. I wasn’t suggesting any particular names seriously.

@manton Some years ago, I did think you should change the name. But here I was only suggesting an additional brand. I don’t think you should abandon the name now….at least, not unless/until another is much more successful.

@njr I’m not disagreeing with any of your opinions. I’m just offering that successful product marketing is based on your target market’s language. You and I are people who understand the current pitch, which puts outside of the target, is all.

@njr personally I think “micro.blog” is too great a domain to leave behind. I would think the marketing challenge to solve is what Manton is circling which is explaining “it’s so much more than microblogging”—for me it’s “indieweb for the rest of us”—I have zero confidence that would help, though.

@njr Got it. 👍

@bloftin2 I’ve noticed the same trend on the WordPress side. It’s used a lot for marketing sites, online stores, and whatnot, and maybe less for blogs.

@pratik I’m beating the drum of “Social media is just blogging!” oddevan.com/2024/09/2…

@oddevan I agree. In fact, social media made “blogging” more accessible (for better or for worse). Also, it removed the friction of needing a title, choosing a category/tags, agonizing on the structure, and whether you covered all bases. All these made the common person more resistant to blogging. At the same time though, now I wish for “social media” platforms support rich text and hyperlinks for those who want to be more purposeful even in their short posts, and letting us choose where to share it and who should see it. Micro.blog comes the closest for me hence I’m now fiddling and tweaking how I use it to read others’ writing and share my writing.

@pratik Lol I stopped using categories when i was using WP, and just used tags. No reason to use both.

@oddevan I’ve decided I much prefer the term “platform decay!” Thanks for that! lol.

@ladyhope I know I know but if there’s something people are tempted to use it. Don’t get me started on the Yoast SEO plugin that everyone had

@ladyhope it was on the Wikipedia page…

And also I’m trying to get a job right now and also I have friends that are kids and I want their parents to let them watch the video 😇

@manton who are you trying to reach with rebranding/repackaging?

@Annie To be honest I’m not sure. I don’t plan to rename Micro.blog, but I think we could reach some people more effectively if major parts stood on their own. For example, with the companion apps like Epilogue and Strata.

@manton I’m not a marketer, but due to being someone who makes their living as a writer in the 21st century I’ve had to think about marketing a lot. And I think that’s probably a pretty important question, who you want to reach. it determines the language that will work.

​fwiw, I think micro.blog is really special in the best possible way. I have a note (thanks, Strata!) that’s just an informal kind of list of things I like about M.b. It fills a certain niche that’s not “blogging platform” and is also not “twitter alternative.” It’s something in between, and defining that is a challenge, for sure, because anything that doesn’t fit a predefined category is by its very nature difficult to categorize and thus difficult to explain. We’re always looking for ways to shortcut understanding by plugging things into known categories, that’s just the brain saving energy. But I’d hate for M.b to be shortchanged by forcing itself into a category when it is both more and less (again, in a good way–being ‘less’ than Wordpress is being less friction-filled, being ‘less’ than Twitter is being less antagonistic and stress-filled) than the defined categories. What’s really beautiful and valuable about M.b to me is that it doesn’t fit in any of these predefined categories precisely. It is its own thing. Some of us will immediately recognize that “thing” as something we’ve been looking for, and be really happy to find it. Others will need a bit more education and a lot of terminology equating, and that’s the tricky part. But just so you know: I value, immensely, what you’ve built here. You’ve added enormous joy and meaningful connection to my life, and I really appreciate the work you’ve done and continue to do.

I don’t really have any advice h​

@Annie …don’t really have any advice that’s actionable, but I’m sure you’ll figure out the best next move.

@manton As others have mentioned already, I think it would be a mistake to give up on the micro.blog name.

Good naming is hard, really hard. The name «micro.blog» encapsulates so much of what the core service is. It has the «why didn’t I think of that?» feel to it.

@manton micro is a fantastic name and you could expand that. But I would go back to the core of what you want to achieve if it’s audience reach I think a rebrand is not the way, I see people going nuts for the new app Croissant and all I could think was yeah but micro.blog does that and more and wondered why for example of relay connected they didn’t even mention you… so I think it’s marketing and comms not branding

@timapple @manton I totally agree with Tim here. Micro.blog has a brand already established, and I think changing that may cause more harm for long-term growth than good. I would look at establishing a parent brand that Micro.blog falls underneath similar to Tim’s reference of Alphabet.

@manton I think the name is fine. I’ve had an account since the kickstarter but confess I didn’t fully grok exactly what it was until about a third of the way through reading the book. If someone had explained POSSE in a sentence to me, then said “…and Micro.blog does that”, I think I would’ve ramped up much sooner.

“Micro.blog: write here, automatically publish everywhere!“​ might have gotten me over the hump.

@Annie Thank you so much!

@manton Maybe it would pay to do some Market Research via a simple form among recently signed on members. I joined in January, knowing only that I could use my own domain name and that it was $5 a month for a blog. l learned about all the extra stuff along the way - Fediverse integration, cross posting, multiple blogs, the extra apps. You can use the data to see what new people of ignorant of and market off of that, or you couple play to your strengths when you see what it is that brought them in.

@manton Ditto for newsletters nowadays.

@manton I like his second suggestion, but maybe there's a third one. Instead of a new product, why not just redoing the current home page with a slogan or design playing with the “micro” word in contrast to all that M.b can do. I'm terrible with slogans, but something similar to: "It's a micro blog, but a complete solution". And the page would highlight all the features. Maybe even several yellow chat balloons describing each one 😊

@manton There’s not much in the interface and user experience that suggests the long form capabilities of micro.blog. Hope you keep on considering this idea (till it becomes a reality)!

@manton One dichotomy I notice in the many features of M.b is between interaction and publishing. The main information I see when I log in is my feed, not my blog; maybe a different balance would highlight more features?

@micahrl That’s an interesting observation. Will think on that, thanks.

@manton I personally really like what you’ve built with the micro.blog name and brand. I work in marketing and over time arrived at the opinion that the name of the thing really doesn’t matter. It’s all about how you talk about it and explain what it is. That’s what I would work on, if anything!

@SimonPeng Thanks! That’s a great point.

@manton There are very few options for non-technical people to participate on the internet. The choices have devolved to joining one of the social network gangs or buying an expensive storefront in the hopes of hacking “online marketing and commerce tools” into some semblance of what they actually want. Micro.blog’s human-centric services are, in my opinion, your biggest differentiators. There’s a myriad of ways to attract new people but what helps keep them here are the tools that allow them to easily and reliably do what you offer. That’s what I feel you should continue to lean into.