Last month I went down a “Why bother?” rabbit hole related to my photo-a-day project. Yet that wasn’t the only place where I was asking that question.
Now it is time to look at this website! And its time to ask myself again, why bother?
Life of Mike website
Believe it or not, doing this website takes a lot of time…and money!
This has been a hobby that I have been doing for about 21 years, and while at times it can be tedious, I do enjoy it. And I feel like I have some brand/flow going now.
But all this time and energy, is it worth it anymore?
Costs
The cost of running a website has increased exponentially over the recent years. But this year it is taking the piss!
There are several costs to running a website, which have collectively seen an increase from the previous year by 33%!
The hosting has seen a ridiculous increase of 75% compared to last year, while the security tools have increased by 67%! I wouldn’t mind, but the services have not improved.
While the costs have sky-rocketed, they are still not bad for a hobby. I am sure that there are things that I can do to try and reduce costs, but then I also think that there are things that I need to look at investing in the website to make it better.
I need to sit down and look at the costs properly, and what can be done to sort everything out. All this “back-endy” stuff is not my forte, so I always put it off.
And time
The main cost of creating a website is your time. I know it may look like it, but it’s not just me typing a few words and then posting.
There is the planning process, the draft copy and the rewrites. Then I need to think about the additional content, such as imagery before posting and promoting.
There are at least a few days of work per post. So when you spend a lot of your time creating content, to see little viewership, it can be quite disheartening! Again, why bother?
Viewers
Creating a website means that the content is out there to be seen, and that is the main goal of the site. And at the moment, it’s just plateaued.
Ideally, I would like more viewers to the website, but truthfully do people still read websites like this? They are more interested in TikyTok and shit like that!
Apart from a few friends, is anyone really interested in what this little queer boy has to say?
The fact is, the interweb has changed since I created this website about 21 years ago. I mean, social media was just in its infancy then!
There is still a space for personal websites, but I do feel that it’s more of a niche thing now. So I don’t expect viewership to be in line with the BBC website, but to bother continuing, it would be nice if I could grow it.
Social Media Promotion
As I mentioned previously, social media algorithms are a pile of wank at the moment.
When I share new posts, they are being seen by very little people. So when I try to promote new website posts via these channels, the audience is low.
When sharing with family and friends on Faceache, the interaction is low too. I feel that this is linked to the fact that people aren’t seeing it. We joke, that it can take days to see posts about an event that happened days ago!
Several people have subscribed to my website, but click-through seems low there too.
The chances are people are just not interested in what I am saying. And again that is fine.
Website frustration
The current iteration of the website has been up and running since the beginning of 2021, and if I am truthful, I don’t like it. I never have. It’s not awful, it just doesn’t fit with what I want to achieve.
When you use a Wordpess theme, you can be restricted to what it offers. Then there are the plugins, that you add to the site to help create content. And again, you are restricted to what they offer, and sometimes it does meet with what you have in your head.
I think this is a major ‘why bother’ for me, as I can’t do what I want to do, so just don’t. For example, the Cross-stitch section is not how I envisioned it to look. But after a while of trying to set this up, I eventually did the best I could so I could get the section up and running.
So, all of this can be quite frustrating, because as a developer, what I want to be delivered isn’t happening, and I know that I can do this.
It’s just that I don’t have the time (or energy) to learn how to develop WordPress. Plus, I am not a fan of PHP, so I would rather not learn that language either.
New Website
Ideally, I would want to create a new website, but I don’t want the restrictions that come with using themes or plugins. But I also don’t have the time or resources to learn and build my own WordPress theme.
I am also not sure what I would want my website to look like and how to deliver the content. I just know that I don’t like it at the present moment. I would need to get some advice from a designer on how to proceed from there.
However…is there any point?
As I have been saying, there is a lot of time and money that goes into running the website. This would be additional time and money needed to make the required improvements to the site.
But if I invested that time, would I gain any rewards from it? And right now, I don’t think I would.
What next?
I have set myself a target that if I don’t see a 10% increase in traffic year-on-year, I will rest the website.
Now I have written that out, it’s kind of heartbreaking that something that I have done for about 21 years could be coming to an end!
There is no time to get sentimental about it! The reason to bother isn’t there in the end!