Only A-Listers Say There’s No A-List

by Ben Yoskovitz

It’s a nice notion - that there’s no A-list - but of course there is. And everyone who isn’t on the A-list knows it. There’s even a widget out there to tell you what list you’re on!

Some A-listers may say, “there’s no A-list” to avoid coming off as elitist, and the sentiment is appreciated, but even they recognize an A-list exists.

Every domain of expertise and industry has its authorities. Whether they came to that authority through experience, education, luck, time or a combination thereof doesn’t dissuade from the fact that authorities exist. And then there’s everyone else. The value of their authority is dictated in part by how they got to that position of authority (which is especially true in blogging where bloggers that have been around the longest may have more authority than they really deserve), but we’re not hear to judge value (at least not right now.)

Mack Collier started the Z-list meme as a way of providing some additional recognition for lesser known blogs (specific to marketing.) He asked people to copy and paste the list and add any others they wanted. It was a nice idea; people offer up as much link love as they can to others in an effort to give those bloggers more attention (and traffic, recognition, buzz, etc.)

And it worked. This blog was hovering around 16,000 in its Technorati Ranking before someone put it on the Z-list. It’s now around 8,500 on Technorati. That’s not only because of the Z-list, but that was a huge part of the jump.

Woohoo! 8,500 is right up there! OK, it’s not Top 100, and it’s important to note that my traffic hasn’t gone up noticeably. I do know certain people came to Instigator Blog because of the Z-list (which is great) but I’m not seeing big enough traffic increases to mention them.

The Z-list was doomed to fail.

It was a nice, open idea, but as much as we say the blogosphere is full of nice people (and it is), it’s also full of people that want ever-increase amounts of attention for their own blogs. So people started adding their own blogs to the list. And then the A-Listers got involved. Seth Godin posted the Z-list on his blog (which did result in a good chunk of traffic) and he also created a Squidoo Lens with voting.

Instigator Blog has -6 votes. Well that sucks!

On the Squidoo Lens additional blogs were put on the Z-list, including a number of A-list blogs. The voting suddenly takes a friendly list of Z-list blogs that do deserve more attention to a list of ranked blogs with several A-listers coming up on top.

Seth Godin did respond to what happened with the Z-list by adding a moderator and creating more rules around the voting. A good move on his part. An appreciated move.

Memes are tricky things. Make them too easy and they can certainly become popular, but they may also get buggered like the Z-list. Make them too complicated and they won’t catch on (people want easy!) I’m a big fan of memes and group projects (like the group writing projects I’ve run) because they can be interesting, entertaining and run at the heart of what makes blogging so important: communication and community.

But we also see where memes can go wrong, ideas can be twisted just a bit to take out the original purpose and meaning. Seth put it very nicely when he wrote, “The web is a daily experiment, and this one, like most, was interesting.”

December 31st, 2006
More in Blogging, Online Community
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  • Ben, I think you've hit the nail on the head about what makes your blog sticky. The z-list was a viral blogroll which everyone wants to be on but really doesn't care about anyone else on the list. This in the MySpace world would be a train, collecting as many 'friends' as possible. But in reality, building your blog equity is no different from building your network in real life. You could either be a fast food joint or a great restaurant frequented by discerning patrons. To do latter, you build it one relationship at a time.
  • I agree with you and vernon...

    I would add that "Z-Tags" or something like that might have been better solution. However, I buy into the concept a bit, afterall, there are only a few hundred blogs involved here... it's not like the entire technorati world will change... unless every community within technorati starts to do it.

    Most of us are marketers after all. Who doesn't buy in to the odd pyramid scheme from time to time?
  • Hey, I STILL think it's cool that this even happened. Don't over-analyze! Just be grateful for these little jumps and moments of velocity. Congrats!
  • These are the dynamics of trust, sincerity and other-focus as played out at net-speed.

    What's hot (or liked, or trusted, or popular) starts out as genuinely content-based--a new idea, a new look or feel. People then pile on--people who seek what's hot, or liked, or trusted, or popular--and add more ideas.

    Then it changes. People who want to BE hot, or liked, or popular etc. start trying to work the system. Motives change. Sincerity starts to fall off. The emphasis changes from helping others to get cool stuff (or be cool, etc.), to getting others to buy the stuff. Sales and marketing moves from "check this out" to "buy my stuff." Technology changes from "isn't this cool" to "how fast can I flip it?"

    Rapleaf is a meta-example. Seeking to expand on the eBay and Amazon referral systems to establish trust in vendors, they've pulled out "trust" as a generic, and ask everyone to rate everyone. They even suggest you get your friend to rate your "trustworthiness"--not with respect to a transaction, or any particular context--just in general.

    The simple truth is nobody trusts someone who says "trust me, my friends say they do and I'll say the same about them." That's indistinguishable from a con.

    The thing is, it's hard to scale trust. You do it by narrowing scope, or by increasing context.
  • Thank you for all the comments guys.

    Vernon - I like restaurant metaphor, very apropos.

    Collin - thanks for commenting! Now I've found a new blog *grin* I buy into the concept too - after all, I did participate on this blog and Startup Spark. And I've participated in other memes too. The boost to my Technorati ranking is wonderful, and any good quality traffic that flows will be appreciated.

    Christine - you're right, it was cool. And it's still cool to see it moving forward even with the occasional hiccup. Over-analyze? Isn't that what us bloggers do? *grin*

    Charles - you're right too - trust is hard to scale, it's hard to earn and people will always try to game every system. Rules were made to be broken, right?

    Happy New Year!
  • servantofchaos
    Hey Ben ... I dont know that the Z-list was doomed to fail -- in fact it seemed to have succeeded in its primary goal -- to bring some more attention to those sites that other bloggers feel are under-represented.

    In any marketing exercise, the first step is awareness. The Z-list achieved, and continues to achieve this (and actually I like the fact that it continues to evolve and spread - just at a slower rate - since the Squidoo listing). The next step is all to do with content -- you have an audience, now you need to dazzle them -- and that comes down to content. I am sure I am not telling you anything you dont know.

    The Z-list was a nice burst of attention, and now the hard work of community building begins. And as you say, it is not the volume of the traffic, but its quality. Great discussion ... and nice to find you ;)
  • Gavin - you're right in the sense that it achieved it's first goal: get more people attention. And in fact, even if the attention seems negative or there's a sour taste in people's mouths over the direction the Z-list has taken, it's still attention...

    "Doomed to fail" might be a bit strong (but it grabs attention right? *smile*)

    I think it's more, "doomed to get steered in the wrong direction..."

    Thanks for stopping by and commenting, hope we'll see you back here soon!
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