The Bored Meeting

Adam Turinas - CEO of Messing About In Sail boats: "We need to talk. We have a bit of a crisis on our hands. After consecutive months of growth, Messing About In Sailboat’s traffic is flat. More concerning, the number of sites linking to us has dropped off a cliff. Our Technorati ranking dropped from 42 to 28. What the hell is going on guys?"

Adman Tunasalad, Marketing Director: "Oh, I wouldn’t worry too much about it.  It’s probably a seasonal thing."

CEO: "Seasonal? 33% fewer sites link to us."

Marketing Director: "Well, I have to admit it, this is a little worrying. At first, I thought that it was a few of those zombie spam sites disappearing and there was a rash of sites that stopped operating."

CEO: "And…"

Marketing Director: "Maybe it’s a content thing. You know. Maybe people don’t like us that much anymore."

Adrian Torinos, Editor In Chief: "Oh, I hardly think that's the problem. Look we were ranked as a Top 10 site by The Tillerman, not to mention that nice Mr Rouse’s Popeye Award last year. And we got that award from Platial for the Map. And don’t forget that we had that article published in Lats and Atts. Oh no! We have a very sound editorial policy."

CEO: "Which is what exactly?"

Editor In Chief: "We find nice photos we like on Flickr and then we post them on our site. You know, sailboats, old guys with beards and dogs. The dogs on boats thing is very clever. Everyone likes dogs. Then on Fridays we find a nice music video from Youtube and we post that."

CEO: "Do we ever write anything any more?"

Editor In Chief: "Oh yes. We have lots of writing projects. We have the Saving the Planet thing and don’t forget we are commemorating the Golden Globe. It’s their 40^th anniversary, you know."

CEO: "And how are these going?"

Editor In Chief: "To tell the truth…"

CEO: "That would be a refreshing change…"

Editor In Chief: "…We haven’t really followed up much on the Saving the Planet thing."

CEO: "And why is that?"

Editor In Chief: "Well, it was hard. You know doing something green every week was tough."

CEO: "And…"

Editor In Chief: "I got bored."

CEO: "And what about the Golden Globe"

Editor In Chief: "Well, that’s pretty boring too. And I am pretty busy too with my son’s rugby team blog and the, you know… the …er job thing."

CEO: "So what you’re saying is that since we got those awards, we have pretty much depended on ripping off other people’s photos, posting some crappy old videos from Youtube and we haven’t written anything worth a damn for six months."

Editor In Chief: "Well, when you put it like that..."

CEO: "Lets face it, we have become boring! B-O-R-I-N-G. Dull, dull, dull. I am bored even talking about this. We don’t write anything original anymore. Anyone have any ideas?"

Marketing Director: "I have an idea that I want to run up the flagpole. Thought I would throw it in the pot and see if the cat licks. It’s wild and crazy. It could be big. Why don’t we run some ads on Facebook."

Editor In Chief: "Here’s a radical idea. Are you sitting comfortably? OK, get this. How about pictures of cats on boats. Now THAT would be cool."

Marketing Director: "How about a competition? Maybe name that Sea Shanty."

CEO: "You're fired."

Editor In Chief: "Pigs on boats?"

CEO: "Oh, for the love of all that’s holy! Now this is what we are going to do. From now on, we won’t post anymore random pictures without a point of view about them. No more music videos without something vaguely interesting to say about them. We will start writing again. We won’t post as much as we used to. We may go weeks without a post but we are going to get back to why we started this blog in the first place. We are going to post stuff we like about sailing. We are going to share stuff that’s worth sharing and we are going to stop shoveling crap out there on a daily basis because we think we have to. Above all we are going to have fun with it. If it's not fun, we won't do it."

Editor In Chief: "So the cat thing is a no? Just checking."

CEO: "Aaaaaaaaaagh!"

Comments

[Christy]

Love ya! Mean it!

(And I'll give you a dollar if you actually find and post a photo of a pig on a sailboat.)

~Christy~

[Elizabeth]

I love it too! It's hard to keep a blog going with new content, but I read yours everytime you post something. Why not post about what other boats are doing? You could subscribe to their newsletters and then write about what sailboat owners/businesses are doing. Just a thought ;-)

[JP]

So thats a no to cats on boats then? :(

I know the feeling - creating good content is time consuming and doing something interesting which could write about also time consuming.

Suggest new plan:
1) win lottery
2) retire
3) use time to do lots of interesting water related fun stuff and then write about it

I've got a series of posts have been wanting to do last few months but not enough time to do them justice (yet)

[vikings]

Four words:

Hot Girls in Bikinis

[Adam Turinas]

Wayyyy too much competition for that

[vikings]

start with:

http://www.sjoukjebredenkamp.nl/site/wp-content/uploads/2007/04/pic7.jpg

[tim]

I like Cats; and boats. So what's wrong with Cats on boats?

[Edward]

In case you're wondering, preparing to cross an ocean doesn't give you the tons of extra content you'd expect. I'd go with the sea shanty thing.

[Johnny Tarr]

I don't know about boring. I am so new to sailing that anything I can find is a real help. I mean without the dedication of people like you what would I have to read every morning?

[Carol Anne]

Send me money to replace the camera that broke, and I'll send you a picture of a Maine Coon Cat on a Laser II.