This is nothing #1

Welcome to This Is Nothing, a special series on Blogfyre devoted to examining content marketing opportunities and solutions. If you’d like to submit something that you think might be Nothing, email it to us with the subject line “Is this Nothing?” and we may feature it here! Matt@bahnfyrepr.com

—

In my many years marketing on the internet, I’ve seen a myriad of tactics that are Nothing. So what does it mean to be Nothing? Well, I’m glad you asked. I deem things as Nothing when they:

• Cost more than they’re worth, either in time or money

• Promise great impact with no infrastructure to produce results

• Generally have no benefit to a marketing strategy.

—

The Subject

So, for the first edition of This Is Nothing, I’d like to examine an email I received this weekend. It was an invitation to be interviewed for a magazine. Initially, I was pretty stoked! This email wasn’t just for me; it was sent to the inbox of a podcast that I cohost. We’ve literally spent the weekend tabling at a local convention and I was really jazzed that we were seeing immediate pay off. But, as I do with all things, I did a cursory Google search. And what I discovered was that this invitation was, in fact, Nothing.

First thing’s first, let me show you the email. I’ve blacked out last names, emails and physical addresses. While I think at least one of those three is fake, no one needs to get doxxed for hustling schlock.

—

The Investigation

Right off the bat, what human being addresses an email like this? Could have used a cohost name, could have just used the podcast name, hell, you could’ve just swapped “Cast” for “Team” and I would have let it slide. But, our email address is “DebateThisCast@...” and clearly that’s as far as they got.

Next, let’s talk about my cursory Google Search. When I typed in “CanvasRebel Magazine,” Google auto-filled “is scam?” So we’re off to a bad start. Anyway, I denied the auto-fill and Googled on. Within the first five hits, I found this reddit thread and this article from Ease Up Consulting. Read through both at your leisure, but to sum them up, CanvasRebel Magazine feels like spam.

I tend to trust the opinions of Reddit and I have to give a second shout out to Ashley from Ease Up because her article did a lot of the heavy lifting for me. Both of those things aside, I still wanted to check out CanvasRebel’s website. You can check it out for yourself, what you’ll find is a field of links just begging to be clicked and about as many pop-up ads as a local news affiliate. You’ll also find ZERO information about the magazine itself, their interview process, their team, or their strategy. I consider all of these must-haves for the website of any journalistic venture.

While we’re at it, let’s talk about the “journalism” of this “magazine.” Their homepage features links to 29 articles all of which have been posted in the last 9 hours. Hey, genuine question, could you write 29 feature length articles in 9 hours? Didn’t think so. The 6 or so of these 29 articles that I opened read as though they were written by the article’s subject through some fill-in-the-blank style form. Last time I’ll reference Ashley’s article on Ease Up’s website, but that article leads me to believe this was exactly how these articles were produced.

Ok. We’ve dissected the email and it sucks, we’ve done a google search and it sucks, we’ve checked the website and it sucks, let’s do our due diligence and check the social media. CanvasRebel’s Instagram, which is linked and featured on their website, has made one post in 2024. I’ll say that again. This digital magazine has made one, singular post on social media this year.

—

Is this nothing?

You bet your sweet ass this is Nothing. Minimal internet presence, minimal effort, minimal benefit. It’s as simple as that. To assess by the three metrics I laid out earlier:

• I don’t know how much time an interview will take, but anytime at all would be an overinvestment for the perceived outcome.

• To CanvasRebels credit, they don’t seem to make any egregious promises about impact upfront, so they get a pass on this one.

• I see no benefit here to a larger marketing strategy.

—

Why would they do this?

This is a question I hear from clients on the daily. “If this is Nothing, why does it exist?” Quick answer: to make money. Websites like CanvasRebel sell ad space for their websites and guarantee advertiser return based on their clickthrough rate. This means the more time someone spends on their site and the more links they click, either the more money CanvasRebel receives from advertisers directly, or the higher they can price their ad space. Once you’ve created a link-dense website, you can hire a click farm (yes, that’s real) to run up your clickthrough numbers. In conclusion, they’re using you to harvest content.

—

Should I do it anyway?

Here’s the M. Night Shyamalan-ian twist to this blog: maybe! Citation in a digital publication can be a good way to validate or legitimize your business. In fact, you can’t start a wikipedia page without having third-party digital sources to reference. If you need a free and easy digital footprint, a CanvasRebel interview may be worth your time! That said, if you expect to gain any more than that, in reach or sales, pass on this opportunity.

Oh, and if they try to make you pay for anything, tell them no.

—

In conclusion

Congratulations CanvasRebel, we here at Bahnfyre PR have determined that you are Nothing! I do not feel bad about saying this. The time I spent on your website to write this blog probably made you a nickel.

---

This Is Nothing is an ongoing feature produced and written by Bahnfyre PR. If you’d like to submit something that you think might be Nothing, email it to us with the subject line “Is this Nothing?”

---

Want more things like this in your inbox?
Join our newsletter!