Yesterday, Facebook, Instagram
and WhatsApp
went down.
These three platforms
were inaccessible.
They could go down
again today.
They could then stay down
for a week, a month,
forever.
We have no control
over this timing
because we have no control
over these platforms.
They aren’t ours.
A couple weeks ago,
client k had a hosting issue.
This site went down also.
It was down for a few days
because I was traveling
and I had other
more business critical priorities.
When I reached stable internet,
I fixed the hosting issue
and the site was restored.
I had control over that
because this is my platform.
I own the domain name
and I have copies of the content.
I have control over
my Romance Novel newsletters also.
I download a list of my subscribers
every month,
keep it in a safe place.
If the newsletter provider goes down,
I can switch to a new newsletter provider
that same day.
If we want to stay in business
online,
we need our own platforms.
Preferably,
we need multiple platforms
– a website/blog and a newsletter,
for example.
We need a place people can find us
when other platforms go down.
We need places that are OURS.
If you don’t already have a place
like that,
put one in place
today.