This article was originally intended for one of my journalistic projects. Earlier this year I was commissioned to write a brief analysis of the German beauty blogosphere; what it looks like, who the main players are and a description of the major trends and dynamics.
Long story short: in the end the company was unable to publish the article because of budget cutbacks so I decided to stick it on this blog, without fancy layout or anything. Please respect my copyright. If you want to quote from the article or otherwise use it commercially, then please have the courtesy of getting in touch with me first.
When I started my initial research for the article I realised that there isn’t much recent market research about the world of German blogging. It is easy to to find official data about German Internet usage and consumption – the percentage of Germans who have access to Internet resources, what online services they use and how often, do they like e-commerce (yes they do!), how many are active in social networks and so on.
The German Federal Statistical Office Statistisches Bundesamt publishes an annual study about German Internet usage, TV channels ARD/ZDF also bring out an annual Onlinestudie and of course there are commercial market research agencies like TNS that commission regular studies about German Internet consumption.
However, there seems to be little hard research about German blogging – how many blogs there are and what kind of rating mechanisms exist, or the effects of FMCG blogs on German consumer behaviour/purchasing patterns. Admittedly this kind of data is hard to track because the German blogosphere is so fluid and fact-moving and even the definition of what exactly counts as a “blog” is difficult.
All I could find were smaller studies authored by social media agencies (and you can argue about the impartiality of such studies since they are, of course, intended to be marketed to clients). And even these studies were several years old. Most of them were published between 2007 to 2010 which roughly coincides with the drastic rise in German language blogging during those years. All of this made the research for the article stimulating and challenging but very interesting. My friend Julia from Beautyjagd.de very kindly helped me out with information on the German blogosphere – thank you!
And here it is: Between Opinions and Advertising: The German Beauty Blogosphere. Feedback is welcome, by the way!
TRENDS. TRAVELS. AND BERLIN 