The Steampunk Explorer launched on March 6, 2018, and against all odds, we’re still here seven years later, with a spanking new website that we unveiled in December.
It helped that I had no grand ambitions to build a publishing empire. That’s actually been key to the site’s endurance.
Serving the steampunk community has many rewards: It’s a blast to go to steampunk events and to interact with so many creative people whose interests align with my own.
This is a wonderful subculture, but the harsh reality is that it is not the kind of community that can sustain a serious, profit-making media business. In fact, that’s part of its charm.
First, steampunk is relatively small. To take one example, look at how it compares to anime fandom. I’m sure we’d love to have the steampunk equivalent of Crunchyroll or the Anime News Network, but if you add up paid attendance at every steampunk event in the U.S., it’s probably less than the tally at one medium-sized anime convention.
If I approached this as a serious business, I’d also be looking at advertising potential. But steampunk is a grassroots community served by independent artists and entrepreneurs, not large corporations that would typically be the most reliable advertisers. Moreover, many steampunk artists make apparel and accessories that are most effectively sold in-person at events, not through online advertising or e-commerce sites.
This means that anyone who has dreams of becoming a publishing magnate is going to look elsewhere. But it turns out that steampunk is well suited for folks like me who see a publication as a passion project.
The steampunk community may be small, but it has the ideal scale for a solo operator with free time on his hands. There’s enough activity to keep me reasonably busy, but not so much that it’s overwhelming. And covering such a creative grassroots community is much more rewarding than attending corporate trade shows and press briefings.
Given the economics, none of this would be possible if I had to hire designers, web developers, etc. to produce the site. Fortunately, I’ve picked up enough of those skills to do pretty much everything myself with minimal expense.
This gave me a lot of leeway to avoid practices that I personally find annoying on other websites, such as clickbait headlines, intrusive pop-ups, and ads that masquerade as editorial content — all serving to squeeze every possible penny from readers and advertisers.
Because I’m not single-mindedly focused on search-engine optimization, I also have the luxury of writing stories in a way that serves the interests of my audience as opposed to SEO algorithms. (Despite that, the site does well in search rankings because there aren’t many other sources of steampunk news.)
Many readers would probably be surprised at the extent to which SEO drives content decisions on many sites. One previous client of mine (which shall remain nameless) encouraged writers to begin their stories with long meandering preambles, on the theory that this would improve “stickiness,” the amount of time people spend reading the stories. Sometimes, you’d have to wade through two or three paragraphs just to learn what the story was about. A site like that might score points with Google, but what about the folks who have to waste so much time reading the stories?
Sadly, these practices have made the web a less pleasant experience for many users. But I’m not going to let it happen here.
Looking ahead, I have more new features in mind, including expanded directories of steampunk creators. And though The Steampunk Explorer remains a passion project, I will be looking at ways to generate more income, as long as it doesn’t compromise the site’s credibility or user experience. A big part of that will involve expanding the audience.
Although I produce most of the content on my own, I’ve had plenty of help from guest contributors, including Curt Knapp, Craig Jenkins, Clara Blackheart, Bill Nesbitt, Professor Elemental, and, more recently, Kit Catlett and Bel Briar. Thanks to all of them, and to all our readers for staying with us over the past seven years.
