7 Decisions to Make About Your Posting Frequency
Conflicting advice is everywhere on the Internet. Write more! Write less. Post frequently! Don’t post often. Get hits! No, wait, get readers! No, no, get noticed!
(groan)
So how often should you post? Well, that depends on the goals of your blog and your purpose for blogging.
One of the first bits of marketing advice we received when our blog began was to “blog the snot out of it.” From an SEO perspective, that made perfect sense. Banging the Internet mercilessly with keyword-rich content would push up our page rank.
But was that really what we wanted? Or needed?
Here are seven decisions (and a bonus!) to make that will help you figure out whether you should blog like a fiend or pull back to a more moderate pace.
- Decide how much value you can feasibly offer to readers based on the frequency of your posts. If daily posting makes you feel like you’re slamming out content just to have a post each day, cut back. Create better posts with plenty of value and publish them a few times a week. Cutting back often brings great results.
- Decide whether page rank is a first or second priority. (Check out number 4 on John’s list of Seven Habits of Highly Successful Bloggers.) If you want your PR to rise for certain keywords, then you do need to create multiple posts often. Write shorter, keyword-rich posts that still provide value to your reader. Quantity over quality never wins.
- Decide what your readers prefer. Overkill can kill your popularity. Many people are getting tired of having to read so much from their favorite blog. They often ask that the blogger post less so they can keep up. Observe reader stats, ask questions, and post accordingly.
- Decide how involved you’d like your readers to be. Posting frequently may drive commentators away. If you want to establish a blogging community, post at a slower pace so that readers can discuss and comment before they move on to the next topic of conversation.
- Decide how much free time you’d like for yourself. If you want to take weekends off, you won’t be available to respond to comments and keep the discussions alive, so publish your posts around the days that you are available to be involved.
- Decide why you’re blogging in the first place. Are you blogging to market and promote your business? Is your blog a personal one where you jot down your thoughts? Business blogging requires more consistent, regular posting. Personal blogs are looser and less rigid in posting frequency.
- Decide what you prefer. If you resent blogging so often or you feel like you aren’t blogging enough, do something about that. Too much blogging burns out creativity. Infrequent blogging kills interest (both your own and your readers’). Figure out how much you’d like to post – and then do it.
BONUS TIP:
Decide if you can afford to blog. Often, bloggers balance posting with work that earns far more income. Those that invest too much time in blogging soon see that the quality of their work suffers or that they’re getting worn out burning the candle at both ends. If you need to earn a living, your time needs to go towards making money first and blogging second.
No matter what posting frequency you finally settle on, it’ll be successful if you focus on building a great blog. John Chow put together a great list of Ten Blogging Mistakes to Avoid. Note that John doesn’t recommend posting more or posting less…
…Just post better. That’s all.
14 Responses to “7 Decisions to Make About Your Posting Frequency”
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This certainly seems to be the topic of the week in the blogosphere, and you, James, have nailed it. Your advice is a timely reminder that each of us needs to figure out what works and it’s not always the same for everyone.
I needed to read this one, great post. I am considering using some of these for one of my blogs
I find that it’s also really helpful to have more than one contributor to our blog. The readers get different perspectives, and neither one of us feels like we have to push to come up with topics in order to keep up. I think it creates a nice posting pace and a good balance for the bloggers, too.
@ Lorna – Yup. It’s nice when Harry posts and he enjoys when I post (though I’m more prolific with posts than he is). Gives each of us a break. We see things very differently, too. But I don’t understand what you mean by multiple posters creating a posting pace? Or did you mean that multiple posters reduces the need to post?
@ Jorge – Thank you.
@ Melissa – Yup. I think too many bloggers feel there are some hard rules to posting frequency and there really isn’t. It’s figuring out what works for you and your blog.
Sadly, I am not the posting bunny James is. I over-think everything. Most of the time is spent trying to come up with topics no one else is doing. Sometimes you have more impact if you don’t say a lot. Take for example Shane & Peter, or the comic duo, Penn & Teller, each pair has one vocal partner and one quiet partner. When the quiet guy speaks up, everyone stops to listen. For us quiet guys, it’s not how much you say, but how and when you say it.
I don’t know if less posts will help my productivity, it might give me more time to procrastinate.
I wrote about this a few months ago, when I was still trying to figure out the frequency thing. I since decided that I was going to stick to a three-times-a-week schedule mainly for my own sanity. I’m not one of those writers who can really write anything quickly–I tend to want to go overboard with everything I do–and I knew I’d drive myself crazy on a once-a-day schedule. Still, the blog is doing really well, and I’ve since heard from some readers who say they’d rather people posted a few times a week and not daily–it makes it easier for them to keep up.
You write excellent posts, Jen, and it’s clear that you’ve taken the time to think them through and craft them well. Personally, I’d rather read more from you than your current pace.
True about the recent craze that usually starts with, “Oh god I’m tired of reading blogs.” I’m hearing that more often all over the place – and with many people having 300 blogs to read a day, I can understand why!
It’s really a question of figuring out what works for you and what works for readers. We’ll get there, and thanks for your input
I meant that I think it makes for a nice number of posts going up on the blog each week. We put out a pretty good amount of information without innundating readers with a zillion posts in their feed readers.