Most of us start blogging and social media marketing with an unbeatable enthusiasm. So did I. Now, when I look back, I laugh at my downright stupid planning. Just because Google Panda loves fresh content doesn’t mean it’s a rule embedded in stone to publish one post every day. Same applies to social media posts. You don’t need to be extremely strict about publishing multiple posts daily. Unless it is a news portal that you need to update with the latest content you can opt out of this practice safely.
The reason it simply makes no sense is that posting every day doesn’t guarantee increase in traffic on your blog. It also doesn’t necessarily translate to more subscribers for your blog.
Moreover, keeping on your toes to get one live can cause the much-dreaded battle fatigue of having to write something. That ‘something’ might not be a value add at all. Written in a rush, it might have no goal, no objective, and no takeaways for your audience. You don’t want to compromise quality for quantity just for the sake of publishing one post per day, right?
Even if you think your blog or social media content topics aren’t something that requires too much thinking, you still would know deep down how boring it can get churning content every single day.
You know that one day you’ll force stop yourself from publishing every day. Now, why not stop this madness before that happens?
Why should you not post content every day
Daily posts in email frustrate subscribers
Every time you publish a post on your blog, your readers receive a notification and email about it. Imagine them being bombarded with one or more such messages from you every day!
When you send them updates that frequently your subscribers will either totally ignore them or simply hit ‘unsubscribe’. Email clutter is already a dreaded phenomenon and adding to it will only frustrate your subscribers.
Don’t make them fret the frequency of your posts. People will be glad to receive two latest posts in one single newsletter sent once a week.
Daily posts don’t necessarily mean more social proof
When you post content on your blog too often you replace the latest content with something new even before a significant reader base has had the chance to interact with the previous content. What happens is that the chances of winning comments, likes, and shares on the replaced content keeps shrinking.
People are habituated to clicking and reading only the first three or four posts on the blog. They don’t expend their energy on browsing any further. Rarely, they go beyond the first page. That’s where publishing every day could hit you hard.
Even if you have written a post just five days ago, it will go unnoticed because now it has been replaced and lost that sweet first-page spot on your blog. No chances of it getting any shares or comments. When this continual replacement keeps happening, none of your posts get enough interactions and social proof.
[bctt tweet=”You *need* social proof to win more subscriber count. (Common sense, guys!) #contentmarketing #inboundmarketing #marketing ” username=”VanhishikhaB”]
Publishing daily causes information anxiety
And, no one wants to be struck with a perplexing, truckload of material to be read and consumed too often. No one reads information instantly. Anything that arrives in the inbox sits there at least for a day before it’s clicked open. Unless it is an urgent work email from their boss or employer. Everyone is pressed for time!
You don’t want that this natural time crunch breaks your bond with your subscribers and that they keep skipping your content. If you really want your readers to click every post open that they receive in their inbox, don’t over-serve.
What will work instead
Consistency vs. Quality – Who wins?
It’s often pointed out that people appreciate content being served on a schedule. Consistency is touted to be what wins readers’ hearts. However, is that really true? How many bloggers have ever received a complaint about a blog or newsletter not published on the normal schedule?
People don’t notice when if you are usually publishing on Monday but break the routine and publish one randomly on a Thursday. It’s not an offense. Neither does it hurt reader sentiment badly.
What does destroy it though is when what you are publishing every day isn’t getting your readers the information they could use and benefit from. If what you are publishing is incredible, no one really minds when you are publishing it.
You could take weeks or even a month between two posts. No regrets.
People already have too much content at their disposal and they’ll not have a reason to complain if at the end of the day they like what you have to say.
Having a plan in place – Focus on ‘Why’ instead of ‘When’
When chalking your content plan out, put the goal column in bold. What does the post mean to achieve? Should you be writing a ‘how-to’ post for your new users? Should you be informing potential subscribers about something? Should you be intermittently posting something to maintain light humor on your blog? All these questions will give a direction to your blog. Once this is all sorted, get to the micro goals. You want more clicks on your posts, for sure. Get serious about headlines.
Chalk out three title options for each post that you have to publish. Make sure the post titles you will be sharing in your email is 41 characters or less. Two other important things that you must include in your plan – focus keywords, and your target audience.
Doing your keyword research before creating content will equip you with the arsenal needed to beat competition right in the face. Focusing on your target audience will see to it that you win long-term readership and not just temporary clicks.
With all these elements checked on your list, your content plan is set to achieve your blogging goals. Most bloggers also list a publishing date on their plan. It’s a good habit to do so but don’t be extremely rigid about it. Yes, in a way it helps ‘you’ stay focused and consistent about your work but from a reader’s perspective, it is okay not to always follow a schedule.
Create value assets instead of plain blog posts
Say yes to case studies. Say even a bigger yes to ebooks and webinars. These are content assets that will ultimately help you win qualified leads for your business. While having a good subscriber base is important, it does not guarantee revenue. So, instead of writing and publishing blog post every day, divert your time and efforts towards spinning excellent content for ebooks, whitepapers, and webinars.
Even if you aren’t too keen on ebooks or webinars, you could make your blog posts a value powerhouse. Wouldn’t your post be of much more insight to your readers if you include ‘expert’ excerpts in it?
Use all that spare time that you have on hand when not publishing every day to interview influencers and use their knowledge to make your blog posts more credible.
Like Rand Fishkin Pointed Out – Write 10X greater
You need your content to cut through the noise and be noticed. That’s a tough job in itself with 2 million blog posts being written every day. What this means is that you have to keep your content from sinking in the black hole by utilizing intelligent content marketing.
You have to write authority content that wins on search, is interesting, gets shared and talked about. 14, 500-word blog posts written a week are no good in being 10x greater than average content. One (1500+ word) blog post can make a difference if interesting, authoritative, and informative. If a single, neatly planned blog post gives 10x value to your readers, what’s the need to write and publish daily?
Ask yourself what your readers really like to read. That’s the only way you can understand what users find interest and value in. Analysis comes into the picture here. Over time, you will be able to cull out data and insights on posts that your readers spend time on and those that they simply bounce off from. Focusing on the most read topics and formats will help you deliver greater value.
Promote more than you publish
The beauty of social media and content marketing is in the fact that it can help you fetch a much larger chunk of readership than organic blog traffic itself. Nonetheless, you shouldn’t be blindly promoting content on every social media platform also.
Honestly, Facebook won’t win a loyal reader base if you are a B2B business. LinkedIn, Growthhackers, Quora, and Medium will. Tweet a lot but on the right communities and with planned networking.
Include click-to-tweets in your copy and follow some of these strategies for excellent Twitter marketing to win the right traffic. You can look for the best content marketing and social media strategies for other platforms too to get the most out of each.
[bctt tweet=”The only way to make content work for you is to focus on promoting it! #inboundmarketing #marketing #contentmarketing ” username=”VanhishikhaB”]
Wrapping it up
While publishing every day all that important, chalking out your post structure and writing rough drafts should be routine to exercise the brain muscle. Also, read daily for steering clear of writer’s block. Once you’ve understood what your audience really wants to read you’ll stop wasting time on anything that isn’t serving the purpose.
Other than the points talked about above, another advice to consider is getting your name out on other blogs. You got that correctly – I mean quality backlinking.
This is a fruitful exercise in winning relevant traffic from quality blogs that already have a good footfall and readership.
What’s your take on publishing content every day?
