Digital marketeers, (so-called) social media gurus, bloggers, corporations, and sundry, have all struggled with this quandry. What is the ideal posting frequency to keep your audience engaged, interested, and when does it veer from that to, well, spamming?
As I write this, I realise I’ve made an unconscious decision to post no more than once a day. In fact, I pace myself (with calendar in tow) to avoid that little click of the mouse all bloggers fear, unfollow. Yet I see the likes of London Beauty Queen and A Cup Of Jo often posting twice a day, sometimes even thrice, and they’re wildly successful (A Cup Of Jo has over 43k followers on FaceBook alone, London Beauty Queen 32k on Twitter). The multi-post-a-day approach appears to be working for them/their brand.
That said, every brand clearly has its own agenda and objectives, with an accompanying strategy towards achieving them. It is this very diversity which keeps us all continuously confused. On one hand, you have those posting no more than twice a week, pulling in huge numbers, while that very same frequency for others yield dismal numbers. Then you have the flipside wherein the consequence of minimal posting is few to zero new followers, and higher frequency leading to many unsubscribing. So, what is the solution then?
Honestly speaking, there is absolutely nothing cast in stone. No one stroke fits all, folks. There simply isn’t, I’m afraid. It’s a process of trial and error, carefully learning what works and doesn’t work for you and your readers. Diving in deeper, the subject of the blog post is another compelling variant in the game of numbers.
For instance, I find that my beauty posts pull in the highest views and likes but very few (if any) comments. OOTDs, on the other hand, pull in fewer views but it’s a far more interactive pool. And when it comes to the meatier stuff (opinion pieces, viewpoints, thoughts), the traction is usually decent. From past experiments, I’ve found that the teeny posts (I call them fillers) do nothing for my traffic. Perhaps it was the frou frou nature of the topic I chose, or maybe I should have approached the topic from a completely different perspective? I’m not quite certain.
I’m going to try a new plan starting today, right now, with this post, and create a roadmap which will see multi-posting every other day twice a week. My strategy is that on multi-posts days, one piece will focus on the day’s headlines, something with a virality factor.
The other will be a scheduled post with, shall we say, a longer shelf life. Of course, this is going to require some serious planning, discerning topics, conducting research, writing them up, and then placing them into the calendar. You know the sort of articles I mean. The ones that talk about things that would be just as pertinent a year from now, or even longer. The ones that bounce around search engines because people will always key in those phrases and words. I hate to use the word because of possible innuendos but I’ll do it anyway, the ones that contain intelligent content. Content that buffers in meta tags, that can be repurposed (be it in the form of graphics or spin-off stories). It’s adaptable, evergreen.
I want to see how this hybrid method works out and if it affects my traffic. Ultimately, it’s the right mix of frequency + type of content which will achieve the best momentum for your blog, and I’ll be sure to share what transpires.
In the meantime, I’d really love to know how you feel about blog posting frequency. How many posts do you publish per week? Is it around the same number of posts each week or does it vary? Has that frequency changed over time? What factors come into play for you in deciding how many posts per week is right for you?
Love, Sheela
Sheela Goh 
I aim to post daily however I post when it feels right. This will regularly be twice a day and occasionally I will omit a day. I won’t post something I am not happy with just to post.
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You are truly inspirational, maintaining the momentum is no small feat. My proposed strategy kicked into action yesterday and I barely made it with two posts. Today is a single post day (thank the blog gods) while starting on tomorrow’s two-pronged push. Whatever was I thinking 🙂 but you’re absolutely on point, it’s not just the frequency which counts, content remains king.
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Hmmm… for me, I check on my favourite blogs frequently and would actually love daily postings from them! 😀 I guess it doesn’t matter how frequent it is as long as it’s great engaging content 🙂
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I feel the same way. Intelligent, well-written content which feels genuine always pulls me back like a magnet. Sadly, the vast majority of blogs seems devoted towards appearing like portfolios and lookbooks these days, with barely a legible sentence strung together.
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I loved this! I think as long as people are posting quality* content, posting multiple times a day or daily is fine. I aim to post 2 to 3 times a week, but that doesn’t always happen.
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Life gets in the way, huh? I hear you. In 2012, life got in the way for close to two years before I started writing again 😛
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YEAH – I am working this into my workflow more, but I think I just need to do a little more planning!
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I think posting daily is the best! If all my favourite bloggers post twice a day, I’m afraid I’d stay glued to my laptop screen… But if we’re talking about how little to post, twice or three times per week is perfectly acceptable too. Actually I don’t even mind once a week, as long as the content is fresh and keeps me interested in coming back for more!
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I too am a sucker for daily posts, particularly if it’s from someone whose writing I admire. Mind you, it has to be content with substance (not necessarily lengthy), and not the fluff so many dish out nowadays. Something a little more than loads of outfit photos and a caption to end letting me know what brands they’re wearing. Oy. Hahahahaha I’d be glued as well, thank god for Bloglovin.
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I love blogs that post daily however, I find that focusing on quality over quantity is the best policy. I can’t stand a blog that posts everyday or 2-3 times a day and the posts are poorly written fluff. For my blog, my first rule is to only post content that I myself would like to read and sometimes that means taking a little longer to post which translates to 2-3 posts weekly since I work a 9-5 and have other ventures I pursue. At the end of the day it comes down to what works best for you and your readers.
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Precisely. For some of us, that does equate multi-posting, for others, daily or intermittently. No matter the approach, the key thing is to track, monitor and adjust accordingly 🙂 thank you for sharing. I really appreciate that you made the time, Anastasia xo
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I agree with most – I tend to focus more on providing quality content and making every post count than trying to aim for daily updates. Sometimes, when you update too often it is easy for your loyal readers to keep up.
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Yes, that is true. Regurgitating out posts simply to click the Publish button is the quickest way to lose one’s readers. It’s a tricky thing, this balancing act 🙂
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Wow! I mean, wow! Posting one article every day is already way way way too much for me, but posting multiple times per day is a totally out of my possibilities. And honestly, I wouldn’t even like to. Here’s why:
1. I am the only blogger on my blog, or at least I have been until I’ve taken up some contributors in the last month. But I’m the one who plans the editorial calendar, who creates graphics for Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter and who creates custom featured images for each post. There’s no way I could do that for one post a day or more than one post a day. Creating all those graphics for the post I publish now is time-consuming enough. I do like myself a little branding and graphic consistency, so I’ve decided to focus on that side for my blog. It’s time consuming and I couldn’t just churn out articles with two or one random images and call it a day!
2. I think that people would be annoyed from too much content. Let me explain: when I see too many posts from one blogger on my Bloglovin feed, or social media shares on my Twitter and so on I always think that the content can’t be good quality. When I see too much of someone, I often don’t even check it out. In my experience this has proved to be true.
3. Brands and PRs don’t like this kind of multiple updating. Once a day is already a lot, but more than once a day means that the sponsored content will soon disappear in the archives and it will live much less on the homepage.
4. It also depends on the size of your following. The more people follow you, the more you can post. This is my opinion. In fact, the blogs you mentioned have a lot of followers. Imagine a blog with 1k followers on Facebook posting multiple posts a day. You can never reach the levels of interaction of people with a lot of followers. I’d say, craft your editorial calendar on your audience. Make it grow as your audience grows. It takes balance!
I would like to post 3 times a week, and that’s the goal I’m going after. I currently post once or twice a week. Taking up contributors was a move in this direction. I have 9 categories in my blog so I’m hoping to post a couple of times in each category per month. I think this is enough for the kind of following I have right now. Of course I’m trying to expand my blog, but I feel that for now this is enough. As far as engagement and interaction is concerned, I agree with what you noticed! Personal posts, self development posts and posts that somehow connect with readers get far more engagement than other kind of posts! That’s a given 🙂 In the end, that’s what blogs are made for: to give a personal point of view and connect with readers!
Ooooops I’ve written a book not a comment XD
Thank you for this post, it was interesting and good food for thought.
xx
Elisa from styleBizarre – Kickass Conscious Style for Compassionate Bold Girls
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I would love to be able to post more frequently, but time doesn’t permit. I think once a day is good, but generally, the more content you have, the longer people tend to stay on your blog especially if they are captivating.
x
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Yes, and it has to be varied content to balance the equation. It’s a lot of work, a lot of hard work xo
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This is a very interesting topic, and I loved reading this. My thoughts on the topic: as a reader, I would stop reading a blog with multiple posts per day, even one post per day is a lot… it would become a chore, and I would probably just skip a post or two, or three or four… and then I would unfollow (and have done this, I have to admit…). My point is, if I start feeling that I ‘must’ keep up, it’s too much work and takes up too much of my time… I have a life, after all. Which is why I post only twice a week, occasionally three times. I simply could not post more often, as I can only have photos taken at the weekend, and I also need some time to edit them and write the posts. If I felt that I ‘have to’ post daily, I would probably stop blogging (again, it would be a chore, too much for my already quite full to-do list). But I can understand that full-time bloggers may feel the need to post daily. However, I think they should keep in mind that their readers are not full-time blog followers…
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This is an interesting topic, and here’s my two cents’ worth: I find posting every day is a lot, and as a reader I would not have time (nor interest) to read multiple posts by the same blogger every day. I might even skip a few of those daily posts… Yes, I’m one of those readers who unfollow if I feel overwhelmed… But I have a life, and I don’t need anything added to my already long to-do list, and I don’t want reading blogs to feel like a chore, something I ‘must’ do. So, I’m happy to catch up with a particular blogger once or twice week. After all, I follow several bloggers, so there’s always something new to read.
And as a blogger I’ve made a conscious decision to post twice a week (sometimes three times), it’s all I can manage as I can only have photos taken at the weekend and I like to take my time editing and writing. I also think that my readers have busy lives,and lots of other blogs to read on days when I have nothing new to post…
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definitely have struggled with this one! I think we all have issues feeling out what readers like/hate haha. I’ve just tried to remain consistent no matter how much/how little I post. I work full time as well as being a blogger so it’s not always on point, but I think sincerity is what comes across most for readers. That’s been my experience, anyway. great post ♥
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