How Often Should You Blog?

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Original content is one of the best ways your company can stand out online. Blogs offer your business a unique way to address and solve the problems experienced by potential customers, and answer any pressing questions they may have. Blogs are an effective way to establish a brand’s personality and create long lasting connections with potential customers. Thousands of blogs are posted each and every day, many of them by businesses looking to stand apart from their competitors and convert readers into customers.

Not only are they valuable for building a brand and customer base, but they also allow your business to stand out – blogging more often means that your business is more likely to rank highly on Google search. This is because it scores you points on two things Google looks at to rank your website: freshness of content and, as long as they are done properly, content quality. While some things in search change constantly, those two factors are not going away anytime soon because Google uses both to keep low-quality sites out of its search engine results. 

While many businesses understand that they should be blogging, too few know just how often they should be writing and publishing new blogs. To answer that question effectively and find out how often you should be blogging, there are a few things you should take into account first.

How often are other businesses blogging? 

Millions of new blog posts are published each and every year, many of them coming from businesses all around the world trying to make an impression with their target audience. Some businesses write their blogs in house, while others enlist the services of professional copywriters and agencies to take care of this for them, freeing up time and ensuring that blogs are of the highest quality.

The latest numbers about how often businesses are blogging shows that companies aren’t posting as frequently as they once were. Rather than posting several times a week, many companies have moved to a weekly or bi-monthly blogging model. This shift is mostly because many brands have opted for longform content over multiple shorter blogs. Another study shows that businesses that publish blogs daily report far stronger results than those which only publish blogs several times per month. In fact, businesses that publish blogs monthly or several times per month are far less likely to report strong results than those which publish daily, multiple times per week, or weekly.

How often should you blog?

Depending on who you ask or where you look, this question has an almost endless amount of answers. Ultimately, the decision of how often you should blog is entirely up to your business. If you’re a new business owner looking to establish a brand, then higher frequency blogging is recommended. Established websites can get away with posting less frequently, especially if the content being published is of a consistently high quality. The frequency at which you publish blogs will depend entirely on what your goals are and what your capabilities are in terms of producing content.

If your goal is to increase website traffic, blogging a minimum of once weekly will ensure that search engines are more likely to rank your website over competitors with a lower blogging frequency. If your goal is to convert readers into customers, then your blogging schedule should be at least weekly and the content being published should provide value to customers, whether it’s solving problems they might have or providing them with new information.

If your aim is to establish your brand as an industry leader, then you should focus your resources on crafting meaningful longform content. These longform blogs generally take longer to write and refine but are generally perceived as being more valuable to readers, so these can come at a slightly slower pace. We usually like to use what we call the “hopscotch” approach, where we publish two longform blogs one month, and four “regular” blogs the next. That gives your business the benefit of longform content without cutting into your budget. 

No matter what frequency your business settles on for publishing blogs, the key to success is consistency – if readers are able to predict when there will be new content on your website, they’re far more likely to return on a regular basis. If readers can’t reliably find new content, there’s no reason for them to return to your website or take your content seriously. Focusing on fresh content with each post will ensure that your website ranks higher on Google search, and shows customers that your brand is the authority on a wide variety of subjects.

If you are blogging regularly, you’ll also have the added benefit of being able to send clients on your email list regular updates with new blogs – and promotions to go along with them. Your customers are more likely to open emails that have topics that seem relevant to them, and making the email subject line one of your more engaging blogs for the month will spike your open rates. 

Create a schedule and stick to it

The most effective way to ensure you’re blogging at a frequency that meets your needs and capabilities is to create a schedule and stick to it. Whether you’re producing content in-house or working with a professional copywriter, developing a blogging schedule can completely change the way your business develops content. An effective schedule should outline what it is your blogs are going to be exploring, how you’ll use it to appeal to customers, and when it’ll be published to the website. This makes it far easier to explore fresh subject matter, publish blogs on a consistent basis that’s easy for customers to predict, and is a great way to ensure that your blogs won’t fall off after a month or two, or if your business experiences an unexpectedly busy period.

ion8 is an all-in-one business consultancy with a full team of digital marketing and design experts with experience in a wide range of sectors. Our team will ensure that your company’s blogs perfectly represent your brand and speak to your target audience, using carefully crafted messaging to build your brand and convert readers into customers. For more information about everything that ion8 can do for your business, visit our website today.