This guest post is by Francis Santos of Benchmark Email.
Blogging and email marketing are a lot alike. Okay, a lot might be stretching it, but they do share some similarities. For example, both are easy for beginners to use, are generally inexpensive, and great for business.
Another quality these two internet-powered vehicles share is the importance of frequency.
Whether it’s entertaining your blog readers or marketing to your email subscribers, frequency is something that could literally make or break you.
Blog posts: two perspectives on frequency
One of the golden rules of blogging is to post, and often. How important is it to post with regularity? Very, if you’re a fan of market research.
According to HubSpot’s 2012 State of Inbound Marketing report, underestimating the importance of posting frequency is equivalent to leaving cold, hard cash on the table. The report showed that businesses that posted to their blogs multiple times per day had the highest levels of new customer acquisition, at 92%.
On the other hand, you have those who say that blog posting frequency no longer matters, citing that quality, engagement, and reader loyalty are more important.
The observers on this side of the fence have a point, but frequency is something that should never be viewed as an afterthought. It is usually the moment you get comfortable and feel you can ease off on posting that your visitors get bored and take their blog reading adventures somewhere else.
Email: frequency matters
Although I’d say it’s vital, the overall importance of blog posting frequency may actually be questionable when you factor in aspects like quality, engagement, and loyalty. When it comes to email marketing, however, there are no ifs, ands, or buts about it—frequency definitely matters. It really is one of those double-edged swords that can cut you on both sides, too.
With blogging, you can pretty much post away until your heart’s content. Of course some posts might perform better than others, but this really is one of those no harm, no foul situations.
This is not the case with email.
If you flood your subscribers with too many messages, they are likely to get annoyed, which could lead them to opt-out or cry “spam” and report you to their ISP.
But if you’re not contacting them enough, you run the risk of having them lose interest, which could again lead to a higher opt-out, rate and money wasted on subscribers who have little to no chance of converting.
Finding the frequency sweet spot
Blogging and email marketing may be two entirely different animals, but you can take similar steps to determine the ideal frequency of both tactics for your blog and audience.
Think about your content
What type of content are you offering your readers? Is it the latest in celebrity gossip and entertainment news? If so, then daily updates may be appropriate. Is it coupons, special offers, or other forms of cost savings? Maybe every other day or once per week will suffice.
When you’re trying to nail down the right rate of frequency, your content should be one of the first things you consider.
Evaluate your resources
You could have all the ambition in the world, but in some cases, it will be your resources that determine what is the right frequency.
For instance, if you have multiple people contributing to your company blog, posting every day may not be a problem. But if it’s just you, something like a monthly newsletter to your email subscribers may be all you’re able to handle.
Let your audience dictate
Bloggers and email marketers alike often find that letting their audience decide is the best way to get a grip on the frequency dilemma.
It is possible to determine what they want by judging their response to your approach, but don’t hesitate to ask them in a blog post or a survey just to be sure. This is a good idea because people tend to have different preferences, especially when it comes to email communications.
Frequency and format
Whatever the format, as long as a communication concerns your marketing message, the frequency at which you deliver it will always be important. This is true whether we are talking about blogging, email, or posting on social networks like Facebook or Twitter.
No matter what turns out to be the best frequency, make sure you commit to it because your ability to be consistent with it will tell all.
Got any additional advice on frequency for bloggers and email marketers? Feel free to share them with us in the comments.
Francis Santos is a writer for Benchmark Email, a best practices email marketing company.
Yet another great read! Just started visiting ProBlogger and I look forward to reading your next article!
It seems like blogging frequency is talked about a lot! Ive heard that blogging daily is important and then some writers would say having a new post at least 2-3 times a week is fine.
I tested this out and if you don’t blog on a consistent basis, you will lose traffic. People aren’t going to care about your blog if you aren’t posting frequently.
I think the most important thing I’ve learned is “resources.” I was headed for the blogging five times a week routine, but all things considered, that’s like spinning my wheels.
Thanks for being honest about frequency because most people argue that higher frequency is the only way to have a successful blog.
Great points here Francis. I will totally unsubscribe from a newsletter if they email me more than once a week. As far as blog posting goes I guess it depends on the niche and the results you are getting so far. I post about 3 times per week but I will probably play around with that some more until I get it right.
I do agree that regularity of posts play a part but the other even more important element is the value of your content. We need to strike a balance between frequency and content. There is no point posting multiple times a day but the content is shallow (or rubbish). Instead, I think it will be better off to post a few times a week with valuable and good content.
Just my 2 cents view
Francis
both blogging and email marketing must be balanced out. Bloggers must decide a schedule for updating their blogs and just stick to it.
and for email marketing a marketer must email hia or her subscribers on a particular day regular schedule and send them alot of value while selling them
Good read Francis, I follow the same plan I try posting a good quality article everyday and I then email my subscribers informing them about the new post, I know a lot of gurus say not to send email everyday but I get a good response from my list when I send them emails daily.
This is amazing work Francis! I agree with you on blogging and email marketing working as brothers. It is such a helpful content and with frequency, it is better we be careful not to be hunted down but remain on the well made side! Thanks for sharing, really helpful!
Great stuff! I just got encouraged with your site content Francis and I think you have really inspired many beginners before they undergo the challenge. You are actually right about frequency and I’m glad you were honest about it since rare do you find people believing it as not being the only way of being excellent in blogs. It is much inspiring. Thanks again for the tips!
My most recent post was about email frequency. I couldn’t agree more with you when you said “If you flood your subscribers with too many messages, they are likely to get annoyed, which could lead them to opt-out or cry “spam” and report you to their ISP.” I almost did just that.
For frequency of blog posts it really depends on your niche. For some niche you can find something new to say on a daily basis but for some that is not necessarily true. So as long as you do it regularly whether regular for you means 2-3x a week or once a week is just fine. Your regular readers will eventually notice your regular routine and wait for you on those days.
Trent, but I agree with him here because If you’ve build a good email list than you shouldn’t annoy your subscribers by sending unwanted and spam emails all the time. But in blog post, It’s up to you whether you want to update it on daily basis, weekly or monthly.
Its been a while i did not visit this website, the contents are still great. Good post!
I completely agree with you when it comes to blogging frequency. The frequency of your posts determines the visitors to your blog. If you have a tendency of daily blogging, then you will indeed have a lot of readers because they are sure of getting something to read!
I love the fact that today your blog post is on frequency. I guess this is exactly what I needed to read today. It is a fact that most successful bloggers have a frequent blogging technique to keep their readers coming back for more. I love this post!
Hi Francies!
I am certainly agree with you that posting consistently matters a lot but I think with its the quality content also has very crucial role as well.
For me, posting consistently without having a point of quality content is a time wasting way and if you posting twice in a week but a quality content that’s for me worth doing.
Great read! I think you have to be really careful with the frequency of email marketing, more so than posting frequency, if I tend to get a lot of emails from one person continuously trying to sell I unsubscribe, even one a day is a little too much sometimes… If you are going to sell to your list you need to balance content against sales emails, if I don’t get nay value from being on your list I’m not interested, Ill take my business else where.
Posting frequently without quality means kissing your girl friend without emotions. In both the cases you have to receive a hit; in former case hit of low traffic and in latter case your girlfriend’s attention to somewhere else. So beware in both the cases. Do less but with passion
This is a good topic, Francis.
There is no ” One size fits all” for this issue….
As others have mentioned in comments above, keeping a regular schedule of posts seems to do the trick…
Though, as far as how many posts per week, this would depend on the site(subject, etc)……
Agree that overdoing email marketing to subscribers, may not be the best way of going about it…
Nice read. I believe both blogging and email marketing should be equally balanced. My blog is fairly new and I try to publish a post at least every alternative day. The whole idea is to make the post informative and unique as much I can.
Surely posting multiple times per day really isn’t worth it, since does anyone check their blog subscriptions more than once a day anyway?
Committing yourself to one post a day is the best way to go.
A lot of good advice here. Thanks!
Argree, with outstanding content , there are more and more target audience who is willing to subcribe for useful content, That is much better than normal promotion email marketing .
I respectfully disagree with one of your opening remarks: “One of the golden rules of blogging is to post, and often.”
Yes, I think that was the case a year or so ago, but things have changed. Quality is much more important than frequency. Take a look at some of the best out there. For example, Chris Brogan recently scaled down his posting schedule for a few reasons. To make sure what he does post every week is a quality post but to also stop inundating peoples inbox with his stuff.
Stop thinking about how often you can get away with appearing in someone’s inbox and focus on the best quality content and let them look forward to your posts.
I used to post 5 days a week and did week. I moved to 2 days a week and did better. Now I am at 1 day a week and it’s the best I’ve ever done. My writing is the best it’s ever been and I can spend more time promoting that post. Plus, it feels really good when readers reach out to me saying that they can’t wait until Wednesday to read my next post. You can’t beat that!