Almost every time I do a Q&A at a conference I’m asked this question – How many posts should I post?
The frequency of blog posts is something that gets talked about a lot and there is no perfect answer for all blogs – but here are a few thoughts on the topic.
The Pros of Daily Posting
I’ve heard many people answer the ‘how many posts’ question with the suggestion that you should aim for a daily post.
While I will name some reasons why this may not be ideal below there are certainly some benefits of posting on a daily level including:
Daily Posts Can Help You Get into the Groove
I’ve had a variety of approaches to blogging frequency over the years and I have to say that getting into a daily blogging frequency has helped ME, as a blogger, make writing part of my daily workflow.
I find that if I post less often than ‘daily’, writing begins to slip off my radar as I fill my day with other tasks – and once I stop, I find it hard to get going again.
The more you practice as a writer the better you get (hopefully)!
Daily Posts Help with Reader Expectations and Engagement
It is amazing how readers will adapt to your posting frequency and will even look for your content to be published at certain times. I find that the less you post – the less engaged your readers will become.
Of course this also depends on how and where else you’re engaging with your readers. For example if you’re tweeting every day, answering comments every day and answering emails every day then this will certainly increase engagement.
I guess more regular content builds your brand also (if the content is good content).
More Posts mean More Doorways into Your Blog
I’ve spoken about this over the years many times on ProBlogger. The more posts you publish over time, the more doorways you present readers with to enter your blog.
1 post a week means you’ve got 52 doorways at the end of the year – daily posts means 365 doorways at the end of the year. This means people are more likely to see your content in RSS readers, in search engines, on social media etc. Over time this adds up. For example, here on ProBlogger today I’m publishing our 7001st post! That’s a lot of doorways!
The Negatives of Daily Posting
There are definitely some positives with daily (or at least a higher frequency of) posting. However there are also some costs including:
Blogger Burnout
Perhaps the biggest danger with setting your posting frequency levels too high is that you run the risk of burning out as a blogger.
Posting something new, engaging, compelling and helpful every day over several years can, over time, begin to feel like a chore – particularly if you have competing pressures of life (family, work, social life etc).
Reader Burnout
There is a fine line between giving your readers too little content to be engaged and overwhelming them with too much content to be able to digest it all.
I subscribed to a blog recently that I thought would be great to follow but they posted so many posts per week that it was too much and so I ended up reading none of it.
Some topics and styles of blog will sustain a higher frequency of posts than others. For example, some technology blogs have been posting 10-20 posts a day for several years – but their posts are usually short, sharp and easy to consume (and they are read by content hungry, tech savvy readers).
Decreases Reader Engagement
Related to this, I’ve noticed when I slow my posting frequency down that comment numbers often go up.
Fewer posts means that your most recent post sits on the front page of your blog longer which increases the chance of people seeing, engaging with and even sharing it.
Traffic might be lower overall to your blog – but hopefully each post will be read more!
Advice on Posting Frequency
Ultimately you need to decide what is right for you as a blogger. Your blog posting frequency should come out of a variety of factors including:
- How much time and energy do you have for blogging? Remembering that there are other tasks that need to be done on top of writing
- How much time do your readers have to read content? How thirsty are they for content?
- How big is your topic/niche – how much is there actually to write about on that topic?
- How long are the posts you write and how much time do they take to complete?
- How old is your blog? (sometimes in the early days it can be good to have archives that are a little fuller so there’s more for new readers to explore)
- How much do you have to say right now? Most bloggers go through bursts where they just naturally have more to write.
- Is the quality of your posting suffering because you’re posting too often?
Keep in mind that over time your posting frequency may change. For example, here on ProBlogger I have been as high as 18 posts a week but these days we’ve slowed to 5-6 (with a change in the length and focus of the posts). Slowing our blogging frequency down has led to a higher engagement, higher quality of posts (at least that’s our intent) and steady (if not slightly higher) traffic.
Also remember that YOU as a blogger are probably a lot more worried about your posting frequency than your reader. We tend to put a lot of pressure on ourselves as bloggers. Slowing down to increase quality of your posts and to look after yourself won’t be the end fo the world!
The last piece of advice I offer is to aim for regularity rather than daily. Readers will adapt to your posting rhythm and they will begin to expect that what you do one week is not too far different from what you do the next. So be consistent.
Here on ProBlogger we never switched from 18 posts in a week one week to 5 the next – it’s ebbed and flowed very gradually over time.
How often Do You Post?
I’m interested to hear how many posts you do per week on your blog?
Is that the same amount of posts each week or does it change?
Has that frequency changed over time?
What factors come into play for you in deciding how many posts per week is right for you?
I try to average 3-5 a week. But it’s a nice idea to post something useful daily if it’s a full time job.
We typically post four times per day. Our site is a bit different than most because we have created a niche news site using a blogging platform (WordPress).
Two of us run the site, and this is our full-time job. So we post one main feature or news story each day at 5 a.m. These will be anywhere from 250 to 1,000 words.
Then we post up to three wine reviews throughout the day, usually at 9 a.m., 1:30 p.m. and 7 p.m. Each of these is around 100 words.
We cover the Pacific Northwest wine regions of Washington, Oregon, British Columbia and Idaho. With more than 1,500 wineries as well as vineyards, wine shops and restaurants, we will never run out of story ideas.
In addition, we write for other publications, including a weekly wine column that appears in 17 newspapers.
Thank you for this timely topic!
I have pondered this dilemma for my blog site as well. I have a soft goal of posting once a week and no less than every two weeks as my topic of interior design and the home has so many applications I believe it is easy for the consumer or everyday DIY person to become overwhelmed. My desire is to post meaningful insights on the aspects of design dilemma’s and trends that most families can relate to and easily apply. I have been pleased with a steady increase in viewership over the last year and the excitement over writing small vignettes that don’t take much time by drawing from my own experiences as a designer and writing about design in a teachable format that anyone could apply.
I currently post daily and it’s been working out fairly well. I’ve figured out my routine and am able to stick with it better than I did when posting weekly or every other day. In fact, I’ve gotten it so down pat that I’m pre-written about 40 days in advance. This gives more time for engaging with my community and makes blogging a lot less stressful.
Thanks for posting this, it’s helped me feel reassured about my posting frequency. It’s slightly higher at the moment because I’ve been doing this blog for only a couple of months now, so I want to ‘catch up’ if you will, to give my readers a decent amount of content when they first approach my blog. However, I am gradually decreasing the frequency, as to ensure I don’t overwhelm them – putting myself in their shoes, if I kept getting emails that a new post was up every day, I would find I most likely wouldn’t read them all. Thanks again!
Darren, you ask some pertinent questions. As a blogger, I post about 3-4 times a week. Admittedly, it can be a chore when a topic doesn’t come to mind immediately. I don’t keep an editorial calendar because I want the freedom to blog about the newest marketing research or a customer experience I’ve had. I also like to share valuable info from colleagues’ posts.
As a blog reader, I prefer pithy content that I can easily skim and find the key take-aways. I am certainly not interested in reading long-winded diatribes.
What I find interesting is that you experienced more comments with decreased posting frequency. I wonder if others have had the same result.
I have gone back and forth constantly over the past year. I was posting on Mondays and Thursdays, then Mondays only, back to Mondays and Thursdays, now back to Mondays. I think the one constant is it is consistent, and always on Mondays.
The tips are most useful to me in the right time.I write one post on my blog every day.
I have tried to write a blog. For knowing i have get you website and your site is fit for me.
To answer your question, Darren, I only post once a month.
I’d love to step that up to once a week, but when you’ve not long since set up a website/freelance business you have plenty enough on your plate to be going along with.
However, what I do do is:
– Make sure I post every month without fail
– Market each of those posts without fail
– Set time aside each month to read and study other blogs
– Read up on ways to improve my blog and my social media profiles
– Make sure I implement those improvements.
In other words, I blog to the absolute minimum of regularity at the moment in order to ensure it keeps ticking along.
However, once I’ve got a fully featured blog that makes the most of every visit, I’ll be serving my readers much more frequently.
This is a good posts. It really made me question a few stuff and I should be posting a bit more as well. I really liked the advice which you gave. I blog about once a week. Some weeks I forget.
I was posting around 8 times a month (2 per week) for the lasts months. But it seems like I’m moving that to 4 posts per month and I’ll focus more on promotion. I barely have 100 posts at the moment, however.
And yes, I noticed more and more traffic with each blog post, but not all of them.
My site’s main focus is about sharing my photography and is why I started the site in the first place. I’ve been sharing photos monday-friday pretty consistently for two years now, but this year I’ve started to add more longer tutorial style or opinion posts into the mix these tend to be longer and occur about once a week.
I have been contemplating a switch to M.W.F for photography and a Tu or Th schedule for other kinds of posts – It’s all a work in progress though.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. This has been something I’ve struggled with for years.
I used to post 5-6 days a week; my goal was to put out as much quality content as I could in my first year of blogging.
When I passed my anniversary, I cut back to 3-4 days a week, because my goal now is to increase reader engagement (which I have) and allow people time to read my blog.
3-4 days a week is great for my blog and my blogging schedule. It’s not too much, I’m still able to write quality content, I don’t feel overwhelmed or burned out, and I have more time to put into content marketing. This schedule also allows me to post extra articles should something come up – when I was posting 5-6 days a week, I was constantly reorganizing my editorial calendar when a great story landed on my desk. Not fun.
This schedule also allows me to explore paid, freelance writing, because now I have the time to contribute to other pet related sites.
~ Kimberly
I have always tried to keep a 3 post per week schedule. I also try to keep my post short 500 – 1000 words so my readers can easily digest it in one sitting.
Thanks for sharing!
-Tony Milano
As a beginning blogger, I was posting daily to build content for anyone, who happened upon my blog. At the end of this month, I am aiming for 3 to 5 with 4 being the average. Reader engagement and traffic should show if this decision was correct or I need to blog more frequently. Good article.
I think than more important is quality of articles.
New visitors will visit your blog again if they found quality “reading”.
Hi Darren,
Very few bloggers have the luxury of time on their side. Most web publishers are either managing a blog part-time while they work a “real job”, or they’re full-time writers who need to produce consistent volumes of content to earn a living.
In either case, time management is crucial to a great majority of us folk in the blogosphere.
Yes, routine matters and we have to find one that we are comfortable with and can adhere to in the long run.
Interesting article. Since my blog is about 3 weeks old, I’m posting on a daily basis. It teaches me in some ways about the quality of my content, and also I want to create a good relationship with the readers where by I experiment with ways of making them involved on my blog through comments.
I guess it will change in the future as I gain strength in followers and as I learn along the way.
For me personally I like to post daily, once I take a few days off it’s very hard to motivate myself to get behind the keyboard and bash out a new article. Nice article.
I want to post more than once a day to be honest.
Ideally 4-6 posts a week is what I’m shooting for.
The problem is I hate “mailing in” posts so I take a ton of time writing each article I look at each post like a chapter of a book.
I would rather not post anything than force out something I’m not proud of.
Just a hobby blogger but I try to aim for 2 posts a week, not including my giveaway posts.
Very interesting debate, I can see both sides of the argument. I have in the past aimed for one blog post a day, but failed quite often. I would certainly agree with you about regularity.
As someone who needs to be “in the zone” to write, on those days where writing flows naturally, rather than posting everything at once and patting myself on the back for putting up 4 posts in a day, I’ll spread those out over a few days.
Another thing is that sometimes a topic lends itself to being broken up into several articles. A few months ago I had a great idea for an article. Originally it was going to be a single article, but as I was writing more ideas came to mind. So I finished up splitting it into 5 parts and 5 separate articles spread out over 5 days. It was also good for getting return visitors, I just concluded each article with “come back here tomorrow for more on this subject, where I’ll discuss A,B and C”. Optins increased as well.
Hi Darren,
I believe that publishing an X amount of post per week is not an ideal way. As you said, it may burnout the blogger and the readers as well.
Having said that, we must follow a schedule and ensure that the posts are engaging enough for the readers, even if the count goes up or down with each passing week.
As for the number, I would like to state that a minimum of 3 to 5 posts every week must be the target for every blogger to stay in tune with the readers expectations as well as to rank in the search engine results page.
I am still trying to figure out what works well for me. I started with one post a week, but discovered I had way to much to say and would try to cram to many topics into one blog post. Then I tried daily posting, but I didn’t have time for commenting, social media and other tasks. My dishes also piled up. Right now I am trying out twice a week and it is working out okay. I am thinking about adding in a third simple post. Possibly a round up, or quick tip type of post.
I was doing two posts a week (Monday and Thursday) but soon brought it down to publishing only on Monday mornings. Every Monday morning actually.
It lets me really think about the topic I want to write about and spend a lot of time on that one article. I’m not forced to publish something just because I have a deadline the next day. Also, increased engagement and community is what I’m after so that works out quite nicely. :) You can see the engagement on my blog yourself.
I started my blog two years ago and I’ve posted daily. I was doing an extra post on Monday afternoon but I’ve just decided to make that my main post on Monday. I really want to do one a day – no more, no less. After all, my blog is called HomemakersDAILY so I think daily is to be expected.
That being said, some of the posts are easier. For example, I post recipes Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday. The recipes are easy (well, maybe not the cooking but the posting) so I end up with 3 easy days and 4 days with articles. Posting the recipes makes me feel like I get a break. It works well for me.
I have been blogging since Dec 2009 i started with 3 times a week mon wed and friday then moved to one post on weekdays (always scheduled at midnight local time) and now I write one post daily seven days a week and I just started this a few weeks ago and so far I have noticed a slight increase in comments and a drastic increase in my average time onsite! I treat it like a job in that I only actually write monday through friday but on fridays i make sure I write saturday sunday and monday and schedule them this way when i wake up monday I can start writing for the tuesday but at the same i have been able to take the weekend off without it looking as such
As per my assumption, one cannot produce great content on daily basis. My mantra for content publishing used to be publishing one content in 2-3 days time and I like that content to be really comprehensive and well researched around the chosen topic.
Well I have also tried to become a daily blogger, but my biggest problem was lack of creativity and ideas. Though with daily blogging I have seen spikes in my traffic and have also seen improvements in my SERP, but then blogging if fun ! ( personally ) and if you are not enjoying it then what’s the need.
So considering today I have some planed days and specific time & I usually publish all my posts within these periods.
As a beginning blogger writing about traditional men’s advice I try to post about 3 days a week. I am planning to increase to 4-5 days a week in the future. For me 3 days a week seems to work well for my schedule and it brings steady traffic. I try to work my social media outlets a little more, especially Facebook.
For my experience I think as a begginer its good to post every day so you get used to and your readers get to know you.Once they are established readers a person focuses on quality not quantity so the number doesnt matter as much.Thats worked for me at least
I agree, Marty :-)
A great post as usual. (Thanks for all the great advice. I follow your blog religiously) The type of blog I run requires that I post daily, sometimes 3 to 4 times a day, and so far I think it’s working. However, you’re right about the potential to get burned out as I’ve been blogging seriously for about 5 months now and the pressure and the weight is beginning to get to me. Any advice on how to deal with that?
Hi Darren,
To update a blog daily, especially if we’re very busy, is daunting. We should take it easy! Lift this burden from our shoulders. Content marketing teaches us we should post as many times a week as possible. Even research shows that the more often a company updates its blog, the more readers it gets. But if we’re a one-man band and not a serial writer then we should think carefully how many posts we can really manage in a particular period.
I think frequency of posts has a lot to do with your own niche and readership. For my own blog, I post daily–mostly driven by what I’m seeking to accomplish on my blogging project. For those in a traditional business or education niche, it might make more sense to keep a five on, two off sequence. Of course, those catering to the 24/7 crowd had better be there, well, 24/7!
I follow one highly successful blogger who took the opportunity a while back to actually survey his readers on what they preferred for a post frequency. The result–admittedly not a very scientific study–was a three time weekly, Monday – Wednesday – Friday schedule.
Just having passed my second blogging anniversary, I’m honored to hear from my own readers that they enjoy starting their day with a cup of coffee and my morning post, but for other purposes, that might seem like a drink from the fire hose. Darren, I definitely appreciate your switch to less posts but more detail per post, for instance. It really depends on the subject matter offered and the reason your readers present themselves at your digital doorstep.
As for me, I think a blogger should post at least 2 contents a week. Well, that is just my opinion. But sometimes, due to my busy schedule, I only post 1 article a week.
Earlier I was running six blogs and had to write one post for each on weekly basis but now I merged all my six blogs into one and I publish one post daily. Result: earlier I was getting 25-50 daily visitors on my each blog and now I am easily getting 500 daily visitors and 1500-2000 page views because of merger. But now my one posting daily has raised traffic and my adsense income both. But one thing is confusing I could not have get readers engagement despite my focused post daily and its sharing on all social media.
I used posted daily for about 8 months, and then I changed to a few times a week (when I had something worth saying :-)–not forced). I did start getting more comments, as you mention. I tweet a ton, constantly really, but I only post a post on FB every couple days–I don’t want to bung up people’s feed. I try to think about how I like to see other bloggers’ posts, and that helps :-). Thanks for this thoughtful post and great topic!
I read a number of blogs and I think a couple of times a week is about right. Every day can have the effect of watering down the quality as the blogger struggles to find material to blog about.
hello darren
daily posting is a good idea because it maintain our writing flow but it is not only about the flow , by daily posting our blog’s reader are also interested in visiting the blog daily so daily posting also increase our site brand value.
Right now I’m posting 2x a week. I want to see if this is a great frequency for me. If after a while I feel like I have a handle on it, I will think about increasing. I agree that consistency is more important which is why I am doing it this way.
I’m a beginner blogger, so I try to be modest and post once a week. That way, I make sure I can commit to this schedule and spend time on each post and avoid burnouts. I play it safe since I’m not doing it full time
I began with three posts back in 2009–and it seems to take me AGES to get them done on my website about things to do in small Indiana towns. But after I really figured out my focus and what I was doing…I post at least once a day, every day, and sometimes two times a day.
There’s a lot of content that I just need to get out there. I keep things organized so I can see what is going up when and I always schedule posts for the same time. That way if I am going back through things or rearranging I can double-check that things are scheduled correctly without any extra work.
Posting every day may not be for everyone but when I have a new segment air on PBS or I release another magazine, I write about it. It doesn’t always mean it’s a labor intensive post and I think that’s the difference! I love what I do so much it doesn’t feel like work! At least, not usually. But tackling my inbox and keeping up on emails on the other hand…
I am one of those all or nothing writers. I can sometimes spend 14 hours a day writing and then nothing for weeks. Is it acceptable to publish several posts on one day and then nothing for a couple of weeks? Maybe I should do all my writing in one day and then publish sporadically over the coming weeks?
I started slow in late 2007 and worked my way up to six posts a week. That was way too much pressure, so about two and a half years ago I cut back to four posts a week. Last summer I cut back to three and have debated about cutting back to two. My Friday post is always centered around my Internet show, DestinySurvival Radio, which airs Thursdays. That post takes the most work. I find if I’m to put out quality content, I need more time. Thus, the decrease in the number of posts.
Thanks, i have an website and i am thinking what i have to do now on my site so that it become peoples favourite but from your post my all doubts are clear. Thanks for this….
When I began, 3 years ago, I followed the ‘post every day’ advice. It was tricky to maintain this but I did it for over a year.
Then I began to consider how it might feel to get so many posts and decided that I don’t like being inundated with posts from sites I follow. I now post twice a week.
Over on Pushing Social, Stan has recently advised his readers to ‘add one more post’ and see how it affects our traffic. I’m considering it… we’ll see…
http://pushingsocial.com/blog/
I did updated my blog daily in starting days, it worked well. But NOT now!
I’ve realized that providing useful content is better than posting crap content daily.
Also if we post daily, our subscribe will usually unsubscribe from our blog.
Since, they don’t want to receive crap emails on daily basis. Am I right? :)
For my team and I, this is something we’ve been contemplating and researching. I think we’ve landed on posting every Monday and every Thursday. Because our blog is for a product that helps you build your email list, we didn’t think readers would be interested in a daily posting schedule. At the same time, we love the idea of increase the number of doorways people can find us. At any rate, it’s a fun experiment and one that we will continue to hone. Thanks for the great info!
Another great post!
That’s something worries me. I usually post 2 articles a week (600~1100 word long), I would like to post more, but I don’t have the time and the articles take too much of my precious time, so I just can’t write more. I think 2 it’s ok, but 3 it would be greater… Nevertheless, the questions help me to relief about that. Because I don’t think my readers have too much time free either and there are more than 700 for them to read in case they’re hungry for more content.