One of the things I love about the blogging community is how there’s such a diversity of approaches being tried by successful bloggers in their pursuits.
Take for instance two well known bloggers – Timothy Ferriss and Gary Vaynerchuk. Both take different approaches but both have been very successful in building strong online presence.
Timothy is famous for his book The 4-Hour Workweek a book looking at the simplification of life, outsourcing and focusing upon the important tasks at hand. Tim certainly works hard for his money but his approach is certainly a little different to Gary’s.
For example Tim has written here at ProBlogger about how he finds that posting every 4-6 days on his blog is enough (and actually beneficial).
On the other hand Gary Vaynerchuck’s inspirational keynote at Blog World Expo showed a different approach with a guy working massive hours, arguing that you should respond to every single email you get and that you need to be producing content every day.
Both of these guys have built successful businesses and great online presences through their blogging and social media (and I’m sure that there are some similarities between them also ) but both have done it differently.
To me this is encouraging. There are not ‘formulas’ and there is room for a diversity of approaches!
Which bloggers approach do you resonate with most – Gary or Tim?
I’m definitely more on the side of Tim – though I do try to respond to comments when I can, on weekends typically.
I’m probably a bit biased to begin with though: I’ve been trying various strategies for outsourcing my work and increasing my free time for a long time, and I loved Tim’s book when I bought it.
From a reader perspective, I also prefer blogs that post less often, and make each post worth reading. Otherwise, I end up skimming the posts.
I agree with Gary all the way. . .though I must say I’m pretty jealous of Tim’s success.
I think you have to be privileged to have a blog in which you only have to post every 4 to 6 days. In which case I’d say the majority, like me, tend to put a lot of hours into it – writing posts, commenting, auditing etc
Maybe in the future when you blog is established, you might be able to reduce your posting rate but until that happens, you have to work hard at it.
I love this (and hate it). Even though there are times when I wish there were formulas to follow, and it can be frustrating not knowing what to do, it’s encouraging to think that it’s possible to just be yourself and succeed.
I find myself being mostly on Gary’s side. I tend to work really hard on my blog and like writing a posts at least 4 times a week. I travel a lot so I usually like to write about my adventures and it would be hard to sum them up into a weekly post.
The cool thing is, there is no right way to go about blogging. I have seen people try all sorts of methods with a lot of success. If it were as simple as following the directions everyone would be doing it.
Just be unique, work hard at it, and stay motivated until you find success. It’s all a matter of persistence in the end…
I like Gary’s approach best. I feel that a blogger should be as dedicated and up to date with their blog as can be. This does not mean spamming post after post, but update readers with a well thought out post once or twice a day. Once every 4-6 days just doesn’t seem enough to keep a really dedicated crowd since most will move on. But this is just my two cents worth.
Definitely Tim, though I find that posting a little more often (2-3x a week) seems to work best for me. In fact, I’ve found that if I post every day, I make less money on ads.
With responding to comments, I find that it has the most impact with new readers or when people ask questions — I tend to establish more loyalty sooner. But with established readers, I find it more effective to not respond to every one, and sometimes respond by commenting on their blog. In fact, when I was responding to every comment, some people have told me that they felt uncomfortable commenting because they know they’re going to take up my time with an answer.
However, I definitely want to learn to outsource more. Making more with less is a theme I work toward.
~Angela :-)
It depends what mood I’m in. If I’m really enjoying writing on my blogs daily, then I do that. Otherwise, I follow Tim’s route.
Tim also doesn’t follow anyone on Twitter. Kind of crazy, but it’s working for him because he actually meets alot of people in person.
Gary is all about meeting everyone he can in person too.
Probably good rule of thumb. Make it your mission to meet everyone in the world. And care about others. It’ll take you far.
I am with tim ;) JK that being said its like my DNA video on my site…..IT’s all about being you, don’t be Tim or Gary be YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!! that is where the Sh*t gets exciting, you know why? Cause it’s easy being you ;)
I like Tim’s message, but didn’t his online success come from the book? Gary’s building his success through his online efforts.
I see Tim’s approach as a good maintenance method. To get to where he’s at though, you must work like Gary, or write a successful book.
I think Gary could quit and work as hard as Tim now though. Doesn’t seem to be his personality though. He’s the type that needs to stay busy.
I love Gary’s style, but I also know that for me it’s just not sustainable. I think a lot of us would want to rock it 24/7 like him, but need to go for a more manageable approach.
The cool thing though is that there really isn’t a right or wrong way to publish. As long as you’ve developed content and a style that your readers enjoy and meets your own personal (or business) goals, that’s all that matters.
I’m like Tim, but I’d like to be more like Gary. :)
As much as I try to post every day, it just doesn’t always happen. I definitely think it’s important to be in contact with your readers, and that alone can be a full time job.
I don’t know Tim as a person at all, and have only seen limited coverage of him precisely because I cannot relate to a 4-Hour Work Week. If I did that, I’d make like $400 a week or less, because right now if I’m not working at my computer, I’m not earning. (I am working on changing that by creating products, but that just adds more hours in front of the Mac.) Lots of people are not in a current position to be earning while not working, and for that reason, Gary resonates a lot with me and meets my needs better as a business-coach-from-afar.
But… it actually goes much deeper than his belief in hustling and working a ton – he resonates more with me as a person. I was a bit, umm, off-put by something I read regarding an upcoming conference where Tim said he’d only attend if another famous person was there with him, whereas Gary confirmed and said he’d love to be there and meet everyone. This is not a conference on one of the coasts that will be packed with technology’s rich, well-known and famous. That’s why Gary Vaynerchuk is the best role model for me – it’s not the HOURS he puts in or doesn’t, it’s his attitude. And his attitude is very inspirational.
I think that Gary’s approach is more effective. Many of the blogs I visit that have excellent rankings are posting at least once a day.
The key is to be delivering good content and not just a post a day for the sake of posting.
I like Tim’s approach. I also think he defines “success” a little differently than the traditional way. I think our own definition of success will (sometimes) dictate how many hours you’ll work. More hours doesn’t always mean more success, and in some cases can make burnout a sure outcome. ;)
Right now I’m following Tim’s approach. Of course, it isn’t working for me, so I’m trying to shift gears and get closer to Gary’s.
I say we drink wine hard for 4 hours per week and work hard the rest.
Nah, who can say?
One day when I was a young kid, my grandfather was
quietly observing me, [the youngest in the clan],
watching older brothers and cousins
at play, at ‘work’, at planning play and work.
I must have looked confused because we didn’t have to talk
about what I was struggling with;
‘which of these many ways is right?’
He held up my small hand to my face, just far enough away
for focus, wiggled my fingertips, and said;
“Which two are alike?”
“None Grandpa?”
“That’s right” he said pointing to a perfect grapevine arbor.
“But every one of them does a great job helping me”
“No two are alike, each is one of a kind. In this way
you are all different and must decide;
which ‘what’ works for your ‘who’ ”
Studying successful dudes like Tim and Gary
is a wonderful way to grasp reality; these guys are,
as they used to say ‘self-actualizing’.
They are converting their energies and talents into mattering,
standing out, and prospering for it, amidst nearly
6,000,000,000 people who aren’t.
Each has their own chemistry.
4 hour weeks [not really]
and 4 tasks per minute [not really]
You’ll know yours when when you feel mostly contented
from your day’s productivity, days in a row.
Then you’ll tweak, get even better, get bored, and
need a new high of accomplishment level.
Or you’ll be able to chill, and that’s right for you.
Lets see, travel the world and do everything that you always wanted in life… or work massive amounts of hours daily…
I vote Tim
I think I’m more like Gary but I try to be more like Tim… well maybe not so hard as I should :) …. but maybe I shouldn’t even try.
I talked to Brandon and others about Tim’s approach while at BWE this year. It seems to me the guy is always working, he’s just outsourced all the mundane tasks. He’s still speaking, promoting his book and giving lots of great energy to what he believes in. Gary’s doing the same thing but he’s still doing a lot of the personal interaction instead of outsourcing it. Granted that won’t scale very well.
They both have what’s really important though: passion.
I’d like to think that I’m more Tim’s style, but I think to have his blogging frequency and readership you need to have his ‘celebrity’ and presence (he is a PR machine)
Question is Darren where do you fit? Somewhere between the two?
Great thought provoking post and comments as always!
I am more like Gary. I work long hours. I try to blog daily if possible. I respond to nearly every email. I try to answer as many comments as I can. On one of my websites, it is quite hard to do so though. We give away free DVDs, Books, CDs, Games, Kids Toys, etc. Mainly DVDs though. I can’t respond to the hundreds who enter those contests. I’d be saying “thanks for entering” to every post and it’d waste way too much time! If someone posts another type of comment though, I definitely post back to them.
i struggle with this constantly. and blogging every day, several times a day, always wins. but i run three separate blogs, so even if i don’t blog at each site every day, i’m definitely blogging somewhere. i do also feel internal pressure that if i don’t post something at each site everyday, i’m not doing my job. right or wrong, that’s how i feel. i definitely agree with @coolproducts – if a blog I VISIT doesn’t update every day, or every other day, i quit visiting. i’m constantly looking for something new & useful.
I’m definitely with Tim: I try to post two to three times per week, with one or two long, well thought-out posts and one short newsy post, contest, etc. I am finding, however, that the more my co-author and I post, the more unique visits we get. And I’m a fairly inexperienced blogger, so maybe I’m going about this all wrong!
I’m more like Gary where my blog is my business (main revenue stream). To play the A-game on the web, you have to consistently be posting and participating in community. I also feel I can relate to him more because he started blogging at ground zero like I did, and he has answered my emails or Twitters. The fact that Tim doesn’t follow anyone on Twitter comes off a bit, “I’m amongst you, but I’m not with you.”
Tim came out with a book that became a worldwide best seller so that helped him garnish lots of publicity in the web to help him gain momentum for his blog right away. The book gave him an instant audience, and awesome for him. Did he even have an active blog before the book came out? That would be interesting to know. His archives as far as I can find on the current blog go back only to when the book came out.
I’d like to hear war blog stories from Tim like, “I remember when I’d pump out post after post and only 20 people would come visit me and I made $5 a month on AdSense…” Gary shares lots of his blog war stories and that makes me feel more like he knows my pains and glories. I wish though to someday have some of Tim’s book success. I bought the book, and it is very useful.
I agree that there is no ONE right way to be successful. There are many approaches and you have to figure out what works best for you. Tim has a book to fuel his blog visits, and his blog is not there to make money by getting a consistant flow of visitors to click on ads…he’s just suplementing his book and drawing new people in to his site to learn about his book. That’s how he’s able to get away with sporadic posts. Plus, he’s able to make each post REALLY content rich by posting every so often.
I want to have Tim’s approach but I’m affraid I’m using Gary’s approach for the time being. But hopefully I will get my life back soon. The reason why I started blogging is so I could have more time for family – silly me!
Timothy Ferris all the way…
My approach right now is more reminiscent of Gary’s style.
Although posting everyday can be a real challenge. I believe everyone would prefer to work the Timm Ferris workweek.
But till then I will keep moving forward
Gary McElwain
Personally, while I am sure he is a nice guy, I think Tim Ferris is a terrible role model… especially for young people.
He recommends outsourcing everything – including buying flowers for your wife when you screw up at home. Give me a freaking break.
That may be a nice goal for most… especially those that don’t want to work for a living.
But what about the school teacher making $30k year while working 60 hours per week teaching our kids. Does Ferris expect her to outsource this?
What about the car mechanic busting his tail 55 hours a week turning a wrench and busting his knuckles. I suppose this is not honorable enough for Mr. Ferris… except when he needs his big car fixed.
Further, as much speaking and the like Ferris seems to do I find it hard to believe that he works 4 hours per week.
But I’ll give him credit for this… he is an expert marketer. After all, I bought his book.
With this said, I am all about Gary’s approach of “working your face off.” In the end, I think Ferris is too even if he preaches something totally different.
Gary doesn’t need to work his face off now the way he used to…but he still does. Tim put in a lot more hours into his blog and social media when he was building an audience. So a bit of this issue is really a question of where you are in your blog’s life cycle: if you want rapid growth (“to make a splash”), both quantity and quality are valuable. If you want stasis/maintenance or steady growth, you don’t need that kind of volume.
I’m much more of a fan of Tim’s approach than Gary’s in terms of time management. Gary is an inspiration in customer service, and Tim an inspiration in valuing your time and using it wisely. I know both of them and really enjoy both their lessons.
But for most of us they’re almost like character foils–most of us will never work 4 hour work-weeks or have half the energy of Gary. But seeing them and recognizing that they are in fact “real” and great people, you can see a different way of life–for blogging or for just finding a way of living.
So while this post is in an interesting question for fodder, I don’t think any of us will be Vaynerchuk’s or Ferriss’s. That’s okay.
The more important lesson–care about your customers…while valuing your own time and using it wisely.
I think the optimal strategy is somewhere in between. A serious blog should post every day I think, but answering everything by yourself on a huge blog like that seems lika an inefficient use of your time.
there is so many ways to sucess, it depend on how we take the way.. even how good the way is but we lazy and whatever negative manner (Like me) no way gonna be good at anything.. especially blogging.. and i never.. sigh
I am more inclined toward both styles.
I think and felt responsible to give my reader as much value as possible that why I write and post daily.
At the same time, those task that interfere with this task, as much as possible I will outsources.
Of course my readership still small (about 16 subscribers) but they’re so valuable.
Doesn’t the frequency of posting depend on the subject matter? If you’re talking about current events, you have to stay on top of current events and post quite regularly. But if you’re waxing philosophical on deep themes in life, then you can post once or twice a week, especially after you’ve got a couple hundred posts on your site, all with good SE presence due to links, keywords, etc.
Just some thoughts to help with strategy for beginning and growing a blog.
I was going to say this but then Gary V said it: Be yourself. If there was a formula, that would be it, except it’s no formula at all in the way most people think of it.
You can’t be yourself until you know yourself.
I think Gary’s approach is best when you are just getting started. But I think Tim’s approach is better in the long run.
I think Tim’s blog gained much of its success because of his book, but more bloggers don’t have that kind of media exposure to really launch their blogs… and so this is where I see Gary’s approach being more valid for the majority of bloggers.
Well, for me i’m more experimental person. If anything works for you then that formula should be applied from time to time. If any other formula work for quite a good percentage then why discard it?
Both Timothy and Gary is good for me.
I would actually LOVE to blog every single day and produce 7+ post per day per blog, but I run out of “creative” gas and can’t do it. Right now I’m at 3-4 posts per week, with 1 or 2 posts being longer and more in-depth, while the others are “easy” posts, like a quick review and a video.
I’ve never looked at Gary’s site, but I think Tim’s is terrific. I’m perfectly happy reading him every 4 days or more.
I like Gary’s approach but the one thing a lot of people look over about Tim is that he worked his ass off to get his business to the point where he could simplify his life.
I’m all about hustle though, even if I get it to the point where I’d coast… I’d push it even harder so I could get more. Plus, Gary Vee is a Jets fan, can’t disagree with a fellow Jets fan.
Ah, interesting article…but be careful here. Why would a guy whose personal brand is ‘work less, earn more’ advocate blogging every day and working your coit off online like Gary? I can assure you that Tim does more than this, but will not tell anyone how much…it would destroy the myth! This aside, I like both approaches – as both have taken very different approaches to brand building. I love Gary’s video heavy style, but also like Tims’ inspirational “Live the Life you Love’ kind of approach…you asked for a decision, so Tim for me! I personally post 3-4 times a week, and know I should do more, but I am not a professional blogger, and I spend more time building my brand offline than online!
I am with the Tony Robbins.
Don’t generalize anything. Learn techniques from everyone and mix them carefully to make a better one.
Gary and Tim have done great work, but we can’t copy their strategy completely. That won’t lead to success. We have to make our strategy by taking certain properties from their strategy. Still, trial and error!
There is no right or wrong, or which is the better approach, as long as the method works and it suite your style, that’s the best method!
Eventually we all gonna have our ways of blogging, no matter which method we start learning from!
All different types of strategies will come back to the same and basic principle, we just need to follow the basics…
I try to write at least three articles a day and typically respond to every comment and email. For my site to grow I feel I have to increase content and keep in touch with my readers.
When I first started blogging I wrote three articles a day. It was very taxing and because I was so new the response was daunting and I ended up knocking it down to one a day and sometimes less. I kept on this track for quite awhile but my states grew very slowly. They did start to jump but it just wasn’t enough.
Just recently I started writing substantially more. The formula seems to be that you start off just to get into the market and once you are visible to ramp it up. I’m sure it depends on you niche but the more content for some the better. Not all. If it’s deep and thoughtful posts that aren’t news related I’m sure you can get away with only a couple a week. Anything news related you better get ready to write your brains out.
For me it’s Quality over Quantity.
I agree with Andy, you must have some content up there before you can slow down, otherwise your blog will grow much more slowly.
And I really like Gary’s approach on how to handle the readers. Amazing.
Both quality and quantity is an important thing. If you write qualified material but you do it once in a month, then it is unbenificial.
Quality and Quantity, both are necessary.
If you write qualified material but you do it once in a month, then your readership will be less and you can’t become successful in blogging.