Thursday, June 08, 2006

Are the rules of blogging changing?

One standard rule of thumb for best blogging practice has been to post frequently. In fact, I try to hold myself to a once per weekday blogging regimen, and when I've discussed blog marketing with colleagues, I've also recommended a similar frequent post strategy. A post from the DailyFix challenges this practice and asserts that post frequency doesn't matter anymore. The basic argument of the piece is that people are suffering from RSS fatigue and that by posting often bloggers are only muddying the already murky waters. Instead, quality, infrequent posts are the way to go.

The DailyFix post generated a healthy conversation, indicating that it must have struck a nerve. I must admit that I too generally avoid reading those bloggers who post more than once a day, so there could be something to this. Since many librarians utilize blogs as marketing tools, this idea should prompt us to think selectively about what we post to our library blogs and focus on what the audience wants to read and how they want to read it, rather than what we want to say. Perhaps that means fewer posts. Adjusting post content and frequency is really just following good marketing practice.

I've also been thinking about post frequency for a while here on LM. I love thinking and writing about marketing, and doing so daily keeps me on my toes and on the lookout for great content. On the other hand, there are many topics I'd like to dig into and investigate more thoroughly, but I've found it difficult to do so on a one-a-day schedule. For these reasons, don't be surprised if you find a decrease in weekly posts here along with what I hope will be an increase in quality and analysis.

Categories: tips_to_try

2 comments:

Hunchermuncher said...

I definitely agree that you don't need to blog every day. I would rather read quality posts every two or three days than blogs that are just posted because you feel you have to be frequent. You should blog when you've definitely got something to say. (I'm new to this by the way). This post did have something to say so it was worth reading!

Norma said...

I don't use an RSS feed, and tend to by-pass posts based on date.