New to the Series? Start with Part One
Blogosphere: A series
Part Twenty: The Long and Winding Road
It is important to remember that there are different kinds of blog, and very different reasons for starting one. It should also be noted that there are a lot more reasons for quitting than for going on to the point where your blog takes hold.
Let’s examine the kinds of blog briefly before continuing. While I break it down to two types of blog, I am sure you can come up with any number of types (AKA reasons for) blogs. I say it is for making money, or for getting information out to an audience. Yes, I know, the lines cross, the types overlap, but by and large it is that simple. Blogs that are for profit have a very different look and feel from those that are designed to instruct or entertain (only). The second type of blog can be written at a leisurely pace. Literary blogs might have a single post per day, or week. Some might not post more than once a month. These can be instructional, uplifting, entertaining, and all kinds of posh, but one thing they will not have is a huge audience.
Did I hear an uncomfortable cough just then? The reason the audience will remain slow is because it takes a lot more than one post a month, or week or day to really make the Internet “aware” of you. It takes work, and lots of it. It is the first kind of blog, or a mixture of literature and heavy posting for a blog to become popular. Word of mouth just isn’t fast enough.
I’ve touched briefly on how long it takes for a Blog of the first type to “go viral” in an attempt to scare you away from Blogging. If you’ve followed this series this far, I may have failed in the attempt. And that might be a good thing.
Image: riverdaughter.wordpress.com
Despite the nay-sayers, despite the initial difficulties, despite all the work it takes, getting your Blog up and running is an amazing adventure.
In an earlier post I quoted a magic number for Blog entries. It was a big number, a scary number, and worse, if the theory is correct, and I suspect it is, it is only a 10th of the way to true “fame and fortune”.
That number I’m referring to is 1000. 1000 posts to your Blog, that is. The scary thing about it is that 1000 is that it is not an end point. 1000 posts is not the place where you lean back and say, “all done”. 1000 posts is where things start to get interesting.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I’ve celebrated every hundred posts along the way. After all, you do need some encouragement now and then.
But why, you ask, do I need to crank out a 1000 posts? You don’t. You need more than that. But the first 1000 is going to put you on the Blogosphere map.
Is 1000 a guarantee? Is it a hard and fast number? No, and no. You might make that first major landmark at as few as 998 posts, or it may take you 1003, OK, that’s a joke. There is no guarantee that your Blog will “make it” at all, but for you to get to the point where your “authority” is clear and recognized, to get to the point where your work is read by more than 1000 readers a day, perhaps a lot more, you’ll need to get to that first point.
So, how long does it take to get to 1000 posts? Clearly that depends upon you, the Blogger. This is where you need to decide what your Blogging life will be like. If you post once a week to your Blog, you’ll hit the magic number in 19 and a quarter years. If you post 7 times a day, every day, you’ll get there under 5 months.
Most people will find a happy medium between once a week and 7 times a day. Some of you could do 10 a day, and see the magic point in under 4 months. But that takes a lot of work.
There is more to it than just numbers, too, but if you post the numbers, you’ll be getting the experience to make your posts rock solid, readable, and more.
So, what will it be for you? What is your magic daily number?
We’ll talk more about this down the line.
Uphill Writing 
Thanks RikScott. Gonna stick out reading your posts, as a start!
I’d venture a word of caution here Rik, especially where your subscribers are by way of email. It can be daunting to find my email inbox seemingly spammed every morning. I subscribe to about 40 bloggers and would be rather miffed if each of them posted 7 times every day. I know this from comments by my loyal readers during the period when I was archiving my old blog posts here at WordPress, people were saying ‘whoa, hold up, we can’t keep up with you!’.
Just saying.
Hi, Cin
Thanks for your comments on this. As always, I apreciate your thoughts and insights.
The number of times you post per day depends on a couple of things, the primary being the reason for your blog.
The numbers I quote in this, and other parts of this series are, for the most part, for blogs whose purpose is getting to a level that allows advertising.
My blogging “guru” has seven blogs and gets a combined 1.5 to 2.5 MILLION page reads a month, and makes a very good living from advertising on his blogs.
It is to people who are looking to benefit financially from their blogs that I am directing this series.
I asked him about inundating readers with posts, and his answer was to make it clear to readers that they could opt to have all posts sent together each day, or could choose any number of delivery options. When I checked I found he was right.
I have opted to get blogs from people I follow, you for example, as they are posted.
Your point is well taken, and I think I’ll have to be a bit more careful in the future to differentiate between artistic bloggers, like yourself, and commercial bloggers.
Thanks for pointing this out!
Thanks for clarifying for me 🙂
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