The short answer? Quality. There really are no two ways about it.
Quantity of content is one thing the internet has enough of. Or, you know that saying, “If you take a million monkeys and give them a million typewriters then eventually they’ll produce the entire works of Shakespeare”?
The internet has proven this adage wrong.
Quantity will never help you rise above the noise that is out there. You’ll just be another one of the crazies banging a pot instead of making music.
And however hard you bang that pot, you won’t attract a crowd. That’s just not what they’re interested in.
The long answer is a little more complicated.
Quality Matters, but It’s Not the Only Thing
Let’s throw in another saying here that a lot of people who write blogs subconsciously follow. They assume that, as “they” (didn’t really) say, ‘if you build it, they will come’.
That’s just not how the internet works. Search engines do not know what quality is. At least not yet.
Instead, they rely on what is popular to decide whether to rank what you write near the top of their search results pages or not.
So if you try to play that game, the chance that you’ll actually get anywhere is slim at best. Realistically, you’d be better off playing the lottery (don’t play the lottery – it’s a mug’s game).
You know all those people that say that content is king? They’re close, but not exactly on the money.
Instead, content is more like the kingdom. Marketing is the advertisements that you use to get them to get them to come visit.
Yes, if the quality isn’t great when they do come visit, they won’t come back. But if your little kingdom is beautiful, and nobody knows about it, well then that’s that. You won’t actually get anywhere.
What this all means is that you have to market the hell out of your blog. And no, that does not mean post it on your personal Facebook feed and hope that your friends share it like crazy.
They very well might, but it’s very hard to grow from close friends and family alone.
Some examples of better tactics to consider:
- Use groups. There are tons available on all the platforms. They also have a big advantage that they bring liked-minded people together. If you find the right groups, you’re far more likely to find an interested audience.
- Connect with other bloggers. If they share your content, you’ll immediately enjoy visibility in front of an entirely new audience.
- Try out new platforms. People are constantly building new platforms, and joining them is largely free. The great thing about these platforms is that they will initially have a lot of community. If you take an active role, other people will engage with you. Do note, if you’re finding a platform isn’t working, ruthlessly shut it down. You don’t want to spend all your time marketing to an empty room.
Consistency is Much Better than Frequency
Once you start collecting a following, you’ll want to make sure to post content consistently. This is far more important than how much you output.
Here is a piece of advice: though you might want to post four times a week, it’s a better idea to save those extra articles you’re writing and keep them for another time.
Why? later on, when you’ve lost some of your steam with blog writing (which happens to us all), you’ll be able to pull up these extra articles and plug gaps when you are either too busy or really don’t feel like writing. Having a backlog of articles can really help you out in these situations.
So bottom line: make sure you’re consistent. Yes, you can miss an article occasionally.
That said, if you even miss two weeks, for example, it’s already likely that you’ve lost some of your hard-earned audience.
After all, your blog is only one of many on their reading list.
And the moment they’re not finding what they’re looking for, you’ll get bumped further down.
Some Quick Tricks to Boost Your Quality
Okay, so quality is better. That’s great. But how do you actually create that quality? Here are some quick tips:
- Use the free tools that are out there like Grammarly and the Hemingway App. These are free to use in the basic incarnation and will make your blog that bit better.
- Work on boosting the readability of your content. It’s very important that your text is as readable as possible. It won’t matter how engaging your content is, if your readers are struggling to understand it. They will simply move on to the next blogger’s material.
- Edit your work. This means writing it, letting it sit for a while (or letting it cook as they say), and then returning to it. Taking time to circle back to written content will give you a chance to forget what you think you wrote and let you focus on what you actually wrote. If you don’t like editing, then you shouldn’t be blogging, at least not for popularity. I’m sorry if that’s harsh, but it’s the truth. If you would like some help, then use one of the many services out there. I personally quite like flashessay.com but there are tons of other choices. Shop around!
- Stay the course. Writing is not just some talent. It’s not something you have or you don’t. It takes time to become good at it. So even if you don’t initially get much traction, stick with it. Keep working at your writing skills, and you’ll get better. The topics you write about will get more interesting. And it will pay off. So keep going.
Summary
Quality is the most important aspect of your blog. But that doesn’t mean it’s easy to write high-quality content.
If it was, everybody would be doing it. So instead, work at it for the next few months and years to come. If you can do that two things will happen.
- You’ll get better and actually grow your audience.
- You’ll naturally build up quantity as time goes by.
So focus on that. Blogs are things that you do because you want to say something and you want to say it well.
And if you do that and do it with your heart, then people will start to listen. Take it from me.
Featured Image Credit: CC 0; Public Domain. View original image on pexels.com.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions stated in this post are that of the author, and Return On Now may or may not agree with any or all of the commentary.
Nelma Lumme
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