From January to September inclusive this year, I published a new blog post every 36 hours.
My original intention with this experiment was to see what impact it would have on the readership and interaction, as well as a way of giving vehicle to my ever expanding draft posts list, and hopefully slim it down somewhat.
On the latter point, I failed comprehensively. I started 2019 with around 100 drafts and now have over 150!
On the first point, I concluded back in August that this didn’t really work at all either, and aside from a curious spike in January, my viewing figures were very consistent throughout the following seven months, and not much higher than in 2018 when I was often writing far less frequently.
Comments on blog posts oscillated with little apparent pattern from January to August too, from a peak of 383 to a low of 213.
So now, after two months of reducing my publishing schedule from every 36 hours to every 48, what impact has it had?
On overall views, September was 7757, the first time this year it’s dropped below 8000. Visitors remained around 3000, the same as the previous three months.
In October though, views were up to 9362, the highest all year aside from that unexplained January peak, and visitors were up to just under 4000, the best all year.
Hmmm…
Comments – a stat that interests me far more, as a predominant reason for having a blog is to converse with people like you – were at 252 in September, not great but about average for the year, but had dropped to just 197 in October, the same month that saw greater views and visits.
Double hmmm. Views and visits going up but comments going down? Not really what I want to see.
I can also see that views per visitor, which has averaged around 2.7 for a few years, fell to 2.5 in September and 2.36 in October. Again, not ideal!
In September, five of the top 10 most viewed posts were written that month. The highest by far, my praise of Pentax Espios, I wrote back in February, and has gained increasingly more views month on month ever since!
This post was also easily the highest viewed in October, where only three of the top 10 posts with highest views were written that month.
Perhaps this explains some of the stats, and this single post is attracting a chunk of new viewers just looking for information on Pentax Espios, who are reading silently and then leaving without comment?
In Conclusion
As always, blog stats seem to pose more questions than they provide answers.
Looking at the results one way, I could take pleasure from the fact that older posts are being picked up and viewed, and the depth of the archives here (22 posts shy of 500 as I write this) is giving readers a greater range of material to delve into.
Or I could look at it that the newer posts are increasingly less interesting than my older ones!
Stats aside, I have preferred posting every 48 hours compared with every 36.
The latter was sustainable, but I have been more relaxed with the additional breathing space a 48 hour schedule gives. Especially with an extra little one in our family since June.
Honestly, I think there are so many mysteries with blogging, and so many variables beyond our control, that really all we can do is keep writing what we enjoy writing, keep responding to the comments you all generously make, and let the chips fall where they may.
I plan to continue with the 48 hour plan for now, and perhaps I’ll review the stats again at the end of 2019.
Or perhaps just ignore them!
Do you have any nuggets of wisdom or insight about blog posting frequency? How often do your favourite blogs publish new posts?
Please let us know in the comments below (and don’t forget to tick the “Notify me of new comments via email” box to follow the conversation).
Thanks for looking.
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35hunter 
Don’t fash yourself.
Many factors enter into these numbers and most of the factors you have no control over. Some of them you don’t even have influence on.
Just post what you want when you want and it will all be good. That’s my plan.
BTW you will appreciate my post for tomorrow, I think. 😉
Look forward to reading your new post…
I’d had to look up “fash”, are you Scottish Marc?
Yes there isn’t much we can do to influence the stats, other than keep writing about what we enjoy writing about, and hoping that others connect with it too.
*LOL* No, not actually Scottish just knocked around a bit and have picked up all sorts of expressions from many cultures. I guess I’m a truly multicultural Canadian. :p
Ah I see. Language, and local dialects and phrases are fascinating!
On a typical day my journal gets views in the low single digits which although not particularly good for self-esteem is terribly convenient from the standpoint of convenience in statistical analysis so you see I can crunch and parse my numbers faster than anyone around!
Do you notice any trends over longer periods, like months and years?
The most obvious, more global trend has been the dramatic fall-off in views of my site exactly when I stopped tagging posts with much specificity. The world is being hashtagged to death through social media, places are being “discovered” and trampled like never before and I decided 4-5 years years ago it was time to stem my contribution to that trend (regardless of whether my impact was simply another in that hallowed tradition of failed photography blogs, which is to say rather minimal to begin with). It was disappointing at first. Now I’m glad. The friendships I’ve made on WordPress over the years haven’t happened because of the searchability of my journal. And since my site is even more personal journal these days, the dramatically reduced traffic makes it feel a little more comfortable being on here. I know my rationalizations must sound ridiculous, haha!
Do you read Jim Grey’s On The Road blog? He was writing about tagging the other day and how he thinks it impacted his stats when he changed how he tagged –
https://blog.jimgrey.net/2019/10/30/google-giveth-and-google-taketh-away/
When you say “places are being “discovered” and trampled like never before” you mean real places that were previously only know by a few locals but have now been overrun by visitors? Did you see the photos earlier in the year of climbers queueing to get to the summit of Mount Everest?
Your thinking doesn’t sound ridiculous, and if the lower readership of your blog helps you write posts you feel are more personal and true to you, then it’s a win for you, and the readers that remain.
I follow Bear’s Cornish Photos blog, and happened to find him via WordPress Discover, which I rarely come across, I think it just popped when I was scrolling through my Reader one day. He wrote some interesting thoughts a year after his Discover “fame” and how he felt about it. The clue is in the title of the post!
https://cornishbearsphotos.com/2019/04/03/how-discover-didnt-help-much/
From time to time I’ve read essays from Jim, including the one you’ve linked to just now (so thanks for that) and I think I will specifically follow him for awhile so I can learn some new things. At some point I bookmarked Bear’s Cornish Photos blog and this is a nice reminder to look more, especially at the link you’ve shared here. And yes…. by places being discovered I do mean real places that were relatively quiet only to become overrun, or the new “it” places, if I may borrow that rather un-useful phraseology. It has been a significant issue for Seattle the past ten years, the city has experienced unprecedented population growth and urban development. We’ve added bucketloads of weekend warriors with Instagram and Facebook accounts to brag about their accomplishments during their time off before work on Monday mornings. The city’s close proximity to wildlands has turned from blessing to curse for many places. There are still quiet places and it’s best to be quiet about them. I did see that picture of Mount Everest dominoes. It sent a shiver down my spine. Part of me felt some resignation about it, talk about a certain mirror of what’s happened here! Everest has been a sad state of affairs for quite some time.
Seattle sounds a bit like the district I work in, in some ways. Largely rural with three small towns and perhaps a dozen villages then plenty of woodland and fields in between. In the last decade though, and especially in the last couple of years, demands to supply housing from central Government has seen a massive increase in new development. My trip to work by car is 3.5 miles and eight mins in the later evening. In rush hour the other morning it took 35 mins, even with much diverting to avoid the worst queues. It still feels like a small town, but with a city’s worth of traffic in it!
I love that photo! Is it a cotoneaster? It’s like the ones we have in our front garden. I adore photos with raindrops, dew drops and selective focus.
The amount of comments has nothing to do with how often you post or how many followers you have, and everything to do with how you interact with your commenters. I’ve been blogging here and there since 2004 (and when I was more up to it, which I’m not these days) I used to help out on the wordpress dot com forums, so I’ve a fair amount of experience of this.
First off, the number of followers (for all bloggers) is going to be predominantly spam blogs who follow because they want your attention. If you ever have enough time, the best thing to do about those is put some time aside once a week or once a month and go through your followers and remove all the unnecessary ones . (I can give you a link to where to do that, if you want.) Then when you’re left with the real ones, you need to visit them and comment in their blogs – that way, they’ll click on your blog link and, when they like a post, they’ll comment on it.
Thanks for your comments Val, very helpful.
Re the photo, it’s some kind of hedgerow, I don’t know what the species is I’m afraid.
Re the stats, thanks for reminding me about going through followers and deleting spam, I do this once in a while, but haven’t for some months. I’ll get on to it.
I do comment on other people’s blogs, and try to make the comments as useful and supportive as possible. But we all have limited time, so I couldn’t visit everyone’s and comment. I just try to make those I do mean something.
Val, I went through my WP followers and deleted any that had dubious names like “Marketing Solutions 101” and the like. It was quite a few since my last purge! I don’t generally take much notice of the overall number of followers, more the views of the blog, and as I said, even more than that I’m interested in the comments and conversations that spring up. Thanks again.
Ah, I get rid of more than just the obvious ones. I include ones that are set up to ‘collect’ followers, such as people who never post any original content; ones that are preaching something – beauty products, management skills (usually with no original content to back it up), and what I call the ‘number 42’ bloggers who want everyone to follow their solutions to the troubles of the universe: again, they are just trying to collect people. And what they tend to do is collect the email addresses of people who comment on their posts – and most frequently – on their about pages. If you’re okay with those, that’s fine. I’m not, though, as I like to know that people who follow my blog enjoy it for its content and are willing to interact with me, at least some of the time. 🙂
Most of the time I’m happier to ignore them and focus my attention on the people who are kind enough to read and comment, rather than spend time researching the authenticity or otherwise of followers!
Probably wise!
Val, that does look suspiciously like cotoneaster (i’ve an abundance of it in my own garden) but because of how it’s higher up and branching-looking here it also distinctly reminds me of a certain popular Azara. But I’ll go with cotoneaster.
Thanks.