thanks for your post! I apply a lot of your tips and techniques on my blog. I launched my blog about 6 weeks ago and publish about one article/day.
Another person from the same niche had done a statistical analysis of the blogs and there was somewhat of a correlation between age of blog and posting frequency. Mine being the youngest of the blogs, I had the highest frequency of about 20 blogs :-).
I try to post 1 or 2 original ideas each week and about 3-4 “lighter” articles. I’m still not seeing the visitor numbers that I would like to, but it’s slowly growing.
Cheers,

Oliver

Em

Automated posting systems are problematic. I’ve actually implemented them on a few of my sites recently, but only after establishing some ground rules. The blogs that use them are labeled as aggregators and while they do scrape RSS feeds they only display a partial post and link to the original. I feel this is an acceptable compromise as it should still funnel traffic to the originators of the information.

I would prefer to be posting all my own stuff to these sites, but the reality of my life right now is that I just don’t have the time. This compromise keeps sites going in some form until I can turn my attention to them again.

Seriously though. I’m doing investigative work on medical research at my blog, and these posts take T I M E, so my current strategy is to write one of these every day, and then also post a few shorter re-hashes of cancer news in general. I started the blog to share information that I’ve gathered on my own, so writing those longer pieces with multiple references to clinical research, etc, is what I really enjoy doing, and what I ultimately think will bring in good search results. It takes at least an hour or two minimum to write a good one, though I hope to get faster at it.

Now I’m learning to write those re-hash pieces quick, quick, quick, but still include original content, commentary, etc. I’m struggling with it a bit, but I think it will get smoother with time. I definitely think at least three posts per day is a good goal to start with if you want to get visitors. I’ve noticed a real surge since hunkering down to this level.

BTW, Ecto has really helped me post quicker, too : )

But most days it’s the equivalent of a full time days work probably (and a bit less on weekends of course).

However, with the increase of postings, quality must go down a little (or else you drive yourself crazy). I’ve found that even my little bit of compromise on quality is a non-issue with me readers — they still see the posts as valuable and good enough to read. That’s the only measure I use to evaluate “quality”.

On a final note, it’s been some of my “least quality” most “off the cuff” posts that have generated the most traffic and consumer feedback. Like the post I wrote on a pet costing $48,000 (http://www.freemoneyfinance.com/2005/06/cost_of_a_pet_i.html). Go figure!!!

Seriously, thats a hell of a lot of posts of 3 years, something which most bloggers would only dream of being able to achieve, if only for the fact that most bloggers face other constraints which stops them being able to dedicate the required time.

It would take a huge leap of faith (and I know some that have done it) to give up your day job to become a dedicated blogger, but it would seem to be the route to take to get that volume of postings in such a relatively short period of time (although 3 years on the web is a lifetime).

As for quantity vs quality – I don’t think both are mutually exclusive, so long as an element of care is taken. Without care, I can see that volume could allow quality to deteriorate and be damaging to a blogs reputation.