Comments on: The Why and How on Repeating Content on Your Blog

By: Annie Wong

Annie Wong — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 17:37:12 +0000

Excellent topic and I think many bloggers including myself do that as a result of lack of time to look for content to blog. I always try to jot my ideas down for new topics when I run out as well as writing them before hand and save them as a draft before and when I run out of time I’ll just post the ones I’ve saved with minor changes.

By: Kolia Shlapak

Kolia Shlapak — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 13:21:07 +0000

My blog is to young for this repeating content dillema, bt it certainly will grow up. Hope this tips will stay somewhere in my mind till that time)
And I liked the idea about ‘ The Reader Life Cycle’, I have used to read very intresting and useful blogs, which then went out of my Google Reader

By: Laura Peterson

Laura Peterson — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:41:32 +0000

I manage an official product blog for AOL that balances new feature articles with answers to questions and steps on finding particular functions, and I come up with the same questions time and again.

Our solution was to create a FAQ in our AOL support portal area that we link to in the Resources blogroll at the top of the site.

The tool we use also tells us what people are searching for most, and that gives you an indication of the content saturation tolerance :)

I also respond via comments or even direct emails.

For a help-related blog like mine, overcommunication is probably safer in the long run. It’s definitely a challenge for the news-oriented site, however. I like how valleywag.com embeds static links for hot stories, and reuses graphics and headlines when old gossip gets fresh again on the same topic. That helps manage expectations.

By: Richard X. Thripp

Richard X. Thripp — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 10:04:42 +0000

My blog is becoming like a wiki, not because others can edit it, but because I link back to old posts all the time, if they’re relevant. Of course, as I learn more about my subjects (photography and personal development), I’ll have to do repeats covering certain topics in more detail, but I have plenty of ground left to cover and things to learn and write about.

By: Keral Patel

Keral Patel — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 11:24:11 +0000

I do have this problem as most of the topics I had already covered in early stages of my blog. So I am sometimes writing part 2 of the posts and extending some other knowledge that I gained in the meantime on those topics. If there is nothing that I can add on those topics then I try and rephrase the post and post it again for new comers who can benefit from reading those posts.

By: Bonie

Bonie — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 05:32:16 +0000

thats my big problem too :(

By: eunice

eunice — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 04:40:11 +0000

I was rather silly; when I first started to blog in early this year, I published 100 over posts (all painstakingly done with lots of travel photos and own travel stories) but I didn’t market them, until I realised a traffic surge to a particular topic that I posted (Sichuan Earthquake). Only then, I began to interact with other bloggers and more visit my blog and leave comments.

I always wanted to repost the older 100 over posts that have no comments at all but have been hesitating to do so like what you have mentioned in your post. Now I think I know what to do. Thank you very much! =)

By: Nicole

Nicole — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 00:51:41 +0000

I like your 2nd and 3rd option. Updating an old post may be a good way to help new readers while also giving the long term readers a little “refresher” on that old post because we cannot kid ourselves here….who would remember every single post on a blog? At least, that’s why I can understand how your “2nd post” option and updates can work well.

Now, even though I agree with your options on how to handle old posts, I get pretty lazy with my blog and would probably just take a few days to go through it and add links to the older posts when writing newer posts that are related to the topic in some way. In this scenario, the new readers can find out what they didn’t know already by following the links in the new posts and the longtime readers will still have something fresh.

By: Patrick Sheffler

Patrick Sheffler — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 00:39:08 +0000

Darren,

I always appreciate your knowledge in areas that frustrate me at times. Though I’m not a professional blogger only a full time business marketer and own an advertising agency, I too have a hard time not wanting to duplicate my posts and trying to find good quality items to blog about.

Thanks for your tips, I have you on my blog list now.

Patrick Sheffler
PS Millionaire Mentor

By: ramiro marques

ramiro marques — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 16:58:02 +0000

Hi, Darren!
Great post and very useful tips.
I do the same with my blog. I like to update old posts. I rewrite them and refresh them.

By: Dollface

Dollface — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 16:28:47 +0000

My blog is fairly new, so I have not yet come across this problem. However, in the future, I imagine that I would merely write about another facet of a topic if I ran out of things to write about. For example, my blog is mostly about current events & women’s issues. So if I write a post about abortion, in the future I might invite someone with a different viewpoint on the subject to post an article, or I would focus on a different (but related) aspect like adoption, stem cell research, etc.

Thanks for the post!

By: vekin

vekin — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 13:31:06 +0000

Hi!

I really appreciate that you cover this topic. I was always concern that one day I would run out of resource and had to stop. Even though I still don’t want to “re-post” the topic, at least you shake me out of guilt of “repeating” the topic. Thanks!!

By: L-Jay

L-Jay — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 11:42:20 +0000

I think a perfect way to repeat without repeating is to have a ‘featured’ post section. This way new readers will have a chance to ‘dive’ into your website. A lot of my content is ‘evergreen’ so when I build up my blog (as it is brand spanking new!) I will find a ‘random featured post’ type plug-in that will cycle through my older posts.

BTW – does anyone know of a good ‘random featured post type plug-in’ that I can look at? lol.

By: Paula

Paula — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 10:37:43 +0000

I really like the idea of changing the date to bring the content back to the forefront of your blog. I guess if a blogger does feel a bit guilty doing this they could always indicate at the beginning of the post that it is updated content.

By: Chris

Chris — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 09:46:47 +0000

I’m just looking at this exact problem right now – I have a group product review page that could do with updating to include some newly released items.

My intention is to refresh the original post and change the published date to bring it to the front page again (my permalinks fortunately allow this).

I don’t see a problem with this – it brings the new information to the front of the blog to hopefully be seen by new visitors, keeps all of the backlinks that have built up over time so search engine visitors are more likely to find it, and saves repeating largely similar chunks of information.

The only problem I can see is where it renders comments invalid – if someone has commented on a part of the post that is no longer there it might raise some awkward questions from newer visitors. In that case I’d craft a new post and refer to the old.

By: David Hinchliffe

David Hinchliffe — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 08:54:34 +0000

If you feel guilty, you could always ask your readers if they would like old content highlighted/rewritten.

I get asked similar questions all the time from new readers who have not been through the archives so it should work for me. Cheers Darren.

By: Sire

Sire — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 07:46:41 +0000

I do not repeat the same post on a particular blog but as I run several blogs I will post them on other blogs, making sure to change keywords etc to get the best SEO benefits on each post. Many a time I can revisit old posts because new information has arisen and on these occasions I link to the old post rather that with the new information.

By: Louise Barnes-Johnston

Louise Barnes-Johnston — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 07:28:21 +0000

Thanks for this post Darren. I have ’sneaked’ in a few past articles from my newsletter onto the blog when there hasn’t been time to write anything new – and felt guilty about it! After reading your post I feel a lot better about doing that.

I also find your comment about the ‘life cycle’ of a reader a timely reminder that people move on when they outgrow the information available. This could really raise the bar in terms of content!

By: Alex Fayle

Alex Fayle — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 06:48:45 +0000

I’ve just relaunched my blog and have two years of useful archives in a second blog. I’m considering doing a weekly “a year ago” and “two years ago” on Saturdays and Sundays (days I don’t usually post).

By: Kent

Kent — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 06:37:53 +0000

Thanks for this post… this could help me a lot, especially for beginners like me.. I don’t know what to be done of having a good content in my blog, thus, repeating content is one of the things to do in attracting readers to view and read my blog.