How Often Should You Update Your Blog?

At the beginning stage of our blogs, we tend to post updates very often. Not only are the posts that we put up at the beginning full of content and energy, but we ourselves feel great when we write them. Soon enough though, we lose that initial rush and we begin to do two things: write posts that are of lesser of quality and sometimes we even have to force ourselves to write anything at all.

I myself fell victim to this and eventually burned out. That doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing though. As a matter of fact, I learned a great deal from it. Today, I want to share with you what I’ve learned when it comes to how how often we should be updating our blogs.

There is no universal blogging standard as to how often you should update your blog. Let’s go through a couple of pointers that can help your blog grow – even if you just started:

There is no standard

Different blogs will update at different intervals. This point actually requires that you do some basic research. Look at some other blogs in your niche to discover how often they are updating. Remember, you are not basing your decision purely on how often other blogs post – but it is part of it.

For example, if you love technology and decide you want to enter some niche in that area, you’ll soon find out that you have to update often a lot. Technology-related blogs require up-to-date information and succeed usually on how fast information gets out. Consider blogs like Engadget or Gizmodo that do live-blogging of events like at MacWorld. Those blogs don’t just release information when it gets leaked to the press, they are also at the events writing about it as it happens.

What you need to worry about is how to develop your own style. In the meantime, one thing you have to do is…

Be consistant

The majority of blogs (such as this one) cover topics that are not time-sensitive. What I mean by that is that a post I write today can be just as relevant 5 years from now as it is when you first read it. I picked a niche that, for the most part, has information and tips that don’t “expire”.

Look at your life and see what a realistic number of posting per week is. If you are a college student who has a job, then it’s probably not a good idea to try to write a post everyday. Remember that successful bloggers can recognize their limits and then efficiently use the time that they do have.

Create a schedule

Being consistant is important, but in order to be consistant you must create a schedule. It’s not necessary that you sit down and prepare a physical schedule (although I would recommend doing that). But, you should have an idea in your own head which days you will sit down to brainstorm, write, edit, and post.

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How often you update your blog ultimately comes down to achieving a balance between what you are able to do and what you have to do to keep your blog rolling. I’m wondering how often you guys update your blogs. Have you fallen into the same hole as me – the burnout? If you have, what tips do you have for the rest of us?

(Photo:gadl)