Does Blogging Still Work? Niche Site Case Study Part 3

As we enter week 3 of my case study, I haven't really done much in the way of adding new content. I HAVE just added a couple of new posts (and scheduled some) to both of the sites, but my focus has not been on writing content or doing keyword research. This is what most people do when starting out a new site, but I'd rather focus elsewhere.

In today's post I'm going to discuss blogging, content for the sake of content, and wow posts (if you don't know what “wow posts” are, read on).

Over the weekend I listened to one of Pat Flynn's podcasts from May 2013. He puts out excellent podcasts every week, but this was one that had Neil Patel in it, so it was well worth going back through the archives and giving it a listen.

At the time, Pat was about to start his second Niche Site Duel site, and was grilling Neil for what strategies he thought were working at the time, and what would still be working in the future. This was pretty handy, since I was listening to it from that future.

There are loads of great gems of knowledge in there, so rather than me listing them all, go and have a listen yourself sometime. I've linked to it above.

What's The Point Of This Preamble?

What I found particularly insightful of Neil was early on in the podcast when he said that blogging wasn't as effective as it once was. This resonated with me quite well, and it's something I've been kind of mentioning in my own posts lately.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not telling you NOT to start a blog, and I'm not saying it's bad to blog, but I do think there are more useful content strategies to use in an ever evolving Internet.

Neil's point was that a blog isn't going to gain popularity as easy as it did in say, 2004. People still love reading new content and blog posts, but it's a lot harder to just start blogging and find avid readers. Instead, you've got to focus on putting out seriously good content.

This might be harder than blogging, but you don't exactly have to do it three times a week either, so it balances out.

I remain convinced that the only real purpose of regular blogging (say, 1-2 posts a week) is for building out an authority site where you're not aiming to reach success for at least a year or so.

This kind of method requires you to blog week in, week out for a long period of time. It's what I've been doing with HumanProofDesigns, so it does still work.

With YourOwnGymZone and DateandSimple, I'm not planning to spend a year building them out as authority sites though.

So that pretty much rules out blogging for the sake of blogging.

What real benefit would there be to me putting out a new post every week for a few months? None really. I would eventually gain some traction, and get some income to them, but I'm not planning on waiting that long.

Let's look at what else could work.

It's not only my recent research from Neil that has got me thinking more about spending less time publishing posts, and more time producing posts (by this I mean, publish less often, but higher quality).

Here are some things other people have said, that I'm going to try with this case study:

1.) Brian Dean preaches the value of epic (or “wow”) posts as well. Read about his skyscraper technique and wow posts.

2.) Jon Haver and various others talk about using expert roundup posts to dominate your niche. I talked about this last week.

3.) Pat Flynn talks about a whole bunch of things, but one smart method was to interview forum owners and get a traffic boost from their audiences.

4.) Neil Patel talks about throwing the “Don't write more than 2,000 words” rule out of the window, and producing epic guides. Here's one of his very guides here. See what I mean?

5.) Gael from Authority Hacker has many great ways of “hacking” authority and getting a head start, using all white-hat methods.

We're not all Neil Patel though. We can't all produce epic guides, or get people with big audiences to share our stuff out.

But we can learn how to do all that.

What's the point in writing an average blog post every week, if we could instead be learning how to write epic content and getting it in front of the people who matter?

Content without promotion is a waste of time. 

This will help a blog grow. Once it starts to grow and you get an audience…THEN you can think about regularly blogging to keep them coming back.

Flipping The Old Model On Its Head

Well not exactly flipping it, but something along those lines.

Instead of blogging and blogging until you get traction, why not get traction first? It sounds counter-intuitive, but if you've been reading the post up until now, you'll realize it's not so.

Consider this:

One of the hardest things most people face, is blogging endlessly and not knowing when results will come.

If you can instead focus on things that will get those results first, continuing to blog every week will be a lot easier.

Despite what you may think, you DON'T need to have a huge amount of content to get people to share your site and link to it.

What's Up Next For My Sites

This has been a very “theory” based lesson and I have to apologize a bit for that. You're wanting to follow a case study, and there's not really much to report or follow yet.

Well..this is the “study” part of it.

How Does This Fit Into Week 2?

Last week I talked mostly about backlinks and how important they are. This week I've talked about content and building authority.

If you put the two together, you've armed yourself with something very special. Over the next few weeks, as my strategies and methods play out, you'll get to witness that first hand.

It all adds up, and once you can crack it, you're golden.

Here's what I did this week and what I'll do next week.

Actions this week:

1.) Added 4 new posts to each site. 1 published immediately, 3 scheduled for the next few weeks.

Even though I've just written a thousand words explaining why I think content for content's sake is a bad idea, I do think the sites needed a few more posts and some fleshing out.

2.) Decided the content strategy for the rest of the study:

– Produce 1-2 “wow posts” (epic posts of a few thousand words, aimed at getting traffic, followers, and links) for each site.

– Create 1 expert roundup post for each site.

– Properly use Infographics (don't do what most people do).

– Various other authority building methods and “eyes on content” methods.

Actions to take next week:

I will research and decide on the titles for the wow posts that I will write for each site. Your homework is to read Brian Dean's guide here.

I'll also load an infographic on my site and get people to share it, without having to produce an infographic. Stay tuned to find out how.

See you next week!

Comments, questions, suggestions?

I'm all ears (or eyes).