It Takes a While to Gain a Blog Following – Be Persistent

Problogger reported some advice from Duncan Riley, Founder and Editor of The Inquisitr in the post, The Power of Blogging with a Long Term View. His focus was how long it takes to get rich blogging. I looked at the Inquisitr site and it seems to be a news aggregator designed to attract attention across a wide variety of topics. It is full of ads like the top Google ad when I looked – how to buy pictures of Lindsay Lohan Naked. Remember Google Ads are supposed to be content derived. I will not say more.

Now many niche bloggers have different objectives than Duncan. Few business blogs are designed to make much, if any, money directly. However, almost every blogger wants to develop a readership, whatever their objectives. Duncan does make some good points to consider as you start a blog. He stated the reason for the long ramp up is the need to accumulate a variety of content that appeals to search engines.

Duncan said it takes six to nine months for a blog to get fully ramped up in terms of readership. I tell my blog clients to give it at least three months to see any results but I would agree with Duncan on the longer time for a more robust readership. He said with the Inquistr it was seven months until things really took off in terms of traffic and they actually were making a profit. He mentioned that Jason Calacanis, founder of the Weblogs Inc blog network, puts the number at 2 years.

Blog readers who come to blogs through search engines are largely not time sensitive. I see this all the time in the readers who come to this blog. It is just as likely to be for a two or three year old post as a more recent one. So as you build out a body of blog content think long term and remember you are involved in very asynchronous communication.

So do not be too concerned if people do not read posts when they first come out. They will be out for as long as you keep the blog online. With this in mind it is good to write a posts that are both timely and timeless or some of each. As your content grows there will more opportunities for people to find something they like and come to your blog, and perhaps tell others. So be persistent and think of the cumulative message you want to convey. Build a story in installments and link back to earlier relevant posts to help create the overall message.

Comments

[nick barker]

Hi Bill

Thanks for the words of support. Sometimes we all need encouragement to keep focused and reach the readers. Enjoy your holiday.

Nick

[Bill Ives]

Nick. Happy holidays to you. Let's hope that bloggers will do better than some artists who have to wait until they are dead to become famous. Free associating on this I wonder if blogging persists, if will become a great source of historical record since their are more bloggers than print diarists. For example, I know a lot of artists who are bloggers would describe their thoughts about their art through their blog. Bill

[Nick Barker]

It is strange how so many of the world greatest artists go mad, cut off the ear or become penny less and are buried in a poorpers grave. New idea.. Artist 2.0 ;) Get the online social feedback during ones lifetime to enjoy the fruits of success. Happy 2009.

[Bill Ives]

Nick - Here is an artist friend who did not wait and started a blog 4 years ago. Bill

Fluid Thinking – Karen D’Amico’s Artist Blog
http://billives.typepad.com/portals_and_km/2008/03/fluid-thinking.html

[Nick Barker]

Like it :) How many people do you know Bill?

[Bill Ives]

Nick - Not as many as Chris Brogan who recently posted on the problem of reaching the 5,000 friend limit on Facebook. http://www.chrisbrogan.com/fan-pages-and-facebook-relationships/

Bill

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