High quality content is the most important factor for determining the long-term success of a blog. However, many bloggers just publish whatever they happen to come up with at the moment they want or need a new post. If content is critically important, why not put more effort into planning and creating? Having an effective content creation strategy will help you to produce better, more interesting blog posts with better time efficiency.
Factors Involved in a Content Creation Strategy:
What Types of Posts Will You Publish?
Most blogs consistently produce posts that fit into a particular category. Some publish news-related posts, while others may publish tutorials, opinion articles, detailed and information-packed articles, etc. This is an important factor to consider when starting because your blog will develop a particular identity, which will be significantly impacted by the types of posts that you publish. Of course, most blogs use more than just one type of post, but there is usually some level of consistency. For example, here at InspiritLive, we post primarily informative articles with tips for bloggers. There are some news and opinion content mixed in as well, but the image that most readers will have will come back to the informative posts because they account for the bulk of the content.
You should choose a strategy that will help you to achieve your goals with your blog. What do you want your readers to get out of your blog? Make sure that your content creation efforts lead to this outcome.
How Frequently Will You Post?
Obviously, there is a wide variety in terms of posting frequency among different blogs. Some publish a number of times each day, while others may publish once a week or even less. How frequently you post will certainly be impacted by how much time you have available. Multi-author blogs typically publish new posts more frequently because there are more writers contributing to the blog.
How frequently you post should also depend on the type of content that you’ve decided on. For example, if you want to publish news on a particular topic, don’t expect to only post once a week and draw a large audience. News-related blogs are forced to post very frequently to stay on top of the issues and to compete with others in the industry. On the other hand, if you are publishing long, detailed articles or tutorials you probably won’t want to publish too frequently. First of all, you won’t have the time to produce several of these posts each day, plus your readers won’t be able to digest too much of this type of information at once.
When deciding on a posting frequency, be realistic with yourself. Don’t say that you are going to post everyday if you simply don’t have that much time and you struggle to even post once a week.
How Much Time Will Be Need for Writing Process?
Notice that I said “writing process,” not just “writing.” I believe that brainstorming and developing ideas are critical to content development, as is proofreading. All of these activities, plus the research that’s involved, combine with the actual writing to form the writing process. Be sure that you allocate time for all of these things if you want to produce the highest quality content.
The amount of time needed will depend partly on the types of posts that you are developing, and it should be a factor in determining how frequently you post. Be sure that this equation leads to quality over quantity. Don’t make sacrifices to the writing process in order to publish more frequently.
During the development of your content creation strategy it will be helpful to find the times of the day or of the week that work best for you to dedicate to writing. If you have time set aside that fits into your most productive time you will see better results with your content. If possible, leave plenty of time to write in advance. Have some backup posts ready so that when you are struggling to come up with something of quality you have a backup plan.
Will You Run a Series?
A few weeks ago I published a post about creating a signature series. Some bloggers use an ongoing series of posts in their content creation strategy. When done well this can be very effective.
How Does This Content Highlight Your Strengths?
Every blogger has strengths and weaknesses. Does your content creation strategy highlight your strengths or expose your weaknesses? Be sure that the type of content you are creating allows you to produce your best work. Don’t force yourself into creating content that just doesn’t work for you.
How Will the Content Affect Your Branding?
Most successful blogs have done an excellent job of branding themselves over time. In most cases, the content that has been published is one of the contributing factors to the development of the brand. Just take a look at a few of the most visible examples. Copyblogger is the first blog that comes to mind on the subject of writing for the web, and mostly because of the consistently high level of quality content. Dosh Dosh is another great example. Maki’s style of writing and his extensive knowledge that shines through in his posts has made his blog what it is today. Going in a different direction, PSDTuts is well branded for graphic designers that want to continually improve their skills with Photoshop. How do you want to brand your blog? Will your content creation strategy allow you to do so?
What Are Your Thoughts?
Have you developed a content creation strategy? If so, please share some of the details with us in the comments. What other factors do you think should be considered?
