The Web Authority

I blog professionally for a living and also employ about five writers to blog for me for a variety of clients so I’ve seen it all and have experienced many blog related problems for myself on my own blog.

One of the big problems that I have experienced is loss of readership in 2007. Readers simply want to keep tabs on blogs that are updated frequently. This past year, my own blog readership has suffered due to my own posting inconsistency. My business grew tremendously in 2007, I had personnel problems, and I posted on a very inconsistent basis on my own blog. As a result my website traffic dropped significantly in 2007 and most of my decrease in traffic came from my lack of blog activity.

It is a very tough thing to keep posting to your own business blog when you are busy or have a limited amount of time. I have seen this first hand. Although I still write my own blog and am working to keep it updated this year, it is tough. This is our value for own clients, we do the heavy lifting for them on their blog. Really I should have taken my own advice shouldn’t I have, and employed one of my writers to ghost blog for me instead of stopping. :0)

Blogging on a consistent basis can be very tough, but it is a time tested fact that good blogging done on a consistent basis will bring a website more overall traffic, improve stickiness, and may add to the authority of a website overtime improving organic placement. This has been my own personal winning combination.

So how do you keep blog subscribers happy?
1. Post on a regular basis
2. Post at a regular time – for me this is in the morning
3. Post at least three days a week – for me I shoot for five, but three should be your minimum
4. Write information that is helpful and targeted to your readers
5. Provide interesting content but not too long or a dissertation. 250 to 350 words is best

Every website needs one – a privacy policy! If you market your business online or for that matter just have a web presence, it is a best business practice to let reader’s know one what you do when they contact you, if you will use their email address and in what way, and to include any legal disclaimers to protect yourself from litigation.

Every site should have one. Yours doesn’t need to be as detailed as ours, (click our post title to see ours), but it should cover what you do and how you will use a reader’s information such as an email address even if you don’t collect them on the website.

The other important issue is that did you know that Google looks for a privacy policy when you are using Google AdWords? If you have a landing page for your advertising, make sure that you have a link to your privacy policy to give you additional legitimate standing with Google.

A privacy policy page is much like a site map, every site should have one and make it accessible from every page in your website.