This is one of the most important revelations I’ve had since I started blogging and it applies to everything we do:
Quantity is NOT necessary!
Focusing on quantity is the reason that the Internet is littered with useless blogs and Web sites created by people desperate to make money online.
Having multiple blogs seems like a good idea when you first start blogging because a blog needs to give the audience what they want and ONLY what they want as much as possible.
It doesn’t work though because there are only so many hours in the day and each blog needs someone who is passionate about creating exceptional content and interacting with readers.
FOCUS ON ONE QUALITY BLOG!
Guest post on related high quality blogs.
Collaborate with social-media savvy bloggers.In all things you do FOCUS on RELATED collaborations!
That reality leads to trying to find ways to automate content which dilutes quality and sends your blog or business toward failure. Many viable sites drift along because the person who built them can’t focus enough attention on them.
People THINK quantity is required because they believe
that is what it takes to rank in the search engines –
especially Google.Fortunately that is NOT true because
QUALITY and RELEVANCY work even better!
I can prove this. Do a search for the phrase gift affiliate program and check the positions of posts on MurrayNewlands.com, GrowMap.com and ExecGiftsBlog.com or see the screen capture below:
Google Results for search Gift Affiliate Program Dec 15, 2011
Prior to doing this search I logged out of Google and I used Google Unpersonalized so the results should not be affected by personalization.
You can see from the screen capture above the positions of these
three posts that are today ALL on the first page at Google:
- Third: MurrayNewlands.com
- Fourth: GrowMap.com
- Tenth: ExecGiftsBlog.com
Note the dates of these three posts: Oct 23, Nov 1 and Nov 2, 2009 - over TWO YEARS ago. I have NOT done any link building to any of those posts and have rarely even shared or looked at them since 2009.
They immediately went to the first page and there they still rank.
Sometimes one of them will slip to the top of the second page and sometimes all three on the first page. This is in spite of there being several very strong affiliate marketing forums ranking, that being a very good phrase, and there being who knows how many hundreds of gift affiliate programs.
WHY ARE THEY ON PAGE ONE?
Simple. They are highly relevant quality content
related to that phrase and they link to each other.
Will my publishing this cause them to fall off page one? I don’t know, but we’ll find out, won’t we?
SEO MYTHS:
What does this tell you about commonly held myths about SEO such as:
- Reciprocal linking is ineffective – obviously not.
- Huge numbers of incoming links are necessary – doesn’t look like it to me.
That is NOT the only example of my using that strategy, but it is the only one I’m going to share. I invite you to try it for yourself or if you don’t have access to relevant blogs or blogging skills you can hire me to implement this strategy as part of blog outreach for your blog or small business.
Instead of focusing on more than one blog, massive link building, article marketing – and especially instead of using horrible automated linkbuilding tools that steal the time of others do this:
Focus on ONE high quality BLOG
Guest post on RELATED quality blogs
Collaborate with social-media savvy bloggers.In all things you do FOCUS on RELATED collaborations!
If you don’t already have one blog consider NOT starting your own blog at all – at least for now. Almost every top blog has evolved into a group blog even if they aren’t “officially” a group blog because they publish many guest posts.
Whether you have a blog of your own or not, what we really need are collaborations of related blogs and group geo-targeted blogs because reaching a specific niche geo-targeted audience is the logical next step for bloggers AND businesses.
Every blog (or collaboration) should have both a niche
AND geographically specific content
AND a geo-targeted Twitter account
Think of the blogs you read most or sites from which you have bought products or services:
- Q: Do they have auto-generated content?
- A: Of course not.
- Q: Do they spam other blogs?
- A: Certainly not!
- Q: Do you buy anything from blogs covered in AdSense ads with mediocre content?
- A: No? Then why would anyone else?
- A: No? Then why would anyone else?
- Q: Would you buy from a site that is spamming you with blog comments, spam email, or on any social network?
- A: Not if you have good sense.
- A: Not if you have good sense.
I assure anyone reading this that quality always trumps quantity and I hope by what I have shared here you now realize that huge quantities are NOT necessary.
I am NOT saying that link building is not important.
What I am saying is that links from a quality RELATED site
are more valuable than a zillion links from auto-generated junk.
Success will come from focusing all your efforts on reaching the audience most interested in what you have to offer. That is true on social media (and easily done on Twitter), in your blogs, through guest posting on related blogs, and in building collaborations.
RECOMMENDED READING: Hubspot has an excellent blog and offers exceptional advice on lead generation and management. Start with their post Content Quantity Diminishes Quality [Research] Here’s an exerpt:
The quality vs. quantity content debate isn’t an uncommon one in marketing, especially in the world of inbound marketing. High quality content is beneficial from a thought leadership and brand perception perspective, but marketers also struggle with the need to produce content regularly and frequently to compete for higher search engine rankings and fuel their inbound marketing strategies.
With recent developments in ranking algorithms such as Google Panda, however, quality has gained a competitive edge, as search engines are starting to value content high in quality and ding websites with low quality content.
That intelligence, coupled with the insights from the Presenter’s Paradox, make for a compelling case for quality over quantity in content creation, doesn’t it? The lesson is simple:
Don’t dilute your high-quality content
with mediocre or low-quality content.
Don’t take my word for it. Test it for yourself. Or hire me to show you by doing it for you. [NOTE: I only work with 2-3 total clients per month because I give them vastly more time than I charge them for and so I can mentor them in how to blog, do social media, grow their influence, etc. - so if you want my personal assistance contact me asap because once those spots are full I won't be able to accept more clients.]
Read quality blogs about SEO, especially Aaron Wall’s SEOBook. Start with this interview with Aaron and Andy Hagans on Link Building. Don’t miss probably the most important post I’ve seen on Google’s plans and my comments in that post.
Lastly, check out the brand new SEO Infographic below by SEO Book:
SEOBook Organic Link Infographic
The information in the above infographic combined with my posts detailing why Google IS Evil and How Google Limits Our Freedom of Choice By Discriminating Against Small Business clearly show that Google has declared war on small businesses.
As always, my readers are encouraged to comment and leave relevant links. Businesses and bloggers alike should take advantage of putting their best keywords in as anchor text in their comments. See the information about How to Use KeywordLuv for more details on how that works and how it benefits you.
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- Content Marketing Institute Content Marketing Blog
- See the Junta42 Top Content Marketing Blogs List for the best content marketing related blogs
Twitter: allaboutmexican
says:
quality blog is hard to find nowadays..but if you find one it’s a treasure
fresh salsa would love you to read ..A Simple Quesadilla Recipe
Twitter: matthewacoleman
says:
i totally agree..QUALITY is the ‘meat’ of a blog!
There’s no doubt that quality triumphs over quantity. Quantity might work in some cases, but it cannot come not at the cost of quality of the content. But of course if you can come up with high quality content every time, what’s the harm in regularly posting content? So the keyword is balance…Your thoughts?
Raj would love you to read ..Content Writing Vs Content Curation
Just a quick thought: I do agree with the quality thing over quantity, but true success comes with combining quality AND quantity. This is very hard to do, of course. But if you could get hundreds of pages of content that was better quality than every other link in the SERPs? Boom, you’ve made it!
Great post! Provides reassurance that quality is king. Also, very helpful graphic by SEO Book.
The guest post is definitely the way to go, but requires work. That is why so many use the automated link building techniques. To me, it is telling when you see tons of low quality links. Someone has tried to put up many ‘cookie cutter’ blogs with as little effort as possible.
The funny thing is, sometimes, you get outranked by these guys! But I guess we hope that it will be a short term thing. Quality will outlast them.
Bruce would love you to read ..B12 Injection Dosage
Twitter: devjosephite
says:
I have been really curious about reciprocal link exchange thanks for clearing the air for me.
Dev would love you to read ..How to Improve Your Blogs Pagerank
According to my knowledge, Not that more important how much you have but how effective it is more important. Many internet users use the internet in hurry so it means they only want what they actually expect. They don’t like to read so long page but they grab a piece from the page. Gone are the days when search engines like Google, Yahoo etc… were loved quantity but now as the time passes they realized the value of quality. Concentrating on quality is always lead you to up.
During our work we all experience failure , but for me it tells me that practice makes perfect, I think quantity sometimes is useless, if the content is not rare. so we should balance it.
Kate Brown Wilson would love you to read ..שיווק סלולרי
Twitter: finallyfast
says:
Right I mean, quantity = failure is a bit rigid, and really is a value that’s different for different people in different fields, but judging from some of the comments here people do have a problem with trying to run too many things at once when they first start out…^
Gregory would love you to read ..AFA Congratulates Advancing Teams in CyberPatriot Competition
It is true that the more you focus on quantity the more you fill up the internet with useless and unwanted blogs. You need to concentrate on how to get quality content instead of focusing on quantity. Filling up your website with only content will only make your blog look ugly. It will not help you in getting quality traffic over your website.
Great quality post! I have learned so much from this article, love the graphics!
I agree with you Heather, this is a great quality post, I have also learned a lot from this post.Now I need to focus on high quality post , thanks again.
Twitter: hollybell2
says:
Yup, I am not surprised that quality is far more important than quantity. You cannot have both. This informative blog has excellent graphics and points to make. Also, be sure to proofread your content well beyond spell check.
I agree that it is better to do little work abut the work should be rather well-done and of the best quality ever. Thanks for the tips how to be quality and relevant!
Since grouping similar sites together works well, if you have a couple sites that are ranking well would it be possible to build a large network by adding sites one at a time, getting it ranked, then adding another site, linking them together, and so on?
Roanoke Dentist would love you to read ..5 Easy Tips to Prevent Cavities
Twitter: b_overstreet32
says:
What a great article!! Luckily, I’m fairly new to blogging, so I’ve only dealt with my one blog. That’s time consuming enough. I couldn’t imagine having to work put dedicated effort into multiple blogs daily!
And having only been active for about 60 days, I’m starting to get pretty consistent organic traffic through Google and Bing. It’s mostly via image searches, but I ended up on the first page on Bing with 3 different posts, and 2 of those made the top 3. So I’d say my own results support the point of this article head-on.
Thanks for the great information!
~Barry
Barry would love you to read ..Organizational Culture And The Workplace (Part 1 of 3)