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orion_joel
01-17-2009, 06:38 PM
Just got two question on this topic here.

First, How many blogs do you manage and/or write for?

and, how many blogs do you believe a single person should be able to handle before the quality gets impacted?

thanks for you comments.

vangogh
01-17-2009, 08:25 PM
At the moment I write for just the one blog. I think the number you can write for depends on you. How well do you write? How prolific a writer are you? At some point you'll spread yourself too thin, but is that point three blogs or eight? I think the number varies for each blogger.

It also depends on the type of blog. A news blog needs to be updated several times a day while a tutorial blog could be updated once a week.

Odds are you'll know when you're quality is being impacted when you hit that point.

Harold Mansfield
01-17-2009, 08:32 PM
Right now I have 6 blogs going, and countless others in the works. I have a writer on one, and I write the others, although one of them is suffering.
I am certainly spread too thin, and the quality on a few of my blogs suffers on some days, but other days I hit a home run.

Right now the ones that make money are first, but I have other blogs in the works that will help some others sites that are making a sale or 2 a week, and maybe boost it to a sale or two a day and then some.

I'll get it down to a pattern soon enough and I'll be able to keep at least 10 updated at least 3 times a week.

orion_joel
01-18-2009, 12:16 AM
I can see both sides of the argument here, while i can understand putting the time and effort into a single blog could potentially give much better results then multiple blogs, i cannot see myself being content with a single blog.

At this point i have three blogs, which for the most part i update 2 to 3 times per week. I have just set up a schedule so that i am making at least one post every day, alternating each day between blogs. This means that every third week each blog will each an extra post that week.

I think it would probably be able to handle maybe up to about 6 myself, and could maybe go 9 if they were topics that really interested me. Anything beyond this i think i would definitely need to be buying in content, or something. It would really just be a case of separating up my day to dedicate it in 2 or 3 parts.

vangogh
01-18-2009, 02:05 AM
You don't have to limit yourself to one blog. Many people run more than one. You just can't run more blogs than you can realistically run well. There's no point having one more blog if it means letting one of your other blogs sit idle and wither. The only limit is you and how much you can do.

orion_joel
01-18-2009, 04:51 AM
Yeah well i mean currently i am running three, and pretty much still have a lot of spare time. This is not to say that i am running the ones i have perfectly, there is still lots to do, i know i could improve the content quality, i think everyone can always improve in this area somewhat. Also i could probably doing more promotion then i am, however am trying to make it feel natural, reading a few blogs and comment where i feel i have something to say and trying to build some social networks.

I think the biggest problem you would face with having multiple blogs is the promotion part, trying to ensure that you are promoting to a reasonable level and across all blogs well, without letting one sit without promotion, even though you are continually creating content for it.

vangogh
01-18-2009, 11:15 AM
It's really a matter that each blog takes up a larger slice of your available time. You probably need to find the balance between having more blogs and being able to maintain the level of quality you want. Seems at the moment you're able to do that with three blogs. Yes everything can always be improved, but for now you seem to be able to maintain all three.

Perhaps in time you'll find you can only promote two in a way you want and perhaps you'll discover you can handle a fourth blog.

orion_joel
01-18-2009, 07:14 PM
Another thought that i have had, which i am to some extent following through on, is combining having the blogs, with pure content sites. I first started trying to do this with my articles site, however while this is still there with about a dozen articles and does get a little traffic each month. I soon realized most of what i wanted to put on there i also wanted to put on my blog. So it really came to the point i don't want to have to try and create to articles on the same topic to promote at two different places, so why not just put them all in one place and promote that. However now i do have another site in the work that is a separate topic that is just going to be a whole bunch of information, and see how that goes.

vangogh
01-18-2009, 07:28 PM
Makes sense. No reason to run those as separate sites. I'd move the articles over to your blog, but keep the article site and 301 redirect the old articles to the new posts. That should also help give your blog a boost in traffic and transfer any search engine benefit from the old site to the blog as well.

KristineS
01-19-2009, 04:22 PM
I write for six blogs at present. Two are totally mine, two are corporate, one is an organizational blog, and for one I'm a contributing writer. All of them have suffered at various times from my lack of time to write, but I think, if I had nothing but time to write, I could write for more. Right now, my main impediment to starting more venues is that I have a full time job. If I were getting paid to write blogs I'd have a lot more of them.

orion_joel
01-19-2009, 06:38 PM
The primary reason i have not move the article site and combined it with my blog is that most of the articles i wrote for it initially were not really in the strain of my blog which is why i was seperating them, however i found at the time i was more interested in writing for the business side of things which is my blog and i could not see a reason to split it up for the one topic. So i am keeping the article site there at the moment to just really pickup any traffic it does and may put a bit more into it at some point in the future, still undecided.

Kristine, i also agree if i was not working a full time job i would probably spend a lot more time writing. Which even as it stands if i better managed my time i would be able to get a lot more written, however this is something that i am trying to work on my making todo lists, everyday, and actually trying to put values on completing the items on the list so that i can add it up and try to score myself on how much i have got done each day. This i think will help to motivate me somewhat as i kind of dislike not scoring well in anything, and may be the thing that does motivate me.

vangogh
01-19-2009, 07:58 PM
Joel keep in mind that running separate sites also means marketing separate sites. Some of the marketing may overlap, but you're having to essentially do twice the work. Probably more since having all the content on one site would likely make the marketing easier. I think the combined site would be equal to more than the sum of its parts so to speak.

And Kristine and Joel the answer is obvious. You must both quit your jobs immediately :)

orion_joel
01-19-2009, 10:06 PM
Steve, you do not realize, how happy i would be to go and do that, if i had a proper plan to create a income equal to or more then what i currently earn from working. But really how hard could it be to make $40K per year.....now where is a good form resignation letter. ;)

Also, in regards to the multiple sites, i do understand this, however i find that i am not actually marketing the articles site really and i do get a few visitors, so it is more like a auto pilot till i decide what to do next with the domain. Most of the articles dont really fit my current content range, but they are good to have maybe for later on i suppose.

vangogh
01-19-2009, 10:37 PM
If they don't fit the blog then maybe they aren't best to include. And there's no reason you can't have two sites on the same or mostly same topic. If you do manage to promote both well somewhere down the line there could be benefits to having two popular sites instead of just one.

KristineS
01-20-2009, 03:39 PM
And Kristine and Joel the answer is obvious. You must both quit your jobs immediately :)

If you have a plan for how I can feed myself and keep a roof over my head, I'm up for it. As it stands now, I write when I can and just keep working toward making that my full time gig.

orion_joel
01-20-2009, 06:04 PM
I am actually putting together my plan to make this happen. I figured some of the things that i need to do to make it a reality, now i just need it in a plan, and to put that plan in action.