Same thing for blogging. Only a lot worse.
Bloggers continually grill themselves to write content after content because it feels so wrong to have the same post in your homepage for over a week. I followed that same unwritten law and tried to keep the regular supply of fresh posts. In 2007 (if you’re reading my blog for that long), I even advised bloggers to ‘have a regular posting frequency’.
Now I decided, I’m taking that advise back. Something’s wrong with this. Forced writing doesn’t do me any good. Nothing good at all.
Regularity Versus Quality – The Maki of Dosh Dosh case study
I learned this valuable lesson from Maki of Dosh Dosh over a year ago. I can’t really locate the exact post, nor the verbatim of the lesson, but it goes something like this:
“I don’t write just because I feel the need to write, it’s because I really have something important or valuable to say”.
If you don’t know Maki (well at least everyone is supposed to know him as the faceless pro blogger who loves anime pictures for his posts), then you’re missing out on one of the best blogging and internet marketing tips blog. He really was my idol. It goes as far as the best posts you can ever find is in Dosh Dosh (my opinion).
What Did People Say About Maki?
People used to compare him with a lot of A-listers. They said, even if Maki posts rarely, you wouldn’t mind it because of the grade A quality of his posts and the length involved in the discussion. His lengths could be really long mind you. Maki’s writing is so flawless and the information he presents are so valuable I’d even pay to read his blog. Seriously.
Sadly though, Maki rarely posts these days. But I don’t mind that either. Why? Because even in that case, every post in his archives are worth the read. Even if they’re ages old.
The Standards of Real, Valuable Posts
Here we have to re-asses what blogging really means. Right now what I’m seeing is that many (especially the newcomers) refer to blogging as regularly updating an opinion-based website. I beg to differ. I think it’s all about extending value that transcends time.
It’s like Maki’s posts. Even if it’s dated back to 2006 or sometime ago, I’d still read it simply because Maki wrote it to be timeless. Not just because his homepage seems stale with posts that he have to think of something to write about, but to the fact that he really discovered or learned something that’s worth sharing.
No More Forced Writing
I have to admit that I almost lost my interest to blogging this year. Sometimes, it’s just felt so pointless to compel yourself to update your blog. Why am I doing this in the first place? Mercifully, I realized that I’m doing it all wrong and something needs to be hammered out in this blog.
So what I’m going to do now is to scarp all my posting rules except one – blog for quality. All the other rules (like blog every 2-4 days, or have a regular post length) will go straight to the drain.
I want to make sure that I don’t end up writing worthless, random, abstract or simply obvious posts that I don’t really need to blog about in the first place. It’s a waste of time and I want to give justice to all of my readers who go here to look for usable, solid information.
After all, that’s the point of why I blog. Usable, solid information. Always that.
