I started blogging in 2006, prior to that time I would put my thoughts in my journals. It is often said, “The weakest ink remembers more than the strongest mind”. I didn’t know that I could make money blogging, nor did I know that I could use google keywords to get more readership.
I just wrote about ideas, about the lessons I had with my students, and about other passions of mine such as trading. Prior to blogging my journals contained my ideas and muses. I still go back to them for inspiration for new ideas, and memories of previously comprehended ones. I have also found that certain situations spawn similar seeds of thoughts.
For the past 3 years of “managing” a blogging website I have noticed trends, but until recently I have not been able to quantify them. I would write timely information based on “my time” and experiences. Indeed this is one of the powers of the blogging platform, however as a business I have found a few more structured ways to blog. What if you ran a Recreation and Sports website and wanted to get the most readership on a given topic? When would you start blogging about skiing, tennis, golf, yoga, weight lifting, physical therapy, etc? And what terms are people ACTUALLY searching.
Before I go further, I am sure there are some blogging purists seeing this going in the way of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) or SEM (Search Engine Marketing), or populist marketing. Indeed you are seeing that!
I may write about a number of things, and for my “skiing business” I would like as many people who are interested in my subjects of expertise read these articles. That is one of the main reasons I write and publish them.
So, how might you structure blogging with the Recreation and Sports…
Using
Google Insights you could input a few of what you consider to be relevant topics. Let’s say, Golf, Tennis, Skiing, Yoga, Sports. Each of these terms have seasonality (which is why I initially picked them). You may anticipate Skiing would see winter demand, and you would be right. It peaks in December, and has since 2004. My question is, “When does it start seeing a ramp in activity? Reasonably simple to assume, but Insights let’s us see a bottom in June, ramping in Sept and spiking in Nov/Dec. And what specific search term is chosen? As I write this in June, the strong terms are “ski” and “cross country skiing”.
A person could assume we would see summer spikes in Golf and Tennis, and we would be right again. The term sports remains relatively high year-around, not seeing significant seasonality. Golf troughs in November and begins to rise in February and peaks in July often around major events. Although, over the past 6yrs we have been seeing lower lows and lower highs. And the current top searches for Golf are “Golf” and “Golf Course” (but not “golf courses”). With the top countries of origin being:
- Ireland
- US
- Canada
- UK
A final observation I will make in this post is regarding aggregate demand is that we can see trends over time, and relative interest. Here is a list of 5 from high to low and their relative score out of 100 (taken on June 1st, 2010):
- Golf – 58
- Sports – 53
- Tennis – 21
- Yoga – 11
- Skiing – 3
In short, If I were going to write an article on skiing I would most likely write something regarding summer sports which can benefit my skiing, or summer activities which can be enjoyed at ski resort, etc.
To reminisce in an entire blog post about the great powder day we enjoyed in March may fall upon deaf ears, blind eyes and wither like a snowflake in June.
Stay relevant, and know what the audience is looking to read. This relevance in blog posts can significantly impact your overall Organic ranking for your web presence in search.
