There have been many case studies done to show the effect of publishing schedules on traffic and conversions. I’d like to share some notable results with you, so you can evaluate the data and see how you’d like to apply it to your business.

Case Study 1: HubSpot

Hubspot did a study on their customers (13,500+) and they did a study with their own readers. While the study with their customers showed conclusively that businesses who post more, attract more leads, their own site showed a higher return when they updated old content rather than increasing the publishing frequency.

Their increased posting schedule showed an increase in email unsubscribes and only a 5% increase in traffic to new posts. For them, increasing the posting schedule seemed to be more harmful than helpful.

Instead of increasing the content publishing frequency, they noticed their content type correlated more with traffic and leads. They said business trends, infographics and slideshares, and deep tactical posts attracted the most traffic. Interestingly enough, the highest traffic posts were not the highest conversion posts. Hubspot found they drive the most leads from promo posts like eBooks, templates, webinars, and downloads.

Case Study 2: Neil Patel

Neil Patel started his site posting once per week, but he set a goal to reach 100,000 pageviews in his first year on neilpatel.com, so he decided to experiment by increasing the publishing schedule to 2 posts/week. He noticed an increase in leads when he increased to two articles per week, so he stayed at the ramped up pace to hit the 100,000 mark in under one year.

Later, he wrote a post saying he increased his readership by 51% by decreasing his publishing schedule. We can see with the Neil Patel case study that trends can change. Even with one site, you can have periods where engagement can increase or your readers may be looking for more answers from you, and others where you can be more silent, so it’s best to stay engaged with your readers.

Conclusions from Case Studies

The case studies show us that content publishing frequency may not be the answer for everyone. It may be a good primer to start out or a good challenge along the way to accelerate growth, but it doesn’t sound like a good long term strategy for most digital publishers or business owners.