Off topic posts in feeds, would you mind?

27 Jun

Posted by silkenhut in Blog Updates |

Hi! I'm Allen and I welcome you to my blog. I blog mainly about my blogging experiences where I get to learn how to earn money online through blogging and have fun doing so. To learn more about my blog, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. If you have some questions, feel free to ask me by using my contact form. Thank and have a nice day.

I have to admit that I have been making off topic posts here in my blog in attempts to increase my traffic and learn seo. However, I said to myself that I will not show these posts in my feeds and so far I have been successful in doing them but it has been like a double edge sword to this blog.

What is this blog about?

First, before I talk about the off-topic stuffs in my blog, let me first explain what this blog’s purpose is all about. I mainly talk about blogging and I know it sounds too general so let me break it down. Here in this blog, you can read about

Blogging Tips (example tips such as, how to write your posts, post frequencies, good and bad blogging examples)
my personal blogging experiences where I tried something and shared my results (examples would be Valentine’s day blogging experiences, Manny Pacquiao blogging experiences, Ragnarok blogging) experiences)
News about Wordpress and Blogger - Whenever a new wordpress version is released, I try my best to upgrade then blog about it. The same goes for new updates and features in blogger.
Blogging events in the Philippines - Once in a while, we get lucky and get invited to blogger meet-ups. When I see a news, I help spread it by posting it here.
Current Events in the Philippines - Although this has nothing to do with blogging, as a Filipino, I’d like to create social awareness on the events that are happening in our country.
and lastly, how to make money online through blogging. Well so far, adsense has been my consistent money maker here but I’ve yet to tap into other resources. See a sample of my adsense income here.

What are the offtopic posts?

Well, off topic posts are any of my posts that are not related to the topics I have mentioned above. That would include my post on PSP OFW 4.01, NBA Finals 2008 and other topics. The purpose of these posts is to gain more visitors via search engine and search keywords. So far the results have been good. I make sure that they don’t show up in my feeds so it’s a win-win solution for me and for my regular readers. However, I have noticed a problem here.

The posts take longer to get indexed and harder to rank

I noticed that when these posts don’t get included in the feeds, the search engines tend to be late in indexing them (similar effect to posting immediately and scheduled posting as discovered by fellow blogger Dexter). This is very bad in terms on ranking especially when you are trying to rank for a current news item because by the time they have been indexed, the traffic would have died by then. So my proposal would be, I’d add these off topic posts in my feeds but I’m concerned on what my readers would feel if they saw these off topic posts.

So I’d like to ask, would you mind if you saw off topic posts in my feeds?

Personally, when I see these type of posts in the feeds I read, I just skip them and move on to the next. However, some may get pissed off and unsubscribe. So I’d like to ask for your opinion first.

Thank you very much for reading and understanding.

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18 Responses

marhgil (19 comments.)

June 27th, 2008 at 3:08 pm
1

i don’t mind. coz that’s what i’m doing too. sending off topics on my feeds.
marhgils last blog post..Daniel Dingle’s Water-Powered Car
porch lifts (32 comments.)

June 27th, 2008 at 8:26 pm
2

I do not see any reason not to really.

In regards to your posts not being indexed as fast, do you do any social bookmarking. I usually bookmark my new posts in a few sites and it is good for a little traffic and helps the pages get indexed faster.
Pinoy Nurse Making MOney Online (2 comments.)

June 27th, 2008 at 9:02 pm
3

I don’t mind, because there are things you know in other aspects which I don’t know. It is better to share them to your readers too.

Pinoy Nurse Making MOney Onlines last blog post..Dengue Fever: My experience Part 1
Angela (1 comments.)

June 28th, 2008 at 11:12 am
4

still very new to this..
started my blog as a hobby, but soon found that there was money to be made! (although i haven’t really made any yet, haha!)
i like this blog, just found it :]
check out mine! hehe.

-Angela!

Angelas last blog post..Gender confusion?
ceblogger (21 comments.)

June 28th, 2008 at 11:19 am
5

i don’t think there is an off-topic post in a general blog, or in a blog about blogging, as long the purpose is to apply what we blog about. Same dilemma that I have, which led me to create another blog for whatever hot and current.

Include the post in your feeds, and let the readers decide.

cebloggers last blog post..Pacquiao vs Diaz Fight Results
Ling (11 comments.)

June 28th, 2008 at 1:19 pm
6

Don’t see why you should not include posts in feeds. People can just skip over to the next one, if they’re not interested. As for the late indexing, don’t blogs get indexed immediately by Google? I mean, you hit publish and it should start showing up in the rankings immediately.
Allen (689 comments.)

June 29th, 2008 at 2:05 pm
7

@Marghil - Yeah, I noticed that too. I just skim over and read what interests me.
Allen (689 comments.)

June 29th, 2008 at 2:06 pm
8

@Porch Lifts - Hmm thanks for the suggestion. Once in a while, I bookmark my posts but most of the time, I tend to forget to do it. I should bookmark them more from now on.
Allen (689 comments.)

June 29th, 2008 at 2:08 pm
9

@Pinoy Nurse - I agree, sometimes, you want to say something in your blog which would be offtopic but still important for you. I guess its ok to post stuffs like those once in a while.
Allen (689 comments.)

June 29th, 2008 at 2:12 pm
10

@ceblogger - When I think about it, I can just reason out that these are all my blogging experiences. I don’t want to create a new blog as I realized maintaining a blog is already time consuming.
Allen (689 comments.)

June 29th, 2008 at 2:15 pm
11

@Ling - I used to exclude them for fear that they will unsubscribe when they see off topic posts. I guess I was too paranoid. btw, as for indexing, I do not agree that they get indexed immediately. I’ve been observing this for a while and posts that do not show up in the homepage get indexed later and same goes for posts that do not show up in your feeds.
Allen (689 comments.)

June 29th, 2008 at 2:16 pm
12

@Angela - Hello Angela, thanks for visiting. Yes there is money to be found from blogging. You just have to know how too. I visited your blog and read some of your posts. Keep on posting.
Fitz (4 comments.)

June 29th, 2008 at 5:08 pm
13

I don’t mind seeing off-topic posts from you in my feed reader.

When I was new to RSS, it kindda annoyed me. But now, I actually smile when I see them. Why? Because I know that a fellow blogger has earned money by writing a paid post. Either that or he/she has stumbled upon a good keyword which I can also use. Lastly, off-topic SEO posts are still interesting reads despite being irrelevant to the blog niche.

So in short, go ahead and spam my feed reader. Haha.
Fitzs last blog post..Simple Tips To Save Money At The Movies
security cameras direct (1 comments.)

June 29th, 2008 at 11:47 pm
14

Well, the off-topic posts do not annoy me at all. If you want to learn about SEO then do some research. SEO can be done by yourself but this require some time and some hard work. Please mail me if you are interested.
Allen (689 comments.)

June 30th, 2008 at 10:08 am
15

@Fitz - Oh thanks for the encouragement Fitz. However, I still do not include paid posts in my feeds. They are still hidden haha Since you gave me your permission, prepare to get spammed in your reader. hehe
Allen (689 comments.)

June 30th, 2008 at 10:09 am
16

@Security - Ok i’ll send you a mail provided that the information you will be giving is free and doesn’t require a membership fee.
bloggernoob (3 comments.)

July 1st, 2008 at 2:51 pm
17

My readers don’t seem to mind. Of course i don’t have that many subscribers, but still. I think people tend to understand that blogging about the same thing day in day out is hard.

bloggernoobs last blog post..Why you shouldn’t trust make money online income reports
Allen (689 comments.)

July 2nd, 2008 at 1:18 am
18

@bloggernoob - Yes I agree with your statement, “blogging about the same thing day in day out is hard”. Sometimes I really think about this question before I write a post, what else do I have to say which others have not said before?