According to research by Neil Patel, 59.2% of traffic to blogs is driven by SEO. It’s the biggest single driver of traffic by far.
Neil found that if your site is 10 or more years old, 44% percentage of the pages on your site could be considered “irrelevant” by search engines. The more irrelevant pages your site has, the more it suffers in search ranking.
In other words, Google doesn’t understand what makes for good publishing on the web.
My question is: irrelevant how, and according to whom? Google’s almighty black box of an algorithm that has already changed in the time it took to write this sentence?
Imagine if your photo library was subjected to the same treatment. “Google thinks this cool photo I took is irrelevant, so I guess I’ll delete it even though it captures a meaningful moment in my life.”
I’ve been blogging for 18 years and not once in that time have I considered the SEO implications of my writing. I don’t even look at view stats. I suppose that could be considered a luxury since my blog is not a business and I don’t have a large enough readership to capitalize on. I’m also fully aware that my full archive of 1,200+ posts to date are important to no one but me.
Google is about now now now. That’s its business, but it’s none of mine. Blogging is about now and then. The experience of capturing what’s on your mind now and making connections with what’s come before.
I echo CJ’s advice:
Don’t worry about what Google wants. It’ll change tomorrow. As will Google’s dominance.
Post as much or as little as you want. It’s your place.
Post whatever keeps you interested and publishing for the long term.
Post whatever helps you build a stronger connection with your audience.
Looking back at your archives helps you re-discover connections you’ve forgotten. It helps your readers do the same.
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