You have two blogs in draft.

You are exhausted!

You are ready to call it quits!

One article took a week to make.

A week is a long time to make one measly blog post.

So, you contemplate if blogging is for you.

But you realize that if blogging would’ve been easy, everyone would be writing for a living.

You decide to stick around, and now you want to strategize your plan intricately.

And you want to know how many blog posts you should do before launch. 

How many blog posts before publishing your draft

Speaking from experience. When starting a brand new blog. Publish it now!

Don’t wait to have a perfect blog or a website.

Once you have something in the final draft, hit publish.

I doubt that you have many followers that are eagerly waiting for your very first blog post.

No, it’s all crickets and spider webs on your website. There’s no one waiting.

After you publish your very first article, expect nothing.

You won’t see any action until your site has enough content for Google to index your pages. 

However, if you don’t care about the free organic traffic from SEO. And rely on ads as your sole method to get traffic to your site, then do the following.

Once you have your Homepage, About page, Contact, and other legal articles, start your marketing campaign. 

Don’t waste any more of your precious time writing blog posts.

If you’re selling products or services, you’ll need a remarkable landing page with a high converting sales copy.

Then create your ad and direct traffic to your sales page. 

With ads, you don’t need to keep publishing content as long as you’re paying for traffic.

The problem is, once you run out of ad budget, your only way to get traffic is through free platforms such as social media.

There is a problem with that because the organic reach for social media has declined tremendously.

The only social network to gain amazing organic awareness is TikTok. But, that is slowly going away as more creators are joining the platform.

So, optimizing your website for the search engine is a crucial step to increasing awareness and sales.

How many blog posts before you get social

Now, this is a little different. 

When it comes to letting people know about your blog, don’t do it from the get.

Just imagine you got someone to your blog, and it’s a ghost town?

You’re going to scare the bejesus out of them.

Plus, it could have a detrimental effect on your SEO. 

Not everyone visiting your website will like what you have to say. 

It’s also important to know that the people you’re promoting your website have intent.

Intent like they want to read your blog post. 

The reason being is that some of the signals Google looks for when it comes to ranking websites are the bounce rate, time on page, and dwell time. 

Bounce rate is someone who goes into your site then suddenly hits the back or close button. 

While dwell time is how long someone spends their time on a page, then go back to the search engine results page. 

As you can see, if a visitor goes to your website then immediately hits the back button or closes the browser, Google takes that into account. 

It makes sense that you create highly engaging content and promote it to the right people. 

So, you have a Huffington Post-worthy article, and you target groups that are likely to engage. How many blog posts before you launch?

I suggest having 5 to 10 articles. So that there’s a reason for a user to stay on your page a while longer, increasing dwell time and decreasing bounce rate can positively affect your overall search engine ranking. 

Be aware, though, promoting your blog posts to social media can have a negative or a positive effect. Even Google echoes the same:

…As with most points covered in this document, taking these recommendations to an extreme could harm the reputation of your site…

[source: Beginner SEO Promote]

Your checklist before launching a blog

This general guideline will have your blog on the good side of Google. 

With this checklist, you’ll tell Google that your site will be fresh and regularly updated.

The beginning stage is the easiest when it comes to content creation. So, blog quickly and target keywords that are easy to write. 

What others tell you checklist:

1. Once you publish your first blog post, have five or more articles ready to publish. Having five ready-to-go pieces is a good buffer.
2. Schedule those drafted articles to be published weekly. Doing so will tell Google that someone is posting new content weekly and that your site is fresh.
3. Join groups that you know will read your articles. Don’t join groups that have no intention of reading what you have to say. For example, if you’re selling weight loss pills, don’t join a travel group. 
4. Set up your email capture. You worked hard getting traffic to your site. Don’t waste it by not implementing a last-ditch effort to sell to them continually. Email marketing is still regarded as the best method of marketing with a good return on investment.

What I would do:

1. Write the best article you can. 
2. Publish it.
3. Repeat 70x.
4. Get social.
5. Schedule one post to be published once a week.

Conclusion

The simple answer to how many blog posts before launch? It is simply having enough to keep a reader interested in your brand, leading to a sale of products or services.

It’s important to know that having a regularly updated blog is one of the many Google ranking factors. 

That means you have to have consistent blog posts that are of good quality and provide value to signal search engines that your website is the place to be when it comes to your chosen category.

If you’re a new brand, no one knows you. There’s no point worrying about how many blog posts before you launch your business.

Keep your head down and write and publish as much as possible to get some love from search engines.

And before you know it, you are getting traffic from Google, Bing, QuackQuack (Duckduckgo), etc.

However, there are many factors you should know for improving your search ranking. Factors such as site hierarchy, page speed, internal links, external links, time on site, session duration, and much more. 

Regular posting is just one of many Google ranking factors. There are 982 more. No, I’m kidding. Only Google knows the exact number of their ranking factors.

If you need help starting your very first blog, the following is a free guide so you can avoid the mistakes I’ve made: start a blog and make money online.