How many blog posts before you get traffic?

The number you'll see quoted is twenty to thirty articles. It's a reasonable guess, and on its own it's misleading.

Picture two blogs that both published thirty posts last year. One gets four thousand visits a month; the other gets sixty. The difference usually isn't writing quality or budget. It's that the first blog wrote thirty articles about one subject and the second wrote thirty articles about thirty subjects.

Why depth beats volume

Google is trying to work out what your site is about and whether it should be trusted on that subject. Fifteen articles covering every angle of employee scheduling make that judgment easy. Fifteen articles covering scheduling, tax tips, office design, hiring, and productivity make it impossible, and you end up mildly unconvincing on five subjects instead of authoritative on one.

There's a compounding effect too. Articles on the same subject can link to each other honestly, because a reader of one genuinely wants the next. Unrelated articles can't, so each one starts from nothing.

A shape for the first twenty articles

Pick one subject narrow enough that you could plausibly become the best site on the internet about it. Then divide the twenty roughly like this:

• One thorough guide to the whole subject, the piece everything else links back to.
• Ten or so articles answering one specific question each — the ones your customers actually ask.
• Four articles for people close to deciding: how to choose, what it costs, what goes wrong.
• Three or four comparisons, including honest ones about alternatives to what you sell.

Every article in that set can link to several others without it feeling forced, which is the whole point.

What a realistic pace looks like

One article a week gets you to twenty-four in six months, which lands you right where you need to be. If one a week isn't sustainable, two a month for a year gets to the same place. What doesn't work is publishing twelve in a fortnight and then going quiet for four months.

Consistency matters more than pace. A slow blog that never stops beats a fast one that does.

The mistake almost everyone makes

Running out of ideas at article eight and widening the subject to fill the calendar. It feels productive, and it quietly resets the clock, because the new articles share nothing with the old ones.

If you're out of ideas eight articles in, the subject was too narrow, or the ideas are there and you're not looking where they live. Support tickets, sales calls, and the questions people ask before they buy will give you more material than any keyword tool.

When to stop adding and start improving

Once you're past roughly twenty articles on one subject, updating usually beats publishing. An article sitting at position twelve is far closer to real traffic than a blank page is, and getting it to position six is a smaller job than writing something new.

A simple rule for the second half of your first year: for every two new articles, go back and improve one old one. You'll notice the improved ones move faster than anything you write from scratch.