Should I write more hubs or stop at a certain point?

1. 53

   Daniel Mollatposted 6 years ago

   Does having many hubs count much to gaining more income in HP? I wonder how some hubbers have less than 50 hubs yet are deriving a good amount of revenue from good traffic numbers, while other hubbers have hundreds of articles and are just doing so-so income.
   
   I've noticed that updating and frequently editing a hub counts a lot in increasing traffic. This being the case it's easier to update and edit fewer hubs than hundreds of hubs, isn't it?
   
   So if I'm looking for more traffic should I write more hubs but lesser updates on those hubs? Or should I concentrate on writing fewer hubs and working on these with updates and improvements on a regular frequent basis?
   
   Lobobrando has not that many hubs yet I believe he generates thousands of visitors on a regular basis.

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      Wesman Todd Shawposted 6 years agoin reply to this

      What I've been doing is instead of writing about whatever I want to write about, as i used to do - is concentrating on the subjects where I've seen the most success.
      
      I love Major League Baseball, but out of the many things I wrote about the subject, exactly two have been worth my time. So I'm not going to bother with that any more unless I'm sure I can knock one out of the park.
      
      I also think that by staying busy (I'm always working on something here) I keep what little writing skills I have as sharp as they can be. I'm by no means great at this, but no one can say I don't keep at it.
      
      I've no clue what Patty Inglish makes, but I'd bet that with over two thousand very well written articles, many of them on niche sites, that she makes many times the few hundred a month I'm getting.

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      chef-de-jourposted 6 years agoin reply to this

      If you write good quality hubs and get them onto the niche sites and some of those hubs start gathering momentum view-wise then yes; if that writer were to follow the same or a similar pattern for each hub, thus making a name synonymous with know-how and quality, then having lots of great hubs should in theory mean more income.
      
      Those writers with fewer hubs but great viewing figures are often competing in very popular topic areas and have had to test the waters vis a vis the ideal hub - experimentation playing a key role.
      
      Other writers competing in low stake subject areas probably have to write a lot more to gain the equivalent views.
      
      I've been here 6 years and have stumbled along - then came the niche sites and I realised that if I could crack the template and get some good views with the first few hubs.....well, let's just say the hard work is beginning to pay.
      
      I wish you well. Above all, keep experimenting with your hub template, learn from the forums, from other successful hubbers, from the LC...and who knows where things might lead?

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      peachpurpleposted 6 years agoin reply to this

      I had 132 hubs, my hubs gathered more attention when I was in the 30 days hub challenge. After that, everything goes down.

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      1. 93

         Glenn Stokposted 6 years agoin reply to this

         peachpurple, Of course everything went down. Out of your 132 hubs I only found three that made it into a network niche site. Hubs on HubPages don’t earn much money. What happened? Why did you stop working on making your hubs into stellar quality condition to get them moved?  You put all that effort into writing so many hubs and then you’re not doing anything to make the effort worthwhile. This is not the time to give up!  HubPages is giving you all the tools for success. Take advantage of it.  I’m sure with a little effort you can get your hubs into the appropriate niche sites where they will earn money.

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   4. 94

      CWanamakerposted 6 years agoin reply to this

      In my experience I say that its best to focus on writing on evergreen topics that you know a lot about or that you are passionate about.  I write on many topics but the ones that do the best are evergreen and original.  Another thing to remember is to never compromise on quality. Quality is king. Having 10 amazing articles is better than 500 hundred poorly written ones.
      
      Keep in mind that sometimes it takes months or years for an article to blossom and start earning the readership that you desire.  I've at articles go from 2-3 views a day to 200+ a day after sitting online for over a year. With Google constantly changing their search algorithm and trends in pop culture constantly changing, you never really know what's going to do well in the future.

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   DrMark1961posted 6 years ago

   Several thousand visitors a day will not provide a good income.
   If you expect to have more page views, and derive a good income, you need to edit your hubs frequently AND continue to write evergreen articles.
   It is not like you can choose one or the other.

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3. 93

   Glenn Stokposted 6 years ago

   Everyone has their own methods for success. There is no single answer that works. Some methods work and some fail. Generally, in my opinion, less is more. Concentrate on quality rather than quantity.
   
   Since the online environment and SEO is constantly changing, it's important to be able to keep our articles up to date. Not only with content, but with methods too.
   
   For example of how methods change: Once it was thought that callout capsules were better for subtitles. Then we discovered that Google ignores them and doesn't relate them to the content that belongs to the subtitle. So we had to remove them and put the titles directly in the text capsule where it relates to.
   
   Another example: In March Google increased the character length to 300 for meta descriptions (i.e. summaries on hubs). I thought it would be a good opportunity to improve on our summaries since they may appear in the SERPs. But then in May, Google reduced it to half of that and truncate in the SERPs. Can't win. But Google is simply experimenting.
    
   There are so many other things that keep changing, and even though HubPages is good at keeping up with it, and informing us of it, we still have our work cut out for us. For this reason, I think that it's better to keep the number of hubs at a level where we can manage them. Thousands of hubs may work for some, especially if they are evergreen and don't need much attention, but having just 100 or 200 hubs can work too, as long as they attract organic search traffic.
   
   Attracting search traffic is something I concentrate on (more than writing new hubs), and with only 120 hubs I find it easy to do. I constantly monitor the keywords people use to find my hubs, how long they stay on the page, and loyalty (how many return for more). Google provides all this information in our Analytics, and I use that information to update content, titles and summaries as needed. I couldn't dream of doing that maintenance if I had 1000 articles. But as I say, it can work for some if done right.

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4. 53

   Daniel Mollatposted 6 years ago

   Yes, I agree with what Glen says. As a general guideline, it is better to have fewer articles and be able to manage them more effectively than having too much and not be able to keep all of them current and updated. But, of course, if one's articles don't need much updating then perhaps having a lot of them can be more fruitful. I tend to subscribe to the idea that having less, more effective articles is better than having too much. This is just me and this is my opinion today. I'm still a new hubber and this opinion may change as I go along.

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      wildernessposted 6 years agoin reply to this

      There is another side as well.  I've seen others say, and I concur from my own experience, that 20% of ones hubs produces 80% of the traffic and income.
      
      It may take 100 hubs to figure out which 20 are producing anything; before you can figure out what to write on.  Only then can you write another 100 on that overall topic.

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5. 91

   Ekcedeonposted 6 years ago

   This is great insight guys. I really appreciate it since I am new here

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6. 93

   dredcuanposted 6 years ago

   This has been my concern too.  I'm getting my hubs featured, at least 80% of the total and yet my hubscore drastically going down.  Now, I don't even know what to do. Do I need to stop first and see any changes or continue to improve it.  Since it seems like adding new hub won't even help my score.  One more concern I have is that if my hubscore goes down to 0 now, they might end up closing my account.  I just don't want to waste my time writing hubs then end up losing everything.

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      DrMark1961posted 6 years agoin reply to this

      You should read the post from Wilderness above and follow his advice.
      In the time you have been here you have written very little, maybe not even enough to find out what suject you are best at.
      When you sit down to write your next article, before you even start decide what niche site it is going to be moved to. Find out what is on that niche site already, what articles are most successful there, and write your article so that it will be moved after being published.
      If all of your articles are on HP, and none are ever moved to the niche sites, you are not going to get decent traffic.

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      1. 93

         dredcuanposted 6 years agoin reply to this

         I tried moving one of my featured articles to a niche site, but they declined it.  I will try it again.  Few weeks ago I'm having problem with my articles getting featured.  Now, almost everything went well as I was able to learn how to improve my articles.  So yeah, you're right. I need to check out the niche sites and see how it really goes.  But, will they accept my articles even I have a very low hubscore already?  Anyway, thanks you for your advice!

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            DrMark1961posted 6 years agoin reply to this

            I am not sure that your hubscore has anything to do with being selected, but I could be wrong. Anyway, I read your article on Cobh. It was okay but the title needs to be better.
            Take a look at the articles on that travel site (I think it is Wanderwisdom) and see how you might improve your article to be in line with the articles already there.
            When you are done, I suggest you have someone else read it, or try getting suggestions on the "Improving your hub" forum. There are usually a lot of helpful people here like theraggededge, Rupert, and Jeremy.
            After proofing it, try submitting again. Good luck.

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               dredcuanposted 6 years agoin reply to this

               Yes, theraggededge and nathalie frank helped me in one of my articles. Then from there on, I kept getting my articles featured.  I was just afraid of doing it as often as possible because they might think I'm doing it to get some views.  Thank you for your feedback about my article, I'll take note of your comment and do necessary improvements.

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7. 78

   lobobrandonposted 6 years ago

   There's a lot of good advice here and I would have said anything different from what is already on this post. Since you mentioned me in the initial post, I thought it would be nice if I replied here.
   
   Given that I had the time I would write 20 new hubs and see how they perform. The ones that seem to be doing OK (even a few visits each day from Google) would be the ones I continue working on. I would work on them until they become the best resource on the internet for the topic being discussed. Once that is done, wash your hands and move on to the next batch.
   
   But even ever green hubs are going to need some maintenance every now and then as Glenn pointed out. So, don't write more than you can handle. Also keep in mind that hubs which are not updated do also get traffic, your readers may not be 100% satisfied, but you still get your ad impressions.
   
   In short, there are many factors at play here and there is no sweet spot on the number of articles needed. I have spent a lot of time here in order to find the niches that work for me (in line with what Wesman says). Out of sheer interest, there are so many more topics I could write about. But I would definitely not get any search traffic on those articles.

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8. 77

   Don Bobbittposted 6 years ago

   I have found that, over time, I can only manage around 200 Hubs. I have found that this quantity of Hubs is my personal limit when I consider the amount of work it takes to keep up with the evolution of HP and GOOGLE changes.
   And, I must mention that I DO NOT jackrabbit into my Hubs every time there is a change announced by either company.
   I have found that patience truly is a virtue and I always wait for anything NEW to settle down, so to speak, before I go into my Hubs and start changing things.
   DON

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      theraggededgeposted 6 years agoin reply to this

      That's always a good strategy, Don. Gotta see how it all shakes down first.

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9. 96

   Cre8torposted 6 years ago

   I read in one of the tutorials that more is merrier. I believe it's an odds thing. Write 50 hubs, 5 will hit big and carry your load. write 100 and double your traffic. 200...quadruple. That's the theory I believe anyway. I also agree with Don though that overdoing it can make upkeep a burden and end up hurting you in the end. I personally don't have that many hubs to maintain but so long as I have worthy ideas I'll keep writing regardless of how many hubs I get up to and can maintain.

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10. 84

    Chriswillman90posted 6 years ago

    I too subscribe to the quality vs. quantity approach. I've noticed that the articles that I put a lot of time and effort on have done much better than the ones put together quickly.
    
    I have over 130 articles but a lot of them were experimental and lacked the quality of some of my newer ones. Now I understand how those with fewer hubs have been able to succeed.

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11. 67

    Rob DeLucaposted 6 years ago

    If you are writing to just make money then i would say to stop, if you are writing because of the passion and freedom to do so, then i say never stop

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12. 100

    Bede le Venerableposted 6 years ago

    Here’s a sure saying: “It’s easier to maintain a small backyard garden than a golf course.” I’m in agreement with you elders…less is more.
    
    In my brief time here, I’ve also learned that articles need age before improvement. When one’s nose is in an article for several days straight before publishing, it’s difficult to see the hidden cobwebs. After a couple months, “fresh eyes” help detect improvements.
    
    I just read one of my older articles this morning. Possible enhancements stood out plainly, whereas I didn’t see them before. If I have fewer articles to run through this process of aging/editing, then it’s much better.

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       DrMark1961posted 6 years agoin reply to this

       Of course it is also easier to clean up and maintain a single wide trailer than a four bedroom/3 bath house. Which would you rather have?

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          Bede le Venerableposted 6 years agoin reply to this

          I’d prefer to have a tidy trailer, overlooking the ocean, with a nice breeze.

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             DrMark1961posted 6 years agoin reply to this

             That sounds really nice!

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                Bede le Venerableposted 6 years agoin reply to this

                Unfortunately, it won’t happen unless I get some tips from lobobrandon…

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                1. 84

                   Chriswillman90posted 6 years agoin reply to this

                   I'm not sure that's the right approach either. Yes you can be very successful with only a few hubs as he has been, but that's extremely rare.
                   
                   You also don't want a few hubs carrying the traffic load. All it takes is a few ranking downgrades to go from the top to the bottom. I think having 100-200 quality and niche ready hubs is the perfect amount.

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                      DrMark1961posted 6 years agoin reply to this

                      I totally agree. One or two of my articles might fall out of my top ten % on a given day but one or two of the others will rise up and take its place. Overall my numbers continue to look good.
                      If I only had a few hubs I would be more likely to worry about a hub losing hundreds per day. More is less likely to see fluctuations.

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                   2. 78

                      lobobrandonposted 6 years agoin reply to this

                      100 - 200 would mean at least 5 times my current traffic (if I am being extremely conservative). I would definitely want to have at least a 100 hubs some day. But, until then gonna have to keep pruning what I have.
                      
                      I've noticed off late that many people are trying to get success with just a few hubs and they mention me. I did have around 40 hubs once. But with the subdomains and niching down etc. I had deleted many of them. I would not have done that had I known what I know today, but I don't beat myself up about it. I also, do not suggest stopping at 20 hubs. I only say write as many as you can, but when you write one make it the best article on the internet for that topic. Some may not rank, but most will (provided you do this well).
                      
                      P.S: Chriswillman this is not a direct reply to you, in case you're wondering what I'm on about It's a general addition to this thread, but in line with what you say about having 100 - 200 hubs.

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                         Bede le Venerableposted 6 years agoin reply to this

                         My comment about you lobobrandon was tongue-in-cheek. My sense is that you and I write at a pace we can manage within our schedules. I’m fine with 15 hubs as I’m still a newcomer. The challenge, as you say, is to produce articles that have an edge over the multitudes already on the internet. For this, time and patience are necessary, but I believe it’s possible. The format of HP already has an advantage because of the extras that enhance the text so well. It’s a pleasing format.

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    Sherry Hewinsposted 6 years ago

    It seems like you have already chosen an niche for yourself. When I first started I wrote about whatever popped into my head. I just threw everything at the wall to see what stuck. After a while I began to recognize what kind of hubs did better.
    
    Like most people I found that a handful of hubs got the vast majority of traffic. So, I could make the same amount of money with a quarter the number of hubs, provided they were the right hubs. However, once you learn what makes a hub get attention, there is no reason not to keep writing them, unless you think you are making all the money you want.

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       Bede le Venerableposted 6 years agoin reply to this

       For me it’s not about money or creating a record-breaking hub. I simply enjoy writing and exploring certain topics on a deeper level. It’s understandable if some HP authors are mainly intent on earning money, but I think the majority find more satisfaction in creating articles and interacting with other hubbers.

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          Rob DeLucaposted 6 years agoin reply to this

          I couldn't agree more, what's even better thinking this way is that the money is just an added bonus.

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       Sherry Hewinsposted 6 years agoin reply to this

       If it just about the writing, you could always write in a journal. You must want something more if you are posting your writing online. For me, getting an audience was important. Seeing my views climb, and getting comments gives me a bigger thrill than seeing the dollars climb, but they do go hand in hand.

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    eugbugposted 6 years ago

    Sometimes writing hubs is like throwing mud at a wall. Some will stick and be successful and receive lots of traffic. Others will fail with not much user interest.
    I think you need to take two approaches, add more content to and improve existing hubs as it may pay off in the long run, plus write more articles on topics that are relevant to lots of people.

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