How Often Should I Add To My Article?

1. 95

   ControlledChaos1posted 6 years ago

   Some articles you can add to (or update?) every week, but should you? Does anyone know if how often you add to an article changes (positively or negatively) your views, earning potential, etc.

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2. 94

   jansharesposted 6 years ago

   Weekly seems a bit much. I update every 2 months or so. Most hubbers probably don't update that often. I do think it helps when Google sees fairly current dates. It helps with HP standings on niche sites when you update as well because it goes back through Hubpro algo and you get an email giving you a thumbs up. So updating regularly is good; very frequently is not necessary.

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3. 98

   DrMark1961posted 6 years ago

   I try to edit all of my articles so they have this years date on them. I think that it improves page rank and sometimes will encourage the click rate. I have never read that it is better to edit even more frequently than that.
   I notice that you have a lot of hubs on naming. I find it difficult to add stuff to my names hubs because they usually feel so finished. (I do add to my Marvel article everytime a new movies comes out though). I had a comment last week from a viewer that saw my recent edit date, clicked it, then saw that the hub had been written several years ago. She asked me if I could not suggest a name for her dog that was not so stale and out of date!

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   1. 95

      ControlledChaos1posted 6 years agoin reply to this

      Whenever I run across an interesting name, I'm sure to write it down. So at times I only add a name to an article but it still registers as updated. I may try holding back some and just add a bunch of names at once.

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4. 91

   Natalie Frankposted 6 years ago

   I don't update as often as I should but am trying to get better at it.  Some I update fairly frequently some I haven't touched in a year. It just depends on if it feels finished or if new information comes out that would be relevant to it.  For ex. my article on Surveillance and the novel 1984 I've only update once since not much about it is going to change.  My cryptocurrency article is only a couple of weeks old and I've updated it twice and am already working on another update to keep it current.

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5. 92

   Kenna McHughposted 6 years ago

   I update when I see a need to edit or when a movie relates to the topic of an article. Sometimes, I check the SEO and see if I need to update that as well. I do know that HP encourages us to update articles, so I am happy to do that because I notice my traffic increases.

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6. 100

   dougwest1posted 6 years ago

   I update when there is new relevant information available on the topic - things change. If that doesn't present itself, I update about every six months some part of the article. From what I understand about the Google search engine it likes when things get updated and I do notice a small tick up in views after an update.

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7. 60

   Crown Loveposted 6 years ago

   I think updating an article is something one needs to carefully and skillfully engage in so as not to distort your featured status you might have initially attained.

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8. 74

   Bills Placeposted 6 years ago

   I am actually going through my hubs and working on updating them. My approach is to start with the hubs that are not featured and/or get very few views (if any) right now. A poorly producing hub can only go up, right?
   
   However, I am skeptical about updating featured hubs as it seems many factors depend on who conducts the review process.. For this reason I have avoided updating my best producing hubs, as I know there's always the chance of it not ranking as well afterwords, lowered score or even no longer being featured.

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   1. 98

      DrMark1961posted 6 years agoin reply to this

      That attitiude will keep you from getting better traffic. The hubs you should be updating and improving are those that get traffic. If your article is doing okay but does not have the first page rank position in Google, you need to edit it.

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      1. 74

         Bills Placeposted 6 years agoin reply to this

         I took your advice and updated my hub on "10 Fun, Interesting and Creative Ways to Raise Money for a Charity Fundraiser". It is my 3rd most viewed hub overall, but hasn't been viewed much lately (20 views in 30 days).
         
         I updated the title, added higher quality photos, added content to some shorter sections, included a couple polls, and removed small images.
         
         Now to see where it goes from here... Also, I did not even realize my best producing hub right now (Most popular and forgotten web browsers) is actually ranking on 1st page of Google for 'most forgotten browsers'!

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         1. 98

            DrMark1961posted 6 years agoin reply to this

            Fun way to spend a Saturday, isn´t it? It has been raining here most of the day so I have been doing some editing too.
            I just checked Google and saw that your charity article is not on the first page. The types of edit that you do might help a little but the best thing you could do is add more substance. Find out what other questions have about charity fundraising through Google suggest and ubersuggest, then go back and edit the text of your article. I also suggest you add how to raise money for a charity fundraiser to your search engine and look at the articles on the first page. Is your article better than theirs? Why or why not?
            lobobrandon just broke 1,000,000 page views with only 15 hubs. It takes a lot of editing to get an article on the front page, and then keep it there, but the results in traffic are worth it.

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            1. 74

               Bills Placeposted 6 years agoin reply to this

               Wow, 1 million with only 15 hubs is impressive!
               I have a couple hubs I'm debating if I want to bother updating, leave as-is or just delete completely (such as Kony 2012). That particular hub only seen decent traffic in 2012 with it was a popular topic.
               
               What's your opinion on hubs like that?

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               1. 98

                  DrMark1961posted 6 years agoin reply to this

                  Several years ago we had subdomains (mine was drmark1961.hubpages.com) and Google saw each author as a separate entity. At that point I deleted about 50 hubs that had nothing to do with my main subject and those hubs that I left increased in views enough to make up the difference. Those people that had profiles about all sorts of things did not do as well.
                  Now I do not think it matters. The better material is moved to niche sites and if your material is still on HP main site it is not going to have very good page rank. You can edit and improve hubs so that they can be moved to a niche site but I do not think deleting helps anymore.
                  If you have hubs with very little traffic they are going to be unfeatured anyway. If the subject matter was not evergreen (like the Kony hub) I would not bother editing it or deleting it.

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                  1. 74

                     Bills Placeposted 6 years agoin reply to this

                     Yeah, when I first started (2011/2012) it was more quantity for sure. I decided just to rewrite a couple of them, as I believe my writing has increased in quality since many of these were originally posted.
                     
                     How long does it usually take to notice any real difference in hubs after editing?

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               2. 82

                  tony55posted 6 years agoin reply to this

                  I might be wrong but lobobrandon might have had more than 15 articles in the past. Many non performing hubs are deleted regularly. On the issue of updating hubs, I find it difficult update old hubs because my writing style has evolved over the years. I get a migraine when i read my first articles so I generally delete them or sometimes sell them.

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                  1. 77

                     lobobrandonposted 6 years agoin reply to this

                     You're not wrong. I did have more hubs at some point in time. This was a long time ago when we had subdomains. I once had 40 hubs. But I deleted them as they were mostly not performing well (the subdomains and hubpages were not doing well on Google in general). I moved most of my hubs (in a particular niche) to my own website. They did well there (without any changes to the content) which just showed that the HP subdomains were bad.
                     
                     I then did what many others did, I deleted all hubs that were not in the main niche so that my subdomain was in some sort of niche - I choose gardening, tomatoes in particular. But then over the years, many things changed and HP moved on to niche sites, most of my hubs were moved.
                     
                     But deleted hubs do not count towards your total traffic stats. The 1M is from the 15 I have.

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9. 80

   dwelburnposted 6 years ago

   I've just deleted three hubs that were not performing, and I think there'll be at least two more. My criteria for deletion were 0 - 3 views in the last month and less than 200 lifetime (must have been on here at least two years though). Then I ask myself, can I re-write this in a different way to make it more appealing. So my paleo diet hub for instance I think I can re-write and give it a different title. But some of them I think are no-hopers.

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   1. 74

      Bills Placeposted 6 years agoin reply to this

      I'm taking the same approach with some of my hubs and rewriting them as well. For example, the 'List of Rare Diseases" I decided to simply rewrite when I started revising it today. It only had 4 rare diseases and 900 words - I knew I could do at least a 'Top 5' and hit 1,250 easy.
      
      I'm already over 1,000 words, and only have 2 sections rewritten. It will be fun to see the difference on this major overhaul!

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   2. 74

      Bills Placeposted 6 years agoin reply to this

      Oh, if you're paleo diet hub did decent, you may want to look into writing about the Candida diet. I was put on this by my allergy doctor 5 weeks ago. Since I have reduced my allergy symptoms without medication, lost 25lbs, and only have 1 week to go before I can reintroduce foods (slowly).
      
      I was told the Candida diet is very similar to the paleo diet, but could be another keyword.

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10. 80

    dwelburnposted 6 years ago

    Thanks Bills Place. I've never really looked into the candida diet much, so I must take a look at it.

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    1. 87

       Jean Bakulaposted 6 years agoin reply to this

       It's easiest to write evergreen topics that are informative with information that doesn't change. Then you can update every year or two, even if it's just to add a sentence or two, or some newer, better pictures.

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11. 88

    blueheronposted 6 years ago

    When I look at my older hubs, I am often surprised to see (mainly stylistic) problems: rambling and disorganization are the main troubles. This is really an indication that I've evolved as a writer. It's worth giving old hubs a makeover, just to bring them up to my current standards.

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12. 92

    Tim Truzy info4uposted 6 years ago

    I usually update my articles when there is more relevant materials for the topic. I've also found that going back to some of my first articles and making improvements help to increase traffic. So far, it's been a win-win for me and HP. I expect that to continue because as I learn to create  better Hubs, more traffic follows.
    That's one of the qualities of Hp which I really like the most - you can go back and improve your work.

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13. 88

    revmjmposted 6 years ago

    I'm with you Tim and some of the others. I started in 2011, and I made sure all my old articles were updated to show 2018. It has made a world of difference. I am making more from the articles now than when I first wrote them. Having the opportunity to update is one of the things I like about HubPages. Many of the other sites I write for don't allow that, to my regret.

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