Between my old website, which I started back in 2007 (which has since disappeared) and my blog, which I switched to in 2009 I have been writing and publishing content regularly for a at least 5 years.

I enjoy writing on my blog I use my blog to document what I have learned about SQL Server and other technology. Its a great way to document what you do, it can act as a great future reference when you can’t remember how do something you can just go to your blog and look it up. You can even send co-workers to your blog if they need to know how to do something and you have written a post on that subject.

It can also serve as great tool to supplement your CV/Resume when looking for a new job. If you have a CV that lists a bunch of skills that you say you have and you also include a link  to your blog that demonstrates your SQL Server skills it can help you secure a job over the next candidate.

If you really get to grips with blogging it can actually help you start your own consultancy business. You can end with your own clients and you own business. This is pretty cool thing to do.

But you have to blog regularly, How often is regularly I hear you cry? Well I know some people that blog every day some that blog every week and others maybe every month. I think it should probably be at least monthly. If you are going to maintain a readership you have to give them something read. I compare it to newspaper publishing. Some newspapers get published daily, some get published weekly. Some of the weekly Sunday papers are are just as successful as the daily papers. What you don’t see in the newspaper business is an ad-hoc approach to publication. They pick their days and they stick to it.

I don’t think blogging needs to be as rigid in terms of a publishing schedule like a newspaper but I do think you need to publish regularly. Most importantly to give your readers some fresh content for them to consume. If you don’t publish anything your readers will soon forget about you and remove you from their RSS reader. Regular content is also good for search rankings. You will more likely get a decent search engine rank if you produce fresh content regularly. And finally a blog with nothing but old posts even you do get found in a search engine search just look as good as those site with new fresh content. Even if its the older posts that you want to use.

I write this post today because I realised that for the first time in my 5 years of writing, I have gone through a whole month, April  2012 and the majority of May without a single post. This can now serve as a reminder to me that I need to publish regularly or my blog will look stale…