Research reveals the short time-span during which articles generate peak traffic
Analysis of 30 articles from a variety of websites by Boost The News has found that traffic to three-quarters (74%) of those articles reaches a peak on the same day of publication. Just a quarter (25%) of the articles reached peak traffic on the first or second day.
After the second day, traffic begins to drop off significantly with less than 1% of articles reaching peak traffic more than 2 days after publication. Within a week, traffic drops, on average, by 90% and after a month, by 98%.
Writing on Boost The News’ blog, Daniel Slomka says that “the impact of SEO on long-term traffic of online articles is minimal. When the initial buzz around articles fades away and no promotion of the article is taking place, organic traffic stands for less than 2% than it used to be (for big publishers, 2% of the first peak of traffic can still mean a lot of traffic – but nevertheless, there is still a huge gap in content visibility that cannot be bridged without promotion)”.
In a nutshell, both marketers and publishers alike need to create a sustainable, long-term article promotion strategy if they are to make the most of the investment in content creation.
