If everyone posted a great post every other day or even three a week I’d be able to not only keep up with those I truly love but I’d have the time to do more than just skim the post in the reader, I’d have the time to click links, add comments, and truly participate as a blog reader.

The other thing to remember is that reduced posting frequency here doesn’t mean you have to reduce your posting frequency completely. If you commit to posting three, four, or five times a week here you could commit your ‘spare’ days to a second or even a third blog. As you said, the time could be used for other things, like guest blogging, forum participation, reading other blogs, social media etc. all of which spreads the word about this blog.

Later, you can slow down writing and write 2-3 posts a week.

Afterwards, you’ll be fine with writing 1-2 well researched posts.

As for my personal experience, when I slowed down posting, I started writing more insightful, useful posts. When I spend a week on one post, it becomes so good that it spreads easily.

That being said, you may want to consider another option: post when you feel like it. This way, you leave room for investing time in well researched posts and also leave a chance just to share your minute thoughts with your readers.

I find that sharing thoughts through small, short posts, written in under 1hr, is a good way to keep people interested. Unfortunately, due to my stopping blogging, I have only started testing this system, and it worked really well to my tastes (absolutely no need to force myself to write anything, which all cutting-back in writing is about).

If you’re a new blog trying to gain traction in the social blogging arena you have to post good stuff often. If not every day at least every other day. However, once you’ve developed a reader base, probably an RSS count of over 300, you can cut back to a slower schedule without a huge hit. However, going totally AWOL will still eventually kill a blog that depends heavily on referral traffic from other blogs and social networking sites.

If you’re running a niche blog that primarily focuses on obtaining Google search traffic, once it’s placing well in SERPs for its targeted keywords and long tails you can leave it alone for months and traffic will continue to grow organically.

But as one of the guys you cited said, what works for him might not work for everyone.

Catherine Lawson says on her blog that “[she] posted less… and it did have a negative impact on my blog.”

Sorry Badi or Catherine if you didn’t want to be dragged into this, you guys were easy examples
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So although you’ve cited some higher profile blogs in your post, it can go either way, which as I said earlier, I believe is based off of (a) the quality of the content and (b) the audience / subject of the blog. E.g., if your blog audience was mainly people who read at .5 words / hour, one post per month might suffice.

I like the idea of focusing on just one killer post each week; you can take time to craft the content and pack it full of value, making it into a linkable resource and something that might be worth bookmarking. Value over quantity turned out to be a counter-intuitive decision for me, but I’m glad I finally figure it out.

Great post!