Evergreen and Trending Content: Finding the Perfect Balance

In an ideal world, you should always aim to produce a blog that offers a creative mixture of evergreen and trending content – providing a great balance between things that are suddenly in style – and issues that are timelessly relevant. Of course, achieving this ideal balance is usually easier said, than done.

First of all, you need to understand more about what defines a blog post as “evergreen”. Evergreen content, as the name suggests, is something that never dies off in regards to usefulness. Anything that's written about the latest trending news, for example, can’t be classed as evergreen, because the chances are that in a month, no one will be talking about it anymore. That doesn’t mean that trending content isn’t important, however.

Timely and relevant information captures audiences that are interested in what there is to be said about a certain topic “right now”. Which helps to deliver traffic to your social media and blog accounts. Think about it this way: if a blog about fashion only takes the time to write about the latest updates every month, its archives are likely to be filled with out-of-date content that doesn’t provide a great deal of value to new readers. On the other hand, if that same site focused only on how-to-wear guides and definitions, they could fall behind the times and appear to be out of touch in regards to the current scene. So how do you win?

Know the Cycle for your Industry and Listen to your Readers

Everything has a season – including your business or industry. Knowing when particular information is going to be the most useful to your audience is a key part of planning the most beneficial posts. For example, if you’re writing about home improvements, as winter starts to approach, you may find that it is better to start making posts about damp-proofing homes or saving money on energy bills. Take the time to look at what your readers are talking about in their social media groups, or read what they write about you in the comment sections. You can even examine what your readers are most interested in by looking at your sites’ metrics or conducting a survey. By doing this, you can feel more reassured that you are providing the content that your readers are actively looking for.

Always Commit to Quality

Whether your posts are primarily trend-based, or mostly evergreen, it’s always a good idea to switch between styles every so often and make sure that your archives are as diverse as possible. After all, you don’t want your website to end up acting as a graveyard for old keywords that no longer have any relevancy. Remember, whatever you’re writing about, you should take the time to ensure that your content is relevant and free from replication.  Trending topics aren’t going to last forever, but your archives will, and there’s nothing more embarrassing than checking out an old post a year down the line and discovering a very obvious collection of spelling mistakes.