When writing content for the internet0spherealaxyaverse you need to be aware of a few things, many of which are well known by most but there is one issue that often times gets overlooked. This one item alone can be devastating if you are relying on organic search engine traffic for a piece of content during a specific time frame.

This concept is not anything new

If you search the term “minty fresh content” you will find results going as far back as 2002, but there are still many (possibly the majority) of content creators/bloggers who are unaware of what this means to them and their sites. So I figured I would write a quick post outlining the basics of this concept just so you know.

Content is and always has been king

Google, Yahoo, Bing and most other search engines are on the prowl for fresh, time sensitive content all the time. When they find this shiny new content they index it quickly, sometimes in a matter of minutes after its published. This is generally exciting for new bloggers or webmasters as they feel proud that their content is that “important” that it shows up in the index that fast. What a lot of people don’t realize is that there are two different ways sites are indexed, the initial fresh content and the more permanent index. Google especially prides itself on having the freshest content but they are not idiots, this is why the post you wrote 20 minutes ago that ranked number 1 for hemorrhoid flare ups is nowhere to be found other than buried deep in Googles cache 2 days later.

Don’t get your undies in a knot, your not being penalized

It would be very easy to get all worked up and feel that you are being penalized but you are not, this is completely normal behavior. It works like this; you write something, Google catches wind of it and stops by for a visit, it gets indexed and because its new fresh content it gets a temporary boost and quite likely ranks much better than it should in the search results. This is only for a short time though, perhaps a day or 2 typically. After this initial honeymoon period it drops out of the index, often times completely leaving some wondering it it has been de-indexed all together. Usually that is not the case and in a few days the content will show back up in the results as it should be, ranking where it should as a part of the permanent index.

This is why timing is of the essence

It is very important to keep this in mind when publishing your content, if you want it to be available at a certain time I typically advise publishing it either 12 hours before you need it to be available OR at least five days before it must be accessible online. By publishing during these times you will have a much better chance of your time sensitive content being found where you need it, when you need it to be there. I know this is not ideal, but that’s just how it is. Your content will likely have a window during which it will not be returned in search results on Google, even for a title search or using the site: search so you have to work around it.