Thoughts on writing timeless blog posts and post bylines

I have recently moved the blog post byline from just underneath the post title all the way down to the end of the post. Lisa Irby tweeted me about my decision so I decided to put the thinking behind it in a blog post so others can see my reasons for this, as well.

2createawebsite Hi Marko, I’ve noticed you and a few others don’t date blog posts. I’d love to know your reason for this.

My response in less than 140 characters was:

@2createawebsite mostly because my posts are kind of timeless, and by having an old date can give an outdated image while it is not

Creating timeless blog posts

This has to do with my concept of putting the best blog posts back into the spotlight for my new visitors, even though a blog post might have been written a month or two ago.

I try to write content that doesn’t lose its value and relevance for bloggers as time goes by. I do not just report on the current events and news except for stories on new WordPress and Thesis releases. Even in those cases I include as much analysis as possible to make it very useful for readers at any period in time.

Not chasing blog page views

My other blogging concept is not to chase page views. I do not sell banner ads on cost per thousand (CPM) impressions while it is the preferred method of blog monetization for many of the biggest blogs.

This is why they must write daily and report on all the happenings around so they can keep you visiting and keep the page view count high, so they can sell as many banner ads as possible.

These two things, writing timeless articles and not having to focus on producing new content constantly as I do not depend on page views, give me freedom to focus on some older articles and have them as sticky posts on my front page, for example.

Blog post byline was giving a wrong impression

40%+ of my total blog traffic comes from Google and other search engines, and a majority of these visitors go to my older posts directly and not to the front page.

As the post byline is just underneath the post header, it is one of the first things people notice and I believed that it would give a wrong impression to a new visitor. Impression of outdated and irrelevant blog post, or even worse an impression of an inactive blog. And that is not the image you want when running a blog consulting service.

So, I do not want to give these visitors a chance to click on the back button just because the date on the article is 2 months old. The important thing is that the content is still very relevant and that is why removing the date the post was published on from the top of the article will contribute to new visitors focusing on the content and not on the date published.

Blog byline customization for Thesis users

For users of Thesis theme, in Appearance in Thesis Options under Display Options then Bylines untick all the different selections and click on the “Big Ass Save Button”.

Insert this in your custom_functions.php to get my blog look or edit it to fit with whatever you want to include in your byline:

function custom_byline() {
if (is_single()) {
?>
<p><p class="headline_meta">Post written <?php thesis_author(); ?> on <abbr class="published" title="<?php echo get_the_time('Y-m-d'); ?>"><?php echo get_the_time(get_option('date_format')); ?>&nbsp;<?php echo __('in', 'thesis') . ' <span>' . get_the_category_list(',') . '</span>'; ?></abbr>

<?php }
}
add_action('thesis_hook_after_post', 'custom_byline');