# Cousin-bait ancestor pages: turning pedigree and research notes into searchable posts that bring descendants (and readers) to the site

Harvested 2026-10-31 (skills harvest). Topic: content marketing from genealogy notes. Family-history bloggers call a post written to be found by descendants searching a name or place "cousin bait". It brings a small but steady stream of high-intent readers, plus new documents and photos. That is the audience most likely to buy a local-history e-book.

## What practitioners report (primary testimony)
- **Marian B. Wood, Climbing My Family Tree (Jan 2019, read):** "Currently, I receive **1-2 inquiries every month**" through a contact gadget beside her surname list. Her method:
  - a landing page per main surname with that family's stories;
  - Blogger labels for surnames, places and institutions;
  - key words in the blog description, subheads and image captions.
  - Why it works: one second cousin found her through a post about the synagogue where their ancestors married, because the post "ranked high in the results". Another blogger gets inquiries from a post about an orphanage. **Places and institutions bring searchers, not just surnames.**
- **Amy Coffin, We Tree (Oct 2012, read), how to write the post:**
  - pick ONE family unit (parents + children), not "all the Millers";
  - put individual full names in the post (that's what ranks);
  - state your connection, so the reader knows why you're asking;
  - say exactly what you lack (stories, work, photos).
  - A commenter (Linda McCauley) got an email from a 5th-great-grandparent cousin while reading it, "over a year since I blogged about that family". **The payoff is slow and long-tail.**
- **The counterpoint, Gathering Leaves for My Family Tree (May 2021, read):** "Excepting a few cousins, I can't say that I have learned much from those who contact me." The author thinks cousin bait "works best for those ... who have a sizeable profile". So expect contacts, not guaranteed evidence. Publishing consistently is the hard part.
- **52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks (Amy Johnson Crow, running since 2014; page read):**
  - free weekly prompts by email (e.g. "an ancestor I admire", "a record that adds colour", "Written");
  - share any way you like (blog, social post, video, email to cousins);
  - hashtag **#52Ancestors**.
  - WikiTree runs a parallel G2G weekly thread and profile badge (Help:52_Ancestors; page not readable from here, search snippet only).
  - **Use the prompts as a ready editorial calendar.** No participant counts were published on the pages read, so the reach is **not measured**.

## The recipe (one post per week, about 45 minutes)
1. **Pick one person or one family unit** from a note we already hold (a pedigree line, a census row, a burial, a lease).
2. **Title = full name + dates + place variants**, e.g. "John Williams (d. 1908) of Great House, Llandough juxta Penarth / Tŷ Mawr". Put the Welsh and older spellings in a subhead and the image alt text.
3. **Body:**
   - what the record shows, quoted verbatim with its source;
   - what it does NOT show (a surname in a pedigree is a lead, not proof of standing);
   - one open question ("Do you have a photograph of the Great House before 1988? A family Bible naming John Williams?").
4. **One contact door** at the end: "Descended from this family, or hold papers about it? Tell us." Use a form or the existing signup tagged by post (UTM `utm_source=cousin&utm_campaign=<slug>`). One CTA only, then the e-book card under it.
5. **Internal links:** person page -> family/surname landing page -> evidence record (EV-xxxx) -> /ebooks/.
6. Optionally share on the week's #52Ancestors prompt when it fits (a social post, not a DM or group spam).

## Guardrails
- **Deceased people only.** Follow family-tree-page-living-privacy-proof-standard.md (living people stay private).
- No insignia. Nothing about family holdings or addresses.
- Public text never names the project lead. Banned public words apply (states, assertions, per, second-hand report, not checked, reported, deception, taken); write "not checked".
- Treat replies as **leads**. A descendant's story is recorded as received, not as proof.

## How we apply it to Cedwyn
- **Place pages:** Marian Wood's institution lesson, applied here: separate short pages for Llandough church (St Dochdwy), Leckwith bridge, Cogan, the Ely river crossing. Searchers looking for a place, not a surname, land on these.
- **Measure (honest counts):**
  - inquiries per month from the cousin form (benchmark from one long-running blog: 1-2/month);
  - organic landings on person pages (Search Console, query = name);
  - e-book clicks from those pages.
  - Review after 12 posts. If 0 inquiries and fewer than 20 organic landings in total, fold the series into the evidence catalogue and stop.
- **Owner:** BIZDEV weekly content slot. The book flywheel and the evidence catalogue supply the notes, and every quote keeps its source line.

## Sources
- climbingmyfamilytree.blogspot.com (read 31 Oct 2026)
- wetree.blogspot.com (read; comments included)
- gatheringleavesformyfamilytree.com (read)
- amyjohnsoncrow.com (read; prompts, #52Ancestors, how to take part)
- wikitree.com (search snippet only; page not readable from here)