Success varies from person to person, but even you know that no one blogs purely for fun and games anymore.
And if that’s the case, why aren’t there more successful bloggers out there with a pool as large as it is? Today, we’re sharing exactly why most bloggers won’t be successful. Find out if you’re making these mistakes…
- You justify low quality.
To be successful, you can’t continue outputting low-quality content - that includes your blog layout, visuals, and writing. We understand you don’t have a lot of time, resources, or money, but those are no excuses to validate low-quality work. Become devoted to delivering the best posts you possibly can every time, and always strive for that next benchmark. Maybe you start with your blog layout and perfect it, then move on to improving your writing (side note: reading only great quality blogs help), and then enhancing your visuals. Once that’s down pat, work all these elements together seamlessly and progress onto new mediums and outlets.
- Not promoting.
Most bloggers spend 80% of their time producing new content and 20% promoting, but it should actually be the reverse as Brittany mentioned here. If you’re running a blog that has fairly small traffic, spending the bulk of your time mining new content isn’t going to bring new or more traffic. Your focus should be building a readership, and then streaming in new content regularly. (Note: That’s not to say you should only be producing new content once a week.)
- Promoting the wrong way.
We assume that you currently write a post, share it on all your social media outlets (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram), and then you might even ask some of your friends to share it… While there’s nothing wrong with doing it this way, you’re forgetting one thing: Driving traffic to your blog from websites with a bigger audience. That’s why tagging @ootdmagazine on Instagram is so popular and getting features on websites like Refinery29 and WhoWhatWear make such a huge difference. The value in driving traffic from sites with a large and dedicated readership is priceless!
- You hold back.
Are you secretly blogging (hoping no one you know personally finds your work)? Are you too afraid to reach out to bloggers and brands? Are you making excuses to explicate why you can’t take more photos or create more content? This is called holding back.
Any ounce of holding back sets you up for failure in this industry, so you’ve got to decide how bad you want it and go at it full force. No time for child’s play.
- No plans, no goals, no results.
Without a plan, how do you know what you needs to be done?
Without a goal, how do you take a course of action and produce results?
Without results, you can’t know what success is…
Plans help you create and tackle your to-dos, goals provide you with direction and a timeline, results give you measurable substance. You can’t possibly be successful if you haven’t even defined what success looks like (and it doesn’t have to do anything with money, brands, or subscriber count)!
You Should Also Read:
How to Blog When You Don’t Know Where to Start
What They Don’t Tell You About Success as an Entrepreneur
5 Important Ingredients Every Blog Post Needs
