As of yesterday, my blog turned one month old and I honestly can’t believe it! It seems like just yesterday I started it. If you know me, you know that I have tried very many blogs before and none of them worked out. This is the first “successful” blog that I have had. And by successful, I mean, I continually post on it, and I have gotten more views than all of my other four combined!
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The first and foremost thing that I have learned in my first month of blogging is that if you truly want to blog, you have to make sure it is for the right reasons. I was reading a post from Pinterest the other day that said, “if you need to make money blogging, you will most definitely make blogging work” Well guess what… it doesn’t work that way. Want to know how much money I made in my first month? I made a whole $0.38 cents from Google Adsense in my first month. Can I really make a living off that? No obviously, I don’t need to because that isn’t what I am blogging for.
I have tried blogging just for the money and found out real quick that it just doesn’t work like that. Blogging is something that you have to put time and money into to make it grow. Its honestly like a baby!
The follow/unfollow game for some is strong
The Instagram I knew, meant you only followed people if you were mutual friends/interested in their content and them. NOW? It’s if I follow you and you don’t follow me back, I’m unfollowing you. OR, I am going to follow 300 people, wait for them to follow me back, and then unfollow them. It’s pretty pathetic and says a lot about a person. (Yes, I am being a little harsh but is absolutely ridiculous and the fact that people have to resort to this.)
Instagram pods may not beat the algorithm but could help you find amazing people
So, to be completely honest with you, I have no idea if this actually works. However, whether it does or doesn’t, I have found the most amazing groups of women in Instagram pods and I don’t know what I would do without them! It’s not like a huge group where you just like other people’s pictures to beat the algorithm, these girls actually are my friends. Shout out to my ladies! You know who you are ?
For those of you that don’t know what an Instagram Pod does, it is a way for us to beat the Instagram algorithm. When you post, only about 7% of your followers actually see it unless Instagram “says” it is a popular post. The more likes/comments you get when you first post, the more people will see it. Don’t even get me started… It was a very poor decision on Instagram/Facebook’s fault. I’m not even sure why they decided to do this, but I don’t know anyone yet in the world that likes it.
Facebook Groups are also really great
Before I move on, I wanted to add a little tidbit about Facebook groups. I am in a few blogger ones, a few Instagram ones and so on. They are really great. The first Facebook group I ever joined was “Boss Girl Bloggers” created and moderated by Ell Duclos and she is truly amazing. It is a blogger group for women to ask questions, learn and grow. I truly love it! Facebook groups are really great if you’re someone that is very invested in your blog and really want to make it grow! I would highly suggest Boss Girl Bloggers if you're interested!
Instagram and Pinterest are the hardest platforms to grow
I never thought it would be so hard to grow Instagram, but it's because of this follow/unfollow game. You go to bed one night with 40 more followers than you did the night before, and then wake up and 39 of them have unfollowed you again. It just makes it very frustrating when you finally hit a milestone because you have to wait a good five more days before you “actually” hit it.
While Pinterest followers aren’t really as important as “monthly views/monthly engaged” it is still really nice to grow, but SUPER hard. I think in the whole month that I have been blogging, I have gained maybe 30 followers. I haven’t really been focusing on Pinterest as much because before it didn’t work for me, so I didn’t think it would now. However, after implementing some new tactics, I have gone from 200 daily views to 2,000 in two weeks. (Post to come on how I did it!)
A lot of people still think it's a numbers game
A lot of people still think that blogging is just a numbers game which is why the follow/unfollow game is so strong. This is because when you reach a certain number of followers/blog views, you can start successfully working with brands. This means $$$. But what people don’t understand, is the fact that these bloggers with 300k+ followers have been blogging for 5+ years. They didn’t get all these followers overnight. They worked every single day to get them and didn’t follow and unfollow people to do it.
For some, blogging is a numbers game especially if you are trying to quit your 9-5 job to blog full time. But, sometimes things just take time and you can’t always get exactly what you want right off. If you are going to blog for money (which all of us do at some point) please do us all the favor and grow your following the right way!
Despite it all, you can meet amazing people
I tweeted about two weeks ago asking if anyone was interested in doing a guest post/ collaboration and I had a ton of people comment, a few people message me, but only really one person that stuck! The best part is, we haven’t really even talked THAT much about collabing. We are just blogger friends! That wonderful woman is Sarah from The Polished Palette. She is such an amazing woman and honestly, we just clicked! Of course, she is not the only amazing woman I have met through my first month of blogging. Like I mentioned above, my Instagram pod girls are awesome! However, stay tuned for a collab post between Sarah and me!
You can do awesome collabs/guest posts
Being apart of the Boss Girl Bloggers Facebook group also helped me find my first guest post! (That will be up soon!) It is with the wonderful Niobe! If you’re interested, be on the lookout for that post, I am so excited!
Now that I am looking back on all of the things that I have learned this month, I realize that it has truly been a great one. Not just from all of the stuff that I learned but all the people that I have met, all the things that I have done, and how much I have grown! Which are all thanks to deciding to blog again! I am just proof that if you want to do something, go and do it. No matter how busy you are, what you are doing, just go ahead and go for it! Put yourself out there!
The blogging community is much more supportive than a few years ago
Back when I was blogging 2-3 years ago…attempting to blog that is, the blogging community wasn’t all that supportive. (not saying they weren’t supportive, its just they are way more supportive now.) From Facebook groups, to Instagram pods, and Twitter, I mean everything is just one big support group for bloggers.
If you’re interested, check out my last post on The Most Inspirational Things I Saw This Month. It will give you a little insight into the blogging community! I never use to use Twitter, like ever, but when I started my blog back up, I was noticing SO many people were asking for help and people were helping! Blogger follow trains started to be a thing and it’s just really great to see people and be in a space that people are trying to help each other, rather than step on each other’s fingers to get to the top.
Taking your own photos isn't all that bad
This month I also took the leap and decided to take my own photos. I got this BEAUTIFUL camera for Christmas last year (thanks mom!) and I already had purchased a tripod. The only thing I was missing was the confidence to do it.
I always have been someone that likes to do stuff on her own, but when it comes to being out in the real world and doing stuff that other people see, like posing in front of a camera, I’m not that great at it! I knew that I was running out of time because if I didn’t have good pictures, that was one less thing that I had going for me. I had asked some friends, and of course, I waited until spring break when everyone was gone (eye roll on my part). But after getting really upset and frustrated with myself, I finally got the kick in the butt, I needed to go out and do it! I waited until we had gotten this “big” snow storm and went out and started taking pictures! It honestly went really well. I did end up taking 40 pictures and only about 7 of them are actually usable but still, I would have never gotten that confidence and that strength if I didn’t put myself out there! Here are a few more that I took:
Pinterest can be a make or break for you
Let’s talk about Pinterest briefly. This platform is a hit or miss for many. I followed a post by Ell from my Facebook group (I told you that it was awesome) who kind of helped me get my Pinterest set up as a blogger. I had tried before but all attempts failed.
Failures aside, after pinning both my own pins and others, I had started to see an increase in views (naturally) but not like a dramatic one, which is fine because I didn’t really pin THAT much. It wasn’t until this last week that I started getting 1k to 2k sometimes even 3k views a day on my pins. I was shocked!
(P.S Please remember that this is my first-month blogging (and I didn’t get into Tailwind until mid-month) These stats aren’t amazing, but they are something for someone who just started a few weeks ago!)
Now, this growth wasn’t just from implementing her strategies, but it did help a lot! I decided to jump on the Tailwind train for Pinterest and I think that is what is really helping me gain those views. My favorite part about all of this, my pins from my blog are the ones that are getting the most love which makes me feel like this is all worth it!
(#1, 4 and 5 are all of my pins which is super awesome!)
I plan on doing a whole Tailwind/Pinterest post with my numbers and so on in the near future. Essentially what Tailwind is, is a scheduler (like Hootsuite) but for Pinterest. They create a schedule for you when your pins will be seen the most and allow you to pin with no problems! I encourage you to check it out!
In the meantime, if you are a blogger and are interested in using Tailwind, you can sign up with my link and get a FREE month of Tailwind Plus which gives you 400 monthly pins as well as five tribes and 30 pins to those.
*You will be required to sign up for Tailwind and input your payment method in order to redeem this. (However, you can cancel anytime so essentially, it’s a free month of pro, with no obligations! If you like it you stay if you don’t you leave!) You can also choose to purchase the yearly option which will give you the free month (from my referral link) and then an additional four months for free.*
All of the "how I made x money in one month" does not apply to you.
Every blogger is different and the "how I made x money" posts are just misleading. It's great that those people are making so much, and it's also awesome that they can share this with us however every person is different, and chances are, their ways won’t work for you. I enjoy reading these posts because they are super interesting, and I love to see how others are making money. I like to learn from them and kind of try to implement a bunch of their ways into one rather than just following one person. When I first started blogging x years ago, I tried to follow these posts and they honestly got my hopes up to fail. My advice, to take these posts lightly. Still read them, most definitely, but don’t jump on a blogging platform and implement their tactics and expect to make as much as they have.
I hope that you guys enjoyed this post! How long have you been blogging for? Are you new, old, in the middle? What are some of the things that you have learned over the years? I am interested to hear what you guys think, let me know in the comments below!
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4 Comments
Hannah Becker
4/5/2018 12:03:42 pm
Great post! Facebook blogger groups are wonderful. Like you, I've met so many great people through blogging - so fun.
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1/24/2023 10:49:50 pm
Your Blog is very nice.
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