This past week, I was chatting with a few fabulous women at a workshop I attended about blogging.  I had expressed disappointment about only blogging 14 times in October when my goal was 5-7 times a week.  I had been doing pretty well with my goal until October, when I allowed other things to interfere, and this carried into the month of November and I finally feel like I’m getting back on track.

While I was disappointed, they were wondering how I managed to get in even 3 or 4 posts in a week on average when sometimes they couldn’t even do once a week.  I guess we all have a choice in how we look at things because, it’s really just perception.

They’ve asked me to share my secrets so that’s what I’m doing here today.

Here are my top ten tips for blogging success:

1. Blog because you want to not because you think you have to or because someone told you to.  If you don’t want to blog, it will show up in the energy around your blog.  People will know.
2. Create categories around your business/life that you want to share within.  These can always be adjusted but they give you a solid foundation to work from.  Be sure you find topics you are passionate about.  It’s so much easier to write from this space.
3. Use wordpress.org NOT wordpress.com or any other blogging platform.  A self-hosted wordpress.org site is the only way to go to have the flexibility and control.  It also sends out a statement that you are serious about your business and not afraid to invest.
4. Use the Editorial Calendar plugin for wordpress.org.  This creates a calendar in your back end that allows you to drag and drop posts around, if needed, and see where your gaps are in a calendar view.  This is one of the best tools I’ve found for staying on target.
5. Set goals but don’t beat yourself up when you don’t achieve the  Be clear about why you set them and are they a good fit.  Be clear about why you didn’t achieve them and is there something that needs to shift?  For me, that shifting was about not allowing other people’s emergencies to be mine and ending up frustrated and a bit burned out, which affects everything.
6. Join blogging groups and blogging challenges to help you stay on target and get visitors to your blog.  The Ultimate Blog Challenge is a great one (although it wasn’t enough to keep me on target this October).  I also have a group for Inspired Bloggers using a self-hosted wordpress.org site where we share our posts with each other and then comment on the posts others share.  This is a great way to get some traffic on your site which can be so important in the beginning, especially, when you’re afraid the only ones reading your blog are you and your mom.
7. Find some things that are a bit easier to do than fully writing a post every day.  For example,  I sometimes will include a piece of digital art I’ve done and just share that or I will answer a question a client has asked in the form of a blog post.  I’ve also taken bits out of an ebook or a presentation I’ve created and used that as a blog post.  It’s important to find creative ways to provide something of value when you may not be feeling as inspired in that moment as you normally do.
8. Remember, too, that most blog posts are less than 500 words.  You don’t have to write a lengthy post.  It could be as simple as a few sentences for thought.
9. Ask for help.  This post is the result of a brainstorming session about topics that would be good for us to write or create a video or an audio file about.  Ask your clients what they are dying to know.  Be sure you are asking your target market for help here.  If you aren’t, some of the information you gather may not be relevant, which is okay as long as you are able to discern the difference.
10. Make it a priority.  If you are going to commit to blogging, commit to blogging.  You have to set aside time and make it a priority.  It doesn’t really work to be “sometimes” kind of thing.  If you didn’t do this, your chances of success are nil.  If you don’t do anything BUT this, you are ahead of the game.  Schedule it, just like you would a meeting.  Do several days at once and schedule them out, if you prefer.  I do a combination of scheduling out and sometimes I’m actually doing it day by day.  There is something to be said for the habit that develops when you do something every day.  It becomes as routine as getting up in the morning.
11. Lastly, have fun.  Your blog should provide value and perhaps a little entertainment here and there for you and your reader.  Enjoy it.