Are You Getting Results from Your Blog?

Are you getting the traffic and readers you’d like so you can help more people, reach more clients, or just feel like you aren’t talking to yourself with your blog?

Did you know there are specific steps and strategies you can use to help you get there?

In the past year traffic on my blog has gone from less than 500 unique visitors a month (most months in 2009 it was 200 – 400 unique visitors) to more than 5,000 unique visitors a month and growing.  Here’s a snapshot of my traffic graph over the last 2 years:

And a shot from awStats showing my traffic this year, through February 18th.

Big difference, right?  :)  Still 10 days left to go in February and I’m almost at 5,000 unique visitors so this will probably be a bigger traffic month than January.

But my blog is also getting more comments and more links back to it.  And,  more importantly, I’m reaching more people who I can help!

I’m seeing search engine traffic from specific searches for problems that the answer to is on my blog (like what to do if WordPress gets stuck in maintenance mode during an upgrade which made me crazy when it happened to me so I wanted to share the solution), and I’m getting notes on Facebook, Twitter, this blog, and via email about what’s been helpful.  *warm fuzzies*

I know, I haven’t exactly hit the “big time” but I’m thrilled with how many wonderful entrepreneurs are visiting my blog and connecting with me.  And that’s success to me.  :)

So, what’s worked, you ask?  Great question!

The two smartest things I’ve done to build traffic to my blog have been participating in blog challenges like the Ultimate Blog Challenge (next one is in April 2011) and using the strategies in ProBlogger’s 31 Days to Build a Better Blog workbook.

But it’s a challenging book to get through alone.  So Lisbeth Tanz from Your Words Your Voice and I decided last year to work through it together with a group of other bloggers, had a blast, and we’re doing it again starting March 1st.

This isn’t a “post every day” style challenge.  Instead there’s a task every week day (we take weekends off), and many don’t involve writing a post.  It’s more about creating a better blog than generating content. You can get the full scoop with the link below.

They only cost to join the challenge is that you need to own a copy of ProBlogger’s workbook.  It retails for $19.95 but you can get it for just $14.95 with the special discount code we’ll give you when you sign up for the 31 Days Blog Challenge.

It doesn’t happen overnight.  I’ve been blogging consistently for a year (and my blog has been online for about 3 years, I just wasn’t posting much to it other than an article once a week or so).  I put time and energy into this blog.  But it’s worth it and I’m seeing results.  I’m not spinning my wheels anymore and I’m seeing growth.

If I can do it, you can do it, too!  Join us: http://31daysblogchallenge.com/