Tweak Your Blog for Better Results (Checklist)

Looking for help to get focused and get results from your blog?  Try this 10 Step Checklist!

1. Your Reader

Who is your ideal reader?  Describe them in detail.

What are their biggest challenges?  What solutions are they looking for?  What changes for them when they’ve got those solutions?

2. Your Goals

What are goals for your blog?  You’ve got to define them so you can measure how you’re doing in achieving them.

Here are some possibilities of goals and ways to measure your progress:

• Build a Platform (Traffic/Subscribers)
• Create a Community (Time Spent/Bounce Rate)
• Drive/Attract Traffic (Stats)
• Build Your List (Subscribers)
• Create Discussion (Comments)
• Social Sharing (Shares)
• Build Business/Sales ($$$)
• Ad Revenue (Alexa/Compete)
• Content Creation (Book)
• JV/Partnership Invitations
• Media Requests
• Authority/Reputation
• Get a Message Out (Downloads/Views)

3. Opt-in Strategy

Where on your blog are your opt-in boxes?  Are they working?

Consider testing the…

• position (top of page vs. side bar vs. popup vs. blog post footer)
• headline
• image
• description or bullet points
• button color
• button text
• privacy policy

I recommend Thrive Leads for opt-ins and easy split testing (it’s what I use here on my own blog).

4. Design

Does your blog design, style and graphics clearly communicate what you offer visitors and why they should stick around and read your blog?

Does it fit with the brand image you want to create?

5. Links and Navigation

Review your links and navigation.  Do they guide your reader easily to the solutions and information they’re looking for?

Take some time to look at websites and blogs you find easy to navigate and note why, then apply those lessons to your own blog.

6. Blog Post Categories

Do your categories make sense based on what your readers want help with or what information they’re looking for?

Remember categories are the “big buckets” so you don’t want dozens or hundreds of categories (that’s where your tags come in).

7. Sidebar

Does your sidebar focus on the right actions based on your goals?

Use your sidebar to guide your visitors to the actions you most want them to take.

Also be careful not to clutter your sidebar with too many links or banners that take your readers away from your blog.

8. Footer

What’s in your footer?  Do you have the current year in your copyright?  Have you linked to important legal terms and conditions?

Get those ducks in a row to build confidence with your readers that you’re a “real” business and not just a hobby.

9. Content

Review your post headlines and content.

Do your headlines grab your readers attention and work to get more people reading your content?  (Click here for the solution if you aren’t 100% sure your headlines work!)

Is it actionable?  What’s the result your readers get from your content?

10. Engagement

Are you replying to comments?  Watching social media to interact with those who share your posts or comment on your links?  And generally active with your community?

Infographic created by http://magnnetic.com/